Christa Pike has been released from a hospital and returned to prison after surviving a botched execution attempt, according to a statement from her legal team. "Christa Pike was discharged from a local hospital and is now at Deborah K. Johnson Rehabilitation Center where she has been housed for more than 30 years," her attorneys, Stephen Ferrell, Luke Ihnen from Federal Defender Services ofEastern Tennessee, and Randy Spivey and Kelly Gleason from the TN Office of the Post Conviction Defender, said in a statement emailed to Newsweek Saturday.
"She is grateful to the first responders and her medical team for their care in these extraordinary circumstances," the statement continued, adding, "She is continuing to receive medical care at the prison, and we will continue to track her recovery." Pike, 50, was transported to a hospital after surviving two doses of the lethal drug pentobarbital on September 30 as the state sought to execute her for the 1995 murder of classmate Colleen Slemmer. In an update on Thursday, her attorneys called her physical recovery “remarkable,” but said that questions remain about the long-term effects of what she endured as well as her legal standing. The failed execution has brought fresh scrutiny on how states carry out the death penalty, particularly when using lethal injection.
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