Dispatch recordings reviewed by the AP show the first 911 call from the Riverbend execution chamber came at 8:40 p.m. on Wednesday, Sept. 30, after Christa Pike survived Tennessee's lethal injection. At 9:03 p.m. a Nashville dispatcher told crews it was "a false call," and prison staff did not begin letting responders in until 9:11 p.m., 31 minutes after the first call.
Catch up
Pike spent days unconscious on a ventilator, woke Oct. 6–8 and was discharged back to prison by Oct. 10; corrections chief Frank Strada said Oct. 3 he would step down, and the state has not ruled out a second attempt.
- Tennessee's protocol sets no deadline for medical help if a prisoner survives, the AP found, and ambulances need a code or a police escort to get through the gate (The Tennessean).
- Of five earlier lethal-injection survivors since 2017, two were later executed with nitrogen gas, two died in prison and one is still alive.
- UpdateChrista Pike leaves hospital, returns to Tennessee prison 10 days after surviving her execution
8 earlier issues
- UpdateSupreme Court lifts appeals court's last-minute stay of Christa Pike's Tennessee execution, three liberals dissenting
- UpdateChrista Pike survives two pentobarbital doses; Tennessee cancels its last 2026 execution
- UpdateChrista Pike unconscious on a ventilator after failed Tennessee execution; lawyers move to preserve evidence
- UpdateTennessee corrections chief Frank Strada will step down after the failed Christa Pike execution
- UpdateChrista Pike's lawyer asks Tennessee's governor to commute her death sentence to life
- UpdateChrista Pike is conscious and speaking a week after Tennessee's failed execution
- UpdateJudge orders Tennessee to preserve all evidence from Christa Pike's failed execution
- UpdateChrista Pike walks with help after Tennessee's failed execution; lawyers say her memory is impaired