Christa Pike is set to be executed on September 30 in Tennessee . The 50-year-old went on death row when she was just 18, for the 1995 murder of Colleen Slemmer. Now, she is set to be put to death at the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville.
The death row inmate allegedly drew a pentagram on Slemmer’s chest and hit her with an asphalt block on the head, details during her trial revealed. Since Pike was convicted, details emerged about her own troubled past including sexual abuse and neglect as a child. Further, Pike was found to be suffering from PTSD. The US Supreme Court also turned down the last-minute petition her lawyers filed to stay the execution. Here’s all you need to know about Christa Pike’s execution in Tennessee.
A clemency plea to Tennessee Governor Bill Lee was denied as he said he would neither grant it, nor intervene.
Pike’s lawyers tried to make the case that the girl she was at 18 and the woman she’s now are two starkly different people, and she should get a second chance. Because the latter was 17, and considered to be a juvenile, despite just months of difference between the two, questions have also been raised about Pike getting the death sentence while her then-boyfriend got life in jail,.
