As execution issues grew, Tennessee made the process more secretive

USA Today · , USA TODAY · 2026-11-06 14:49 UTC

Tennessee's failures, from DEA drug seizures to misstatements in court, underpin calls for transparency in executions.

More than an hour after receiving what were meant to be lethal doses of pentobarbital, Christa Pike was still alive. Witnesses could hear her struggling to breathe, even after prison officials closed the curtains on the execution chamber.

It was far from the only time that Tennessee drew a veil of secrecy around its lethal injection procedure.

The procedure has been plagued with problems since the state adopted it in 2000. The Drug Enforcement Administration once seized the state's lethal injection drugs. The Tennessee Department of Correction has likely executed two people using expired, compromised or untested drugs. State officials have incorrectly testified in court that untested drugs had been tested for contamination.

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