A grim tally of botched executions from hanging mishaps to lethal-injection failures

Christa Pike became the first death-row inmate to live through a lethal-injection attempt, underscoring a disturbing pattern of execution failures. The worst-recorded category is bungled hangings, with 85 cases, the most infamous being the 1901 execution of outlaw Tom “Black Jack” Ketchum whose head detached after a miscalculated drop. Electrocutions rank second, featuring incidents where prisoners’ heads ignited, such as Florida cop killer Jesse Tafaro in 1990 and Pedro Medina in 1997.

Lethal injection, promoted as a humane method, has seen at least 75 botched attempts by 2010, including the 2014 blood-splatter incident involving Clayton Lockett. Alabama alone recorded three lethal-injection failures in 2022, each leaving the condemned with multiple needle punctures and bruises.