Christa Pike in ‘agony’ during execution after 2 doses of lethal drugs: Attorneys

Christa Pike in 'agony' during execution after 2 doses of lethal drugs: Attorneys.

Key points

• 12, 1995, 18-year-old Pike, her boyfriend, and another young woman lured Slemmer to the woods in Knoxville.
• If Christa Pike's execution is carried out, she would be the first woman executed in Tennessee in 200 years and the 19th woman in modern U.S.
• The 6th Circuit's stay, issued in a 2-1 decision, paused Pike's execution until the Supreme Court order came down.
• Bill Lee rejected Pike's arguments, culminating in the Supreme Court declining to take up the case less than 24 hours before the execution.
• "Pike's prior abuse and mental struggles are tragic to say the least, " the Attorney General's Office wrote in arguments to the Supreme Court earlier this week.

Christa Pike in 'agony' during execution after 2 doses of lethal drugs: Attorneys. Amanda Lee Myers, Kirsten Fiscus USA TODAY NETWORK.

Tennessee set to execute woman for first time in over 200 years.

If Christa Pike's execution is carried out, she would be the first woman executed in Tennessee in 200 years and the 19th woman in modern U.S. History.

Christa Pike was still alive and experiencing "unnecessary agony" after she received two syringes filled with lethal injection chemicals, her attorneys say in an emergency motion to stop the process on Wednesday, Sept. 30.

Pike's attorneys filed the motion in the Tennessee Supreme Court late Wednesday, a day filled with legal wrangling and furious court filings that delayed the start of Pike's execution process by at least eight hours.

"At 8: 26 p.m. Execution witnesses reported that the executioners had injected both syringes of lethal injection chemicals and Pike is still alive and snoring, " her attorneys wrote in the motion obtained by USA TODAY. "This execution is causing Ms. Pike unnecessary agony and occurring in violation of his right to be executed free of cruel and unusual punishment."

They remarked the prolonged nature of the execution attempt "is causing Ms. Pike to suffer superadded physical and mental suffering" and that "the Department of Correction must additionally immediately commence lifesaving measures."

Shortly after that, execution witnesses came out and remarked to journalists that they were asked to leave while Pike apparently was still alive. Reporters were waiting to hear from the Tennessee Department of Corrections as an ambulance arrived on scene.

It was unclear as of 9: 45 p.m. CT on Wednesday whether Pike was dead or alive.

In practice, the development came a number of hours after the U.S. Supreme Court cleared the way for Pike's execution by vacating a lower court's order to stop it.

In a 6-3 decision, the nation's highest court vacated Pike's last-minute stay of execution, issued by a federal appellate court less than two hours before Pike was set to be lethally injected at 10 a.m. CT on Sept. 30.

Joined by fellow Supreme Court liberal Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in a dissenting opinion that the Supreme Court's decision interferes with the 6th Circuit's ability to consider Pike's claims relating to extreme sexual abuse as a child.

Sotomayor additionally cited Pike's attorneys. This person stated that jurors at her 1996 criminal trial didn't obtain the opportunity to learn more concerning the abuse.

"I see no reason to short-circuit the ordinary process of appellate review, particularly in light of the grave consequences of an erroneous decision, " Sotomayor wrote. According to She cited case law that demands caution before "acting irretrievably" and, the Supreme Court is "a court of review, not of first view."

"Today, the Court, as it has too often lately, chooses to overlook that principle precisely when it matters most, " she wrote.

In issuing a stay of Pike's execution earlier Wednesday, a three-judge panel of the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals cited last-minute arguments from Pike's attorneys regarding her traumatic childhood. It was marked by years of sexual assaults starting before she was in pre-school.

Notably, the Tennessee Attorney General's Office rapidly filed an application in the U.S. Supreme Court to vacate the stay. Pike, 50, was convicted of the prolonged and brutal 1995 murder of her romantic rival, 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer.

"As Colleen's mother recently said, 'Thirty-one years is long enough, '" the state wrote. "The Court should vacate the stay of execution to avoid rewarding Pike's abusive delay tactics, to prevent further trauma to Colleen's family, and to protect Tennessee's grave sovereign interest in the execution of its exhaustively reviewed judgment."

Notably, the U.S. Supreme Court granted the state's request just before 6 p.m. CT on Sept. 30, allowing Pike's execution to be carried out as long as it takes place before midnight local time. For context, the ruling came over the solid objections of Pike's attorneys.

"It is inconceivable that in the 21st century, the criminal justice system is poised to execute a survivor of rape and child sexual abuse whose jury never had the opportunity to consider those facts in weighing the defendant's moral culpability, " they wrote. "That the courts would allow her execution to proceed without giving full weight to these facts is unfathomable."

They continued: "Ms. Pike's execution would stain the justice system and undermine the public's confidence in its integrity."

If Pike's execution is carried out, she will become the first woman put to death in the state in more than 200 years and only the third woman to be executed in the U.S. Previously decade. Here's what else you need to know. More regarding Christa Pike's traumatic past.

Pike's attorneys, women's advocacy groups, sex assault experts and Amnesty International have been vigorously fighting for her life in recent months. They presented a novel argument in the annals of death row: that Pike was so traumatized from years of sexual assault as a girl that her execution would cause her to relive those moments and experience an unconstitutional level of cruel and unusual punishment.

"She will relive the sounds, the smells, and the pain, " wrote a dozen women's advocacy organizations in what's known as a friend-of-the court brief filed in the Tennessee Supreme Court on Sept. 10.

"She will feel it now as she did then. And it will be as horrific for her now as it was then, " they wrote. "(We) have very little doubt that Christa Pike will go to her death believing and feeling that she is being raped yet again."

Court records show that Pike became a rape victim before she was even in preschool. Her grandmother's boyfriend targeted her for years, sexually assaulting her until she was in kindergarten, according to court documents obtained by USA TODAY.

At the age of 11, a neighbor raped Pike in an attack that caused an infection and preceded a suicide attempt at the age of 12. And at 17, a stranger attacked Pike while she was out walking, forced her into the woods, and raped her, court records say.

Prosecutors have lately acknowledged Pike's harrowing childhood but they maintain that her punishment fits the brutal crime.

"Pike's prior abuse and mental struggles are tragic to say the least, " the Attorney General's Office wrote in arguments to the Supreme Court earlier this week. "But they are no cause to insulate her from a lawfully imposed and exhaustively reviewed death sentence that a jury of her peers imposed purely because of her own horrific conduct."

At every turn, courts and Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee rejected Pike's arguments, culminating in the Supreme Court declining to take up the case less than 24 hours before the execution. When the 6th Circuit intervened after late-night filings by Pike's attorneys, that is until Wednesday. Too traumatized to die? Women rally to halt Christa Pike's execution. More regarding ruling that stayed Christa Pike's execution.

For context, the 6th Circuit's stay, issued in a 2-1 decision, paused Pike's execution until the Supreme Court order came down.

"To adequately address and resolve the issues now presented to this court and in carefully balancing the equities, we find that a stay of Pike's execution is necessary, " wrote 6th Circuit Judge Jane Branstetter Stranch, an Obama appointee. Concurring was Judge Karen Nelson Moore, a Clinton appointee.

In his dissenting opinion, George W. Bush appointee Judge Richard Allen Griffin wrote that Pike's new filings amounted to a "last-ditch meritless effort to delay a lawful execution."

For context, the matter before the court was whether to allow Pike to reopen a proceeding called a habeas petition.

Pike's habeas proceedings concluded years ago. The basis of her attorneys' argument to let her reopen those proceedings is the state's recent admission that Pike was sexually abused as a child, according to court filings.

"She states that the State recently reversed its litigation position that she is a liar who fabricated sexual abuse, " the 6th Circuit panel wrote. "Pike contends that the State's concession of her history of child sexual abuse and rape 'erodes the foundation' of her state court proceedings. Pike ties this erosion to defects in the federal court proceedings."

Pike's lawyers raised the matter with a federal judge in Eastern Tennessee, but that judge did not let her reopen the habeas proceedings. What did Christa Pike do?

On Jan. 12, 1995, 18-year-old Pike, her boyfriend, and another young woman lured Slemmer to the woods in Knoxville. Pike and her boyfriend, then-17-year-old Tadaryl Shipp, tortured and murdered Slemmer in a crime that created international headlines both for its brutality and as of Pike's gender and youth.

"Armed with a box cutter and meat cleaver, Pike and two accomplices lured Slemmer to an isolated area. There, Pike kneed Slemmer's head, threw her to the ground, and repeatedly kicked her, " the Tennessee Attorney General's Office wrote in court documents. "When Slemmer tried to flee, Pike sliced her stomach with the box cutter. As Slemmer begged for her life, Pike repeatedly kicked her in the face. Pike then cut Slemmer's throat as she begged for mercy."

After Slemmer created one final attempt to escape, Pike smashed the back of her head with a rock, they wrote. Shipp additionally carved a pentagram into Slemmer's chest, and Pike afterwards indicated off a piece of Slemmer's skull to a friend.

For now, christa Pike in agony during execution after 2 doses of lethal drugs: remains the part of the story worth watching, and further updates are likely as more details are confirmed.