Lawyers for Christa Pike say their client is awake and able to speak, nearly a week after Tennessee's failed lethal injection on Sept. 30.
The statement issued Tuesday was the first public sign that Pike's condition has improved since she was taken to a hospital in Nashville. She had previously received two doses of pentobarbital, the lethal drug intended to end her life.
According to her lawyers, Pike remains handcuffed and restrained to a hospital bed even though both of her arms suffered severe damage. "Against all odds, Christa Pike is awake, speaking, and continuing to receive emergency medical care," her lawyers said in the statement, adding that the prognosis remains unclear but that "at a minimum, this will be a long recovery process."
The statement also expressed gratitude to medical staff, whom the lawyers said had "treated Christa like a human being and given her exceptional care."
Earlier, Pike's lawyers had said she was unconscious and on a ventilator, with both arms "swollen, burned and blistered" from the failed execution.
Pike was sentenced to death in 1996 for taking part in the murder of Colleen Slemmer, a fellow student, when Pike was 18. Two co-defendants received lesser sentences.
Pike's defense lawyers had cited mental health issues in seeking to have her sentence reduced, while Slemmer's family supported the death penalty, emphasizing the brutality of the killing of the 19-year-old victim. Accounts of the failed execution said Pike kicked off a covering sheet and at times appeared to be snoring; she is said to have cried out in pain as the lethal drug entered her body.
The case has reignited debate over the use of capital punishment in the United States. Pike is believed to be the first person in the country to survive a lethal injection.
Botched executions – defined as departures from protocol caused by unexpected problems, delays or administrative incompetence – have been criticized by opponents as causing unnecessary pain and suffering to those being put to death. Citing research by Austin Sarat, the Death Penalty Information Center, a nonprofit, estimates that 3% of executions in the U.S. between 1890 and 2010 were botched.
