Fowler told Intelligencer he believes the lethal-injection protocol needs to change. He said he prefers the older three-drug cocktail involving potᴀssium chloride — which some people on death-row and their attorneys have argued is too painful — over pentobarbital. Fowler said he believes it is more effective, according to Intelligencer.

Fowler also said he believed the people who place the IV lines should remain in the room after they do so, to observe what happens to a person as medicine enters their bodies. Pike “complained of pain in her arm,” he said. “They should have stopped and reᴀssessed, and they didn’t.”

Fowler, who said he recently completed his second semester of seminary, said he still hopes to see Pike put to death, in part, to provide “a sense of justice” for Slemmer’s mother, who was present for the failed execution.

“People will say, ‘Why don’t you just walk away from this?’ And the answer is, that’s exactly what the advocates against the death penalty want,” he said. “They felt that if they could humiliate me I would step back from it — because I promise you, there ain’t anybody else in Tennessee going to sign up for it now — and the answer is, I cannot be pushed off a course that I find correct. I refuse to compromise.”

He also defended his character, telling Intelligencer: “I’m not an evil, vicious person. I’m not unscrupulous. I’m not uncaring, and I’m not incompetent.”

In her first statement since the botched execution, Pike said she was in constant pain and has been largely isolated in the prison’s medical ward.

“There hasn’t been a moment since that night when I haven’t been in pain. My body hurts. My arms hurt. My hands hurt. My throat hurts. I still struggle to speak.”

She said it extended to her mind and soul. “I had not contemplated life beyond that night,” Pike also said, “and I’m deeply hurt by the incompetence that has put so many people in this terrible position.” She said she was also thinking about her victim’s family and “the terrible pain and loss they have endured.”