Tennessee authorities failed to complete the execution of 50-year-old Christa Pike, who was convicted of murdering a young woman in 1995. According to eyewitnesses, after she apparently received two doses of pentobarbital, Pike remained alive and was still partially conscious more than 40 minutes after the last dose – and authorities stopped the procedure. Her lawyers urgently appealed to the Supreme Court, arguing she was being subjected to 'unnecessary suffering' and that continuing the execution would constitute cruel and unusual punishment. Earlier, the Supreme Court overturned a last-minute stay that would have allowed the execution to proceed – the first execution of a woman in Tennessee in at least 200 years.