True Crime Tonight: Christa Pike's Failed Execution

SPEAKER_1 (0:00)

Warning, this is a True Crime Segment and not suitable for children. It contains references to sexual violence and suicide, which some listeners may find distressing. If you need support, you are not alone. Contact Lifeline on 13 11 14, or visit lifeline.org.au for 24 hour support.

Meshel Laurie (0:17)

We interrupt the panel late development, we don't know precisely. It's a voice that will send shivers down your spine.

SPEAKER_1 (0:25)

Stab 19 times. The suspect lured the victim into the water.

Michael Bachelard (0:29)

Biggest legal dramas in Hollywood. Today is a major win to show what the system can do.

Matthew Tankard (0:34)

This is True Crime Tonight.

Meshel Laurie (0:37)

Hello, welcome to Sunday. This is True Crime Tonight. And I'm your host, Michelle Laurie. I'm here with our producers, as always, Matthew Tankard. Hey. Ruby Bartzis. Hello. And we're going to tell you what we've noticed around the traps, crime wise.

Matthew Tankard (0:48)

Yeah, we're keeping an eye on it.

Meshel Laurie (0:50)

We are, don't worry. We are keeping an eye on things. So you can just check in with us every Sunday night to bring you up to date. Coming up later this hour, we talk to Michael Bachelard. If that name sounds familiar, it is not because he's a criminal, but in fact, he is a journalist. And you would definitely have run into Michael on your TV travels. At the moment, he's writing for The Age and the Sydney Morning Herald. And he has a, he's done a podcast on an area of interest for him. And it's a fascinating, controversial, emotional area. It is Shaken Baby Syndrome. There's new thinking around that and around the science that's been used to convict people over the years.

Very interesting chat coming up with Michael Bachelard about that. We'll also be talking about the True Crime Week that was in America. It's been huge. Yeah, it's been big. A lot of weird, amazing stories coming out of the States. As always, it's all coming up Around Australia on True Crime Tonight.

Matthew Tankard (1:43)

Around Australia, this is True Crime Tonight with Meshel Laurie, Ruby Bartzis and me, Matthew Tankard. Coming up, we have an interview with Michael Bachelard about a potential breakthrough on Shaken Baby cases. But first, let's talk about Christa Pike.

Meshel Laurie (1:56)

Oh my God, that's all I can say about this botched execution.

Matthew Tankard (2:00)

Botched execution in Tennessee.

Meshel Laurie (2:02)

Turned into an absolute dead set torture session.

Matthew Tankard (2:05)

Yeah. Didn't it?

SPEAKER_1 (2:06)

It's so weird to even think about.

Meshel Laurie (2:09)

And yet, I know having read a little bit about it, it's not uncommon. Botched executions.

Matthew Tankard (2:15)

I think this is the reality of the death penalty. I think it's such a barbaric, not exact science, that it often ends in these torturous ways of dying.

Meshel Laurie (2:25)

How is it not an exact science? Anyone who's ever had a pet has been to the vet and watched this exact process take place.

Matthew Tankard (2:32)

I was thinking about that. I think with pets, they just blast them with heaps of what's... Oh, great.

SPEAKER_1 (2:37)

But why aren't you blasting it?

Matthew Tankard (2:39)

Because I think they have so many of these safeguarding around the brutal thing they're doing, which is killing someone, they're covering it with, well, we're going to do it in this exact way because maybe this is the least painful way of doing it, or these things. But it's like something I learned recently, is part of this concoction that they give people when they're giving them the lethal injection is they first knock them out. Second part is this paralytic that numbs them. Then the third part is the poison, the potassium chloride.

That second part, the paralytic, that's just to stop them from thrashing about. Makes the whole thing look painless. It's all performative. What?

Meshel Laurie (3:20)

Because you imagine the amount of adrenaline that's flowing through your body when you're being executed.

Matthew Tankard (3:24)

Yeah.

Meshel Laurie (3:25)

I can understand how it, you know, the first sedative might not work. But again, I go back to the Blaston principle. Like if you give me enough sedative, I won't be moving. I can tell you that from experience.

Matthew Tankard (3:37)

Yeah. And now she's getting life-saving treatment. Right. In a hospital.

Meshel Laurie (3:41)

We could go, they're trying to kill her. Now they're trying to keep her alive because they botched trying to kill her.

Matthew Tankard (3:46)

Yeah. That is torture. Trying to keep someone alive after.

Michael Bachelard (3:48)

She's just like, imagine the mental.

Matthew Tankard (3:51)