Death row inmate Christa Pike was believed to be brain-dead and hours from having her life support switched off when she woke unexpectedly and asked where she was, her lawyers said, as a court ordered Tennessee to preserve all material related to her botched execution.
Pike, 50, survived two supposedly fatal injections in Tennessee last week, 30 years after she was sentenced to death for brutally torturing and murdering her classmate Colleen Slemmer in 1995, when she was 18.
Her attorney, Randy Spivey, said the convicted murderer was "angry and confused", with massively swollen hands, a blood clot in one arm and pneumonia. She was also unable to swallow and had not eaten.
A court on Wednesday (US time) ordered the state to preserve and maintain all medical equipment, records and communications relating to the failed execution. Further decisions are expected on Pike's access to a tablet and whether she should be unshackled from the bed.
Speaking to reporters after the court hearing, Spivey revealed Pike had been unresponsive and presumed brain-dead the night before she suddenly regained consciousness and began talking. Her attorneys, Luke Ihnen and Spivey, appeared at a news conference in Nashville on Wednesday.
The case has raised significant questions about the death penalty in the US, along with uncertainty about whether Tennessee will try to execute her again.