In the US state of Tennessee, Department of Correction Commissioner Frank Strada has resigned following the failed execution of condemned inmate Christa Pike, who survived a lethal injection. This was reported by Qazaqyia.kz citing Kursiv Media.
The official's departure was announced on October 3 by Governor Bill Lee.
Strada will leave his post within October. The governor ordered an independent review of the circumstances of the failed execution at the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville. The name of the department's interim head will be announced later.
Strada himself said that, in his opinion, staff followed the established protocol. At the same time, he believes his resignation "is in the best interests of Tennesseans as the independent review moves forward."
Pike, 50 — the only woman on Tennessee's death row — was scheduled to be executed late on September 30, 30 years after her death sentence. She was to become the first woman executed in the state in more than 200 years.
According to journalists who witnessed the procedure, prison staff administered two doses of pentobarbital, but she continued to breathe and snore. During the procedure, Pike moaned and convulsed, throwing off her sheet. The curtain was then closed in front of the witnesses.
Lawyers urgently appealed to a federal court demanding that the execution be halted. The procedure was stopped, and the woman was taken to a hospital by ambulance.
On Friday, the defense reported that Pike remains unconscious and is connected to a ventilator. According to the lawyers, doctors are fighting for her life and trying to clear the drug from her system.
The defense claims that medical professionals had warned in advance about difficulties placing intravenous catheters due to Pike's small veins and a blood disorder. The lawyers believe prison staff ignored these warnings. The exact cause of the failed execution remains to be determined.
The department said staff followed instructions, but the regulations do not provide for actions in case a lethal injection fails. In May, Tennessee also canceled the execution of a male inmate: medics could not insert a catheter into his vein.
In 1996, Christa Pike, then 18, was sentenced to death for the murder of her friend — 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer. The girls studied at a Job Corps vocational training center in Knoxville. Pike believed Colleen was trying to take her boyfriend.
Pike, along with her boyfriend and an acquaintance, took the victim to a secluded place. Colleen was beaten by a group; the girl tried to run away several times but could not escape. In the end, Pike struck her on the head with a piece of asphalt.
After the murder, Pike took a fragment of Colleen's skull with her and showed it to other students.
Her boyfriend was 17 at the time of the crime. He received a life sentence with the possibility of parole. Only Pike was sentenced to death.
Earlier, Kursiv wrote that Uzbekistan wants to introduce the death penalty for pedophiles.