Emergency responders were delayed for about 30 minutes as dispatchers and prison officials struggled to verify that the inmate’s call for medical help was legitimate

NEED TO KNOW

• Emergency responders were delayed after a 911 call reporting that Christa Pike had survived her Sept. 30 execution attempt was initially treated as false
• A dispatcher declared there was “no medical assistance needed” at the prison before officials confirmed the emergency was legitimate about 30 minutes after the initial call
• Pike’s attorney Kelly Gleason also called 911, requesting immediate lifesaving care after the death row inmate survived two lethal injections

Emergency responders were delayed for approximately half an hour as dispatchers and prison officials struggled to verify a call for help following Christa Pike’s botched execution, newly released 911 recordings reveal.

The first emergency call came at 8:40 p.m. on Sept. 30, after Pike survived two lethal injections at Tennessee’s Riverbend Maximum Security Institution, according to recordings obtained by the Associated Press through a public records request.

But the caller could not provide a verification code, prompting confusion among dispatchers and prison officials about whether the emergency was real.

“Per supervisors here at the DEC (Department of Emergency Communications) we have been informed it is a false call,” a dispatcher said at 9:03 p.m., according to the AP. “There is no medical assistance needed at Riverbend Prison.”

It was not until approximately 9:11 p.m., more than 30 minutes after the initial call, that prison officials confirmed the emergency was legitimate and began allowing responders through the gates.

The initial caller, whose identity and title were redacted, reported that Pike was unconscious and not breathing normally, according to a transcript released to the AP.

Representatives of the prison’s Central Control told emergency dispatchers they “would have been the ones to call in” and had not made the call, according to the AP.

At one point, a responder reported that someone outside the prison gates was insisting the emergency was real.

“Somebody is outside the gate at the prison telling us that it’s real and demanding us to go in,” the responder said, according to the AP.

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An AP reporter witnessed an ambulance and fire trucks reach a building inside the prison complex at 9:14 p.m.

One of Pike’s attorneys, Kelly Gleason, also called 911 at 9:08 p.m. to request immediate medical assistance.

“My client, Christa Gail Pike, is undergoing a state execution. She has completed the stages of the protocol and last we knew from the attorney who is present, she is still alive and breathing and needs immediate life-saving care,” Gleason said.

The recordings provide new insight into the confusion surrounding Pike’s failed execution. PEOPLE previously reported that the failed execution left her attorneys scrambling to contact state officials and secure emergency medical treatment.

According to an Oct. 12 PEOPLE report, Pike’s lawyers said calls to contacts in Gov. Bill Lee’s office went unanswered, while an emergency number provided by the Tennessee Supreme Court went to voicemail.

Pike, 50, was eventually transported to a hospital, where she remained on a ventilator for several days before unexpectedly regaining consciousness on Oct. 6.

Pike has since been discharged from the hospital and returned to prison, her attorneys said Saturday, Oct. 10, according to the AP.

Pike was sentenced to death for the 1995 murder of her classmate Colleen Slemmer, 19.

Lee has paused further executions pending an independent review of the failed attempt. The Tennessee Department of Correction has not publicly explained what went wrong.

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