On Sunday's CNN State of the Union, interviewing Stephen Ferrell, the attorney for Tennessee death-row inmate Christa Pike, host Jake Tapper said:
"It is certainly an odd and unusual situation, where the world is waiting, at least as far as I can tell, for your client to recover from these botched execution attempts so the state can kill her for good. That just seems bizarre."
What's "bizarre" is Tapper's claim. "The world?" How did Jake concoct that consensus? He said that his view was "as far as I can tell." How "far" was that? We'll go out on a limb and surmise that in the liberal-media world that Tapper inhabits, there's not an overwhelming clamor for Pike's execution.
Of course, there are bound to be some people who want Tennessee to complete Pike's execution. That would include Senator Marsha Blackburn, the Republican nominee for governor. She has called for the electric chair for Pike. But a candidate's position is not a world waiting at the bedside.
The sitting governor, Bill Lee, also a Republican, has halted the remaining executions for the rest of the year--effectively the remainder of his term--and ordered an outside review. The prison commissioner is resigning.
Ferrell also made a noteworthy claim, saying it was unjust for May Martinez, the mother of Colleen Slemmer, Pike's victim, to have been subjected to "the long many years of back and forth for her." He was apparently alluding to the 30 years between Colleen's murder and the attempted execution of Pike.
The irony: The "many years of back and forth" are largely due to the appeals, the habeas petitions, and the method-of-execution challenges that capital defense counsel like Ferrell file.
Jake Tapper 'The World Is Waiting' To Kill Christa Pike pic.twitter.com/BGArLsWigZ
— Mark Finkelstein (@markfinkelstein) October 4, 2026
Pike was sentenced in 1996. The attempt last week came about 30 years later. People executed in this country in 2023 had spent an average of just over 23 years on death row, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics.
If justice delayed is justice denied, then justice has certainly been denied to the families and loved ones of murder victims in the United States thanks to the dilatory tactics of modern defense counsel.
Compare with the assassinations of President Garfield in 1881, and President McKinley in 1901. The lapse between their deaths and the execution of the assassin was under 10 months in Garfield's case--and just 45 days in McKinley's.
Here's the transcript.
CNN
State of the Union
10/4/26
9:33 am EDT
JAKE TAPPER: And I'm wondering what you think justice looks like in terms of the victim.
STEPHEN FERRELL: I, I, I think that's very hard to say. I can tell you what justice shouldn't be for the victim's family. And that's, this long many years of back and forth for her, and to be brought here to witness an execution that doesn't happen.
Nothing that anyone can do will bring back Colleen Slemmer. Nothing that anyone can do will make this right for May Martinez, her mother. I can't give any better solution than the fact that Christa has been, and may very well continue to be, severely punished, harshly punished, and maybe not overly so. But certainly, this has been a serious punishment for a very serious and awful crime. I don't, I don't think that attempting another execution is going to bring justice.
TAPPER: It is certainly an odd and unusual situation, where the world is waiting, at least as far as I can tell, for your client to recover from these botched execution attempts so the state can kill her for good. That just seems bizarre.
FERRELL: It, I, as far as I know, it's, it's unique, in, in this country. There have been other attempted executions that were botched, as in, they couldn't get the vein, they, other things went wrong.
I don't know of any, situation where the state says that the execution was carried out exactly as it planned to do, and the person survived. And that is a unique situation. And I think that your word bizarre is exactly right.
