Christa Pike, a Tennessee death row inmate convicted of murdering a schoolmate in 1995, survived an attempt to execute her by lethal injection on Wednesday, September 30, after prison officials administered two doses of lethal injection chemicals.

Pike, 50, was taken to an off-site medical facility following the failed execution attempt at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville, according to prison officials. Her condition was not immediately known.

The execution had drawn national attention because Pike was the first woman Tennessee had attempted to execute in more than 200 years.

She was also facing execution for a crime committed when she was 18, making her the only person in the modern era of capital punishment in Tennessee facing execution for a crime committed as a teenager.

Pike was convicted of the 1995 murder of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer, a classmate at a Job Corps vocational center in Knoxville.

Prosecutors said Pike, her 17-year-old boyfriend Tadaryl Shipp and another companion lured Slemmer into a wooded area, where she was tortured and killed. Pike and Shipp later confessed and were convicted of first-degree murder.

Witnesses at Wednesday’s execution described hearing Pike gasping, snoring and complaining of discomfort in her arm after the lethal injection drugs were administered.

At different points, curtains inside the execution chamber were closed, preventing journalists from seeing what was happening. Clergy members were also called into the chamber twice before an ambulance arrived at the prison.

Pike’s lawyers had opposed the execution and sought clemency, citing her history of severe childhood abuse, neglect and sexual assault.

They also pointed to diagnoses of bipolar disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder that she received while in prison. Her lawyers had asked Tennessee Governor Bill Lee to commute her death sentence to life imprisonment without parole, but he denied the request on Monday.

Following the failed execution, Lee announced that Tennessee would suspend executions for the remainder of the year and called for a comprehensive third-party review of what happened.

The Tennessee Department of Correction defended its actions, saying officials had followed the state’s established execution protocol.

The failed execution was the second such incident in Tennessee in 2026. In May, officials halted an attempt to execute a male inmate after they were unable to find a suitable vein for the lethal injection.