Several new details about Tennessee’s recent executions came to light this week, including the price of the drugs and issues with executions leading up to Christa Pike’s catastrophic failed one.
Catherine Sweeney
Catherine Sweeney is WPLN’s health reporter. Before joining the station, she covered health for Oklahoma’s NPR member stations. That was her first job in public radio. Until then, she wrote about state and local government for newspapers in Oklahoma and Colorado. In her free time, she likes to cycle through hobbies, which include crochet, embroidery, baking, cooking and weightlifting.
After Christa Pike’s failed execution, some Americans think Tennessee should try again
A new poll shows one-third of Americans support a second execution attempt.
911 recordings show why ambulance was delayed after Pike’s failed execution
After the second round of lethal drugs failed to kill Christa Pike, she lay on a gurney for an hour an a half before an ambulance took her to a hospital. Newly released recordings from Nashville’s emergency dispatch reveal why.
Attorneys, doctors, nurses and lawmakers asked for a death penalty moratorium before Pike’s failed execution
In the year and a half leading up to Christa Pike’s failed execution, warnings about the state’s lethal injection protocol and its weaknesses piled up.
Christa Pike conscious and able to speak after failed execution
Christa Pike has regained consciousness and is able to speak, according to an update from her legal team on Tuesday afternoon.
What happened during Christa Pike’s failed execution
WPLN’s Catherine Sweeney was in the witness room when Tennessee attempted to execute Christa Pike on Sept. 30. An attempted execution in May had also failed. Here’s what Sweeney saw and heard.
Pike’s team says they predicted complications with her execution
Christa Pike’s legal team argued this summer that her health conditions could make her execution painful and difficult.
After failed execution, health workers say Tennessee’s rules flout medical ethics
As another death row inmate’s execution arrives, doctors and nurses in Tennessee say they want medical professionals removed from the execution process.
Tennessee unable to carry out the execution by lethal injection of Christa Gail Pike, witnesses say
Tennessee officials were unable to carry out the execution of Christa Gail Pike for a 1995 murder on Wednesday, media witnesses said, after the lethal injection was halted for hours as courts considered a last-minute appeal.
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