Christa Pike’s attorneys said Thursday that she is critically ill in a Nashville hospital, still unconscious and unable to communicate, but not in a coma, after the state failed to kill her with two doses of a lethal injection the night before.

Randy Spivey, one of Pike’s lawyers with the Tennessee Office of the Post-Conviction Defender, told reporters the defense team has little sense of her prognosis.

“We don’t have much sense of her prognosis, but we do know that she is alive right now and receiving lifesaving medical care,” Spivey said during a virtual press conference.

Spivey is asking Gov. Bill Lee to commute her death sentence immediately, arguing that “Christa has endured punishment greater than any other person in the history of the American death penalty.”

WATCH:

You can view the full press conference here.

An attorney speaking to TMZ said, “Christa is critically ill but not in a coma as I understand it.”

WSMV reported that she is being cared for at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. The Tennessee Department of Correction has confirmed only that she was transported to an off-site medical facility after the execution attempt was botched.

The failed execution attempt took place late Wednesday night at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution.

Pike, 50, was set to become the first woman executed in Tennessee in more than 200 years for the 1995 torture and murder of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer in Knoxville.

A federal appeals court granted a stay about an hour before the original 10 a.m. start time, but the U.S. Supreme Court lifted it later that day. They attempted the planned execution that evening.

Around 8 p.m. Central Time, executioners administered two syringes of pentobarbital under the state’s single-drug protocol.

Court filings from her lawyers said she did not lose consciousness, still had a heartbeat, and was audibly “snoring.”

Media witnesses described her lifting her head, asking whether the burning and pain in her arm were normal, kicking her feet hard enough to knock off the sheet, and continuing to snore loudly after the curtains were closed.

Witnesses were escorted out while she was still breathing.

The traditional witness press conference outside was interrupted when ambulances arrived to transport Pike to a hospital.

BREAKING: Christa Pike SURVIVES Two Lethal Injections, Witness Press Conference Interrupted by Ambulances (UPDATED)

Her legal team, which also includes Kelly Gleason, Stephen Ferrell, and Luke Ihnen, filed emergency motions asking courts to halt the procedure and order life-saving care.

They wrote that she was in “unnecessary agony.”

In a joint statement late Wednesday, they said, “Tonight the State of Tennessee once again failed to carry out a lawful execution. We take no pleasure in being right, but the concerns raised by Ms. Pike proved to be true: difficult vein access, blown veins, degraded pentobarbital, no emergency medical care available when things inevitably go wrong, all under a protocol that remains veiled in secrecy. Christa is being treated at a nearby hospital. We have not been informed as to her condition.”

The Department of Correction responded that staff followed every step of the protocol approved by the attorney general’s office, that the chemical “has consistently been effective,” and that the protocol does not allow additional procedures beyond what was carried out.

A federal judge noted that she was already receiving medical care.

This was the second failed lethal-injection attempt in Tennessee this year.

In May, the same physician who attempted to execute Pike, Dr. Mark Fowler, was unable to establish IV access on Tony Carruthers after more than an hour.

Lee later granted Carruthers a one-year reprieve.

Pike’s lawyers had argued for months that her small veins and a blood condition called thrombocytosis would make standard IV access difficult and the procedure more painful. They were denied requests for an alternative method.

Lee has ordered a “comprehensive, third-party review” and said the state’s only other scheduled execution this year, that of Gary Wayne Sutton on December 3, will not go forward. This also means that should Pike survive, she will likely not face another execution attempt this year.

Pike’s execution warrant expired at midnight. The Tennessee Supreme Court must set a new date before the state can try again.

Pike was 18 when she and two others lured Slemmer, a fellow Job Corps student, to a remote area, beat and stabbed her, and carved a pentagram into her chest.

Pike kept a piece of the victim’s skull as a trophy. It took years for Slemmer’s mother to retrieve the skull fragment from evidence so it could be properly buried.

The teen killer was convicted and sentenced to death in 1996 and has remained the only woman on Tennessee’s death row.

Her lawyers have argued that childhood sexual abuse, bipolar disorder, and PTSD were not properly explained during her trial and that she should receive a new sentencing because of it.

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