Christa Pike was hours away from becoming the first woman executed in Tennessee in at least 200 years when a federal appeals court stepped in and halted her execution. Pike, now 50, has spent three decades on death row for the 1995 murder of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer. The case has drawn renewed attention because Pike was 18 when the killing happened and because her attorneys say her history of severe childhood sexual abuse and mental illness was not properly considered, as per reports by the Washington Post and The AP.
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Who is Christa Pike?
Christa Pike was a teenager when she became involved in the killing of Slemmer, a classmate at a Knoxville job training facility. Prosecutors said Pike believed Slemmer was interested in her boyfriend, Tadaryl Shipp.
On Jan. 12, 1995, Pike, Shipp and another teenage girl, Shadolla Peterson, lured Slemmer to a wooded area in Knoxville. According to court records and trial testimony, Slemmer was beaten and repeatedly cut with a knife. Pike admitted hitting her with a piece of asphalt, cutting her throat and taking part of her skull as a souvenir. Shipp, who was 17 at the time, later admitted he carved a pentagram into Slemmer’s body. The crime became widely known in Knoxville and drew attention during the period of “satanic panic” in the 1980s and 1990s.
Of the three teenagers involved, Pike was the only one sentenced to death. Shipp received life in prison with the possibility of parole because he was 17. Peterson testified against Pike and Shipp and received probation.
Pike was also later convicted of attempted first degree murder for an August 2001 assault on another inmate.
