Christa Pike's death-penalty physician ‘botched execution months earlier’

The 50-year-old survived being injected with two syringes of pentobarbital, a sedative used in high doses for executions, before she was hospitalised in a critical condition.

Now, it has emerged the doctor who oversaw Pike’s execution was Dr Mark Fowler, who was also involved in the failed execution of Tony Carruthers in May.

Dr Fowler has not been formally accused of any wrongdoing, and when contacted by NPR before the Pike incident, he said the doctor does not participate in the execution except to declare the time of death and did not have further comment.

Carruthers was convicted of kidnapping and murdering three people in 1994.

In May, executioners attempted to insert an IV line into Carruthers' veins for about an hour and 20 minutes, failing to find an adequate location.

His attorney, Maria DeLiberato, said blood was oozing from his puncture wounds, adding: "Tony was moaning and groaning in pain this entire time."

The failed execution of Christa Pike has ignited the debate

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Tennessee Governor Bill Lee eventually halted the execution and granted Carruthers a one-year reprieve, however, his new execution date has not yet been determined.

Mr Lee, a Republican who denied Pike's clemency appeal to commute her sentence to life in prison, ordered a suspension of scheduled executions in Tennessee for the rest of the year and a third-party review of Wednesday's failed attempt.

The Governor told reporters: "There is no one that wanted what happened last night to happen.

"It's a tragedy, and it's deeply disturbing to me that that has happened in this state. The people deserve better and we're going to make sure that happens."

Pike was 18 in January 1995 when she, her 17-year-old boyfriend Tadaryl Shipp and a third companion lured Colleen Slemmer, a 19-year-old classmate at their Knoxville Job Corps vocational center, into a wooded area where they tortured and killed her.

Pike and Shipp confessed to the killing, and both were convicted of first-degree murder.

Dr Fowler’s role in Tennessee executions was revealed accidentally in August 2025, when a warden with the Tennessee Department of Corrections said his name when announcing the execution of Byron Black.

GB News has contacted the Tennessee Department of Corrections for comment.

Riverbend Maximum Security Institution has become the centre of a media storm

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Pharmaceutical companies are forbidden by European law from selling drugs for use in executions, meaning US prison systems typically rely on small, lightly regulated compounding pharmacies in procurement processes that are shrouded in secrecy.

Tennessee switched to a one-drug lethal injection protocol using pentobarbital, a powerful barbiturate, in 2024.

It was unclear where it procured the drugs for Wednesday's failed execution, information that Pike's lawyers say was also withheld from them.

Most countries in the world and 23 US states have abolished the death penalty and the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk said Pike's case showed the rest of the country should follow suit.

Officials laid out the incidents

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Mr Turk said: "The prolonged suffering, physical and mental, arising from multiple failed execution attempts is abhorrent, and cruel."

In Pike’s case, the Tennessee Department of Corrections said it “followed every step of the state’s lawful, established execution protocol approved by the attorney-general’s office.

"The lethal injection chemical in the protocol has consistently been effective, and the protocol does not allow for additional procedures beyond what was carried out this evening."