Christa Pike’s botched execution is a reminder of the horror of the death penalty | Moira Donegan

Lethal injection was a way for us to deny the reality of capital punishment. Pike’s experience shows us what it is Christa Pike had asked to be hanged. In the weeks before her botched execution by lethal injection on 30 September, in which she survived two lethal doses of barbiturate pentobarbital and had to be hospitalized, Pike and her legal team had challenged Tennessee’s execution protocol. The state’s lethal injection regimen had failed before. In May, Tony Carruthers was also sent to Tennessee’s death chamber, only to leave alive after prison officials struggled to find a vein. Moira Donegan is a Guardian US columnist Continue reading...

Moira Donegan · Fri, Oct 9, 2026, 3:00 AM
US news | The Guardian

Christa Pike’s botched execution is a reminder of the horror of the death penalty | Moira Donegan

Lethal injection was a way for us to deny the reality of capital punishment. Pike’s experience shows us what it is

Christa Pike had asked to be hanged. In the weeks before her botched execution by lethal injection on 30 September, in which she survived two lethal doses of barbiturate pentobarbital and had to be hospitalized, Pike and her legal team had challenged Tennessee’s execution protocol.

The state’s lethal injection regimen had failed before. In May, Tony Carruthers was also sent to Tennessee’s death chamber, only to leave alive after prison officials struggled to find a vein.

Moira Donegan is a Guardian US columnist

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