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Emergency Care for Christa Pike Was Delayed After Prison Botched 911 Call

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Newly released 911 calls show that prison officials neglected to provide basic details when calling for emergency care for Christa Pike after Tennessee officials botched her execution last week.

Emergency dispatchers were left scrambling after the prison official who made the first 911 call, roughly an hour after the lethal injection process began, was unable to provide the code for the prison facility, despite it being needed for confirmation by dispatchers.

This caused emergency care for Pike to be delayed by roughly half an hour as the chemicals wreaked havoc on her body. Her lawyer, at one point, made a call saying that she needed “immediate life-saving care” from first responders.

The revelations raise further questions about Tennessee prison officials’ protocol for executions. Witnesses present for the execution attempt on September 30 said that it was apparent during the procedure that officials were not prepared for the injections to fail, despite the high rate of failure for lethal injections.

The calls were released by Nashville’s Department of Emergency Communications (DEC) after information requests by news outlets, and posted online by the Nashville Banner. A transcript of the first call shows the caller, whose identity is redacted, being repeatedly asked for the verification code for the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution, which is needed for emergency dispatch to the prison. The prison official said they don’t know the code.

Christa Pike Hospitalized After Surviving 2 Lethal Injection Doses in Tennessee

“I don’t have a code,”........

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