On Sept. 30, Tennessee tried to execute Christa Pike at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville. Officials gave her two doses of the drug pentobarbital, and she survived. She was taken to a hospital and placed on a ventilator. Her attorneys now say she is awake and talking, but her long-term condition is still unknown.

Gov. Bill Lee can end this. Pike’s lawyers have asked him to change her sentence to life in prison without the possibility of parole. So far, he has not said whether he will.

Commuting her sentence would not set Pike free. She was convicted of killing Colleen Slemmer, 19, in Knoxville in 1995, a crime Slemmer’s family has called torturous. Life without parole means Pike would never leave prison. She would answer for what she did every day for the rest of her life.

What commutation would stop is a second attempt to kill her after the first one failed. The Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution bans cruel and unusual punishment. “In this case, it was clear that it was prolonged,” David Raybin, an attorney who helped write Tennessee’s death penalty law, told FOX 17 News. He says Pike can now argue in court that the state has lost its chance to execute her.

Her attorneys say her arms were badly hurt and that the state was warned ahead of time about problems with her veins. Those claims have not been independently confirmed, and the Tennessee Department of Correction says it followed its rules. Gov. Lee has already paused the state’s remaining executions for 2026 and ordered an independent review. Tennesseans deserve to see what that review finds.

Justice for Colleen Slemmer and respect for the Constitution can both be served. Sign the petition to urge Gov. Lee to commute Christa Pike’s sentence to life without parole and make the execution review public, before Tennessee tries again.