Christa Pike returns to prison after surviving execution attempt

Christa Pike was discharged from hospital and returned to Tennessee’s Deborah K. Johnson Rehabilitation Center on Saturday, her lawyers said, after surviving the state’s attempt to execute her by lethal injection on September 30. The 50-year-old had been hospitalized since officials administered two doses of pentobarbital; her lawyers say she continues to receive medical care in prison.

The failed execution has drawn attention to the U.S. death penalty as a separate controversy builds over the military’s plan to livestream the December 3 execution of Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan, a plan even some death-penalty supporters have condemned. In Tennessee, the episode has not prompted Republican legislators to reconsider capital punishment, with some discussing alternative methods including the electric chair and firing squads. Thirty people have been executed in the U.S. this year, with eight more scheduled.