Tennessee prison chief resigns after failed Christa Pike execution

The head of Tennessee’s prison system is stepping down after the failed execution of death row inmate Christa Pike, the governor announced on Saturday, as authorities investigate what went wrong.

Frank Strada, commissioner of the Tennessee Department of Correction, submitted his resignation and will leave his post later this month, Gov. Bill Lee said in a statement reported in the media.

Lee said he accepted Strada’s resignation, with officials saying an interim commissioner would be named.

Strada said he continued to believe the department followed established procedures but that stepping aside was in the best interest of the state while an independent review is carried out.

Pike’s execution by lethal injection on Wednesday was halted after two attempts to administer the execution drug failed.

Pike’s attorneys said in a court filing on Friday that she is critically ill, unconscious and on a ventilator at a Nashville-area hospital.

They said improperly placed intravenous lines caused pentobarbital used in the execution attempt to enter her tissue rather than her bloodstream.

Lee ordered an independent review of the attempted execution and suspended the state’s remaining executions through the end of the year.

Pike was sentenced to death for the 1995 killing of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer.