Calls grow for US death penalty halt after ‘torturous’ botched execution of Christa Pike

Pike alive but in critical condition as experts call ordeal that unfolded in Tennessee Wednesday unimaginably barbaric'

Top lawyers, doctors and members of the faith community are calling for a moratorium on the US death penalty after Tennessee's failed attempt to execute Christa Pike left the prisoner alive but in critical condition and receiving life-saving medical care.

The recent spate of harrowingly botched executions across US death penalty states reached a new low late on Wednesday when Tennessee's governor Bill Lee called off the procedure after Pike had been injected with two full syringes of pentobarbital. She is the only person to have survived being administered 5mg of the sedative - a massive dose that under normal circumstances is considered fatal.