Christa Pike: Why Tennessee Sent the Same Doctor Back In

Tony Brueski (0:01)

This is Hidden Killers Live with Tony Brueski and Robin Dreeke.

Tony Brueski (0:07)

Let's move over now to another case that, you know, great choice is being made. Christina Pike has been on death row for 30 years, because it takes that long. On September 30th, Tennessee tried to carry out her sentence. Two full doses of pentobarbital, at least seven needle sticks, arm swollen and blistered, and the heart never stopped. But they got a needle to go 90 degrees the other way, because that's, yeah, when you're doing an injection of some sort, you're like, well, the needle's really bending the wrong way. Let's keep going. Press harder.

What makes this case something everybody can't get past isn't just the failure. It's what the state already knew before they walked into that chamber. The physician who oversaw Pike's execution had already botched Tony Carruthers' execution just four months earlier, testified under oath. He hadn't placed a central line in over 13 years, and the state sent him in anyway, then told the court his qualifications were not important or relevant.

This could have been prevented. Screw what you think of Christina Pike. I'm fine with her dying. But this just shouldn't be happening. We're better than this. Joining me to discuss Robin Dreeke, retired FBI Special Agent, Chief of the Counterintelligence Behavioral Analysis Program, and master class instructor. So after Carruthers four months ago, a witness described Dr. Fowler's hands shaking as he's trying to place the central line into a man's chest. Carruthers' family says he's been left partially paralyzed. He survived that one, too. And the governor ordered a reprieve. Four months later, same doctor. Hey, he worked so good the last time. Let's use him again. Walks into Christina Pike's execution chamber. Who in the system looked at what happened in May and said, hey, let's hire him again. This will work out good.

Robin Dreeke (2:11)

You wonder, don't you? I mean, I did. So again, I've never researched these types of cases. We've never covered this before. So if everyone, whatever anyone thinks about that sentence is, put that aside and let's just look at what went on here. Because first of all, I had to look up what Centerline was. I had no idea. Thank you again. Who was it just put in there that she's a nurse? She said it last week as well.

Anyway, yeah, Kelly. So yeah, in Centerline, this is where from my research, from what I found out, Kelly correct me if I'm wrong online, is so they're going to try to do it through a vein. A normal vein like my daughter does, she's a nurse, Kelly's a nurse, where you get in the vein and veins obviously, like in case like this, collapse. But what they do in death sentence cases by lethal injection, they have on standby a doctor or someone that can do Centerline. And what Centerline is, these are the ones that actually, it's a direct into the carotid artery, something goes into the femoral vein inside the leg. So these are the big ones. These are the ones that if you put something in that vein, it's going right to the heart, right to the brain and we're done. And so that is the backup, that's plan B if something goes wrong with doing the intravenous in the veins that normally people do in the arms, which was going on. But this guy has botched that Centerline twice because last one, what he did, again, correct me if I'm wrong, 2013 or 2015 was last time he did that. So he is not, he's a licensed physician, but he's not affiliated with any hospital. So because this is part of the issue of doing death by lethal injection, they don't allow anyone who's actually practicing in the medical field to do this because it's against HIPAA, it's against the Hippocratic Code. I mean, so here's some interesting stats. You know, I know everyone loves me looking at my stats because this made me curious. So from 1890 to 2010, there's been 8,776 executions that were studied, 276 of them were botched.

Lethal injection from 1890 to 2010, 7.2% botched. Lethal gas, we used to do lethal gas, 5.4% hanging, 3.1%. Electrocution at 1.92%. Byron Squad, zero. That works really well. But since the modern era, this is lethal injection botch rate has gone up to 8%. And actually, they think it's worse than this because they think it's underreported.

So this is like the worst thing can do. If you want to guarantee you're going to kill someone, this is like one of the most unreliable ways you can do it.

Tony Brueski (4:45)

Isn't this so American of us, though, too, in a lot of ways, where it's like, well, it sounds better. It doesn't work better in practice over. I mean, we've learned this now over time. I get maybe at the beginning thinking, oh, OK, this seems somewhat medically.