Tennessee is preparing to execute Christa Gail Pike on September 30, 2026, which would make her the first woman put to death in the state in more than 200 years. Pike, now 50, was sentenced to death in 1996 for the 1995 murder of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer in Knoxville. The execution is scheduled to take place at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville unless Governor Bill Lee grants clemency or courts intervene.
The 1995 Murder of Colleen Slemmer
Pike was 18 and a student at the Job Corps Center in Knoxville when she killed Slemmer, a fellow student, on January 12, 1995. According to court records, Pike lured Slemmer to a secluded area near the University of Tennessee campus under the pretense of going to a Blockbuster video store. Pike, her boyfriend Tadaryll Shipp (then 17), and another student, Shadolla Peterson, ambushed Slemmer.
The attack was prolonged and brutal. Prosecutors said Pike and Shipp beat Slemmer, slammed her head against concrete, threw asphalt at her, and slashed her throat with a box cutter. A meat cleaver was used to cut her back, and a pentagram was carved into her chest and forehead. Slemmer begged them to stop, but the assault continued. Pike later admitted to a friend that she had kept a fragment of Slemmer’s skull in her pocket and ate breakfast with it the next morning.
A university employee discovered Slemmer’s body the following day, so badly beaten it was initially mistaken for an animal carcass. Pike waived her rights and gave a full confession to police.
Co-Defendants Received Lesser Sentences
Only Pike received the death penalty. Shipp, who was 17 at the time, was ineligible for execution due to his age and received a life sentence. He was denied parole in 2025. Peterson agreed to testify for the prosecution and avoided prison time. The disparity in sentences has been a focal point of Pike’s clemency arguments, as the developmental difference between an 18-year-old and a 17-year-old is minimal.
Pike’s Background and Mitigating Evidence
Pike’s attorneys argue that the jury at her 1996 trial never heard the full extent of her traumatic childhood. According to the 226-page clemency petition filed with Governor Lee, Pike suffered severe sexual and physical abuse beginning at age two, including repeated rape by her grandmother’s boyfriend. She experienced neglect by her parents, was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder, and spent over a year in a juvenile evaluation center in North Carolina starting at age 15.
Her lawyers contend that this history, combined with scientific advances in understanding adolescent brain development since her trial, warrants commutation to life without parole. They note that all seven other people in Tennessee who received death sentences for crimes committed at age 18 since 1976 – all men – later had their sentences vacated.
Legal Challenges and Current Status
The Tennessee Supreme Court rejected Pike’s appeals and declined to stay her execution in late September 2026. Her attorneys, Kelly Gleason and Stephen Ferrell, said they were “deeply disappointed” but would appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court and continue pressing Governor Lee for clemency.
“Now that he is equipped with information and understanding the jury never had, Governor Lee can consider the totality of Christa’s life and circumstances and right these wrongs by commuting her death sentence to life without parole,” the attorneys said in a statement. “We remain hopeful that he will.”
As of late September, Governor Lee had not publicly responded to the clemency petition.
Execution Protocol and Pike’s Requests
Tennessee’s current lethal injection protocol uses a single drug, pentobarbital. Pike’s legal team has raised several challenges to the method:
- Blood disorder: Pike has a rare blood condition that attorneys say could make venous access difficult and affect her reaction to the drug, potentially causing a prolonged and painful death.
- All-female execution team: Citing her PTSD from decades of abuse by men, Pike requested an all-female execution squad to carry out the procedure. The Tennessee Department of Correction committed to staffing her observation, extraction, and transportation with female officers and keeping her at the Debra K. Johnson Rehabilitation Center until the day before execution.
- Alternative method: Pike sued in August 2026 seeking to be hanged instead, arguing lethal injection administered by men would violate the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment given her trauma history.
State attorneys have argued Pike failed to provide sufficient scientific evidence to warrant stopping the execution.
Victim’s Family Seeks Closure
Colleen Slemmer’s mother, May Martinez, plans to witness the execution. She told the Nashville Banner she needs to see Pike’s death “so I can remember that she is gone and I don’t have to fear that she’s going to pop up somewhere.” Martinez and her husband intend to drive 600 miles from Florida to Nashville after a victims’ advocacy organization raised partial funds for the trip.
Martinez said she hopes to find peace after the execution, though she acknowledged the uncertainty of whether such peace is possible.
Historical Context
If carried out, Pike’s execution would mark the first of a woman in Tennessee since 1819 and only the 19th woman executed nationwide in the modern death penalty era since 1976. She has been on death row for three decades, much of it in solitary confinement.
Pike’s case has drawn sustained attention from true crime media, documentaries, and advocacy groups focused on sexual violence, trauma, and the death penalty. A coalition of experts and organizations wrote to Governor Lee warning that Pike’s execution could cause her to “feel and believe that she is being raped to death” given her trauma history.
What Happens Next
Unless the U.S. Supreme Court intervenes or Governor Lee grants clemency, Pike will be moved to Riverbend Maximum Security Institution on September 29. On the morning of September 30, she is expected to wake at 5:30 a.m., clean her cell, shower, receive a last meal, and have final visits with family or a spiritual adviser before the 10 a.m. execution time.
The case continues to raise questions about the intersection of juvenile brain development, severe childhood trauma, gender disparities in capital sentencing, and the constitutionality of execution methods for prisoners with documented PTSD and medical conditions.
