Execution of Tennessee inmate fails, leaving her alive after lethal injection

Tennessee's execution of Christa Pike went wrong last week when she survived two full doses of lethal pentobarbital. She stayed conscious after both injections. Officials stopped the procedure and took her to hospital, where doctors put a breathing tube in and connected her to a ventilator.

Lethal injection is now the standard method in the United States, but it fails more often than other methods. About 7 in every 100 lethal injections go wrong, compared to 3 in every 100 executions overall. The US carried out 47 executions in 2025, the most since 2009.

The case has raised fresh questions about whether the death penalty can be carried out humanely. The US is one of only 17 countries that still use capital punishment.