British woman reveals traumatising details of watching her death row husband’s execution

The brutality of the death penalty has been discussed perhaps more than ever this week, even after the failed execution of Christa Pike.

The 50-year-old was due to die at the hands of a lethal injection earlier this week, more than 30 years on from murdering Colleen Slemmer when she was just 18 years old.

Although the injection was administered, Pike ended up surviving, with doctors suggesting that she will likely suffer brain damage from the ordeal after she was rushed to hospital.

However, even when there were questions over his guilt, James Broadnax had no such luck when he passed away earlier this year at the age of 37, with his wife in the room to witness his death.

Tiana Krasniqi had become close to the death row inmate after starting her Master's degree in international human rights law, in which she concentrated on racial inequalities on Texas' death row.

This led her to Broadnax and they ended up falling for each other, before Broadnax proposed.

Krasniqi said: "I said, yes, that was my best friend. That was my twin."

James Broadanax and Tiana Krasniqi

Although witnessing anyone die can be a hugely traumatic process, Tiana emphasised exactly what it's like to be in the room as someone is killed by lethal injection.

Speaking to LADbible, she said: "He had these plastic coverings on top of his arms. He just looked like a flipping experiment. He had a woman at the side of him in a suit, a woman at the top of his head with his spiritual advisor. And then there was only one thin wall separating me and the families, screaming and crying.

"He was like, 'I love you queen. Don't give up. I love you queen. Don't give up.' And as he said, "Don't," his head jumped back and he went, "Ugh." And then his eyes rolled up and he dropped. And I screamed."

Watch Tiana Krasniqi's full Minutes With episode below:

Tiana was forced to sit through the whole thing, and wait in the room for another 20 minutes until he was officially pronounced as dead, something which was an awful experience for her having become so close to him after first starting as pen pals, before agreeing to marry before they'd even met face-to-face.

She added: "Before we went into that death chamber, they said to me, 'Once we lock that door, you can't come out of there unless there's an emergency or until he's pronounced dead.' I said, 'He's dead now. Let him go. It's done.' And they're like, 'No, ma'am, you need to wait 20 minutes.'

"So I said, 'So you're going to force me to sit here and watch him die?' And they said, 'This is the procedure.' And I'm screaming because I'm watching James die and he's going blue. His lips are going blue. His face is going blue. "There are veins appearing in his forehead and I'm just watching him suffer and I can't do [anything]."

James died on 30 April 2026, with Tiana shouting that she loved him as he passed away. Following her husband's death, Krasniqi has been even more vocal about his case and the circumstances in which he died, claiming that it was her intention to get him out of there when they first met.