Hours Before Christa Pike's Execution, the Supreme Court Lifted a Stay Without a Word. Then the State Botched It.
On the morning of September 30, 2026, a federal appeals court did something courts are supposed to do when a person is hours from being put to death: it paused to think. By evening, the Supreme Court had told the appeals court to stop thinking. Its order in Nelsen v. Pike (No. 26A428) contained no reasoning. Tennessee then tried to execute Christa Pike by lethal injection, and the attempt failed. Pike, 50, survived. The sequence is a case study in what is wrong with how the Supreme Court handles life-and-death questions on its emergency docket. ...