Tennessee prepares to execute Christa Pike in state's first female execution since 1819

Scheduled execution in Nashville

Tennessee correctional authorities are set to execute 50-year-old Christa Gail Pike by lethal injection at the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville. Scheduled for 10:00 AM local time on Wednesday, 30 September 2026, the procedure will make Pike the first woman executed in Tennessee since 1819. Pike is currently the only woman on the state's death row. The execution proceeds after the United States Supreme Court rejected a final petition for a stay. Ahead of the scheduled procedure, Pike refused her final meal.

Governor Bill Lee previously rejected a clemency request seeking to commute her sentence to life imprisonment without parole.

After careful consideration of the request and a thorough review of the case, I am upholding the sentence imposed by the State of Tennessee and do not intend to intervene.

The 1995 crime and convictions

Pike was 18 years old in January 1995 when she, her 17-year-old partner Tadaryl Shipp, and another young woman lured 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer into a wooded area in Knoxville. Slemmer, a fellow student at a vocational training center, was beaten, tortured, and murdered. Evidence presented during the trial indicated that Pike viewed Slemmer as a romantic rival for Shipp's attention and carved a pentagram into the victim's chest. Witnesses testified that Pike boasted about the killing and displayed a fragment of Slemmer's skull.

Both Pike and Shipp confessed and were convicted of first-degree murder in 1996. Pike received the death sentence, while Shipp received a life sentence with the possibility of parole. A third co-defendant acted as a lookout, cooperated with prosecutors, and received probation.

Clemency arguments and international appeals

Pike's defense attorneys submitted a 226-page clemency petition detailing extensive childhood neglect, domestic violence, and sexual abuse, including rapes at ages 11 and 17. The petition cited prison diagnoses of bipolar disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder, alongside maternal alcohol consumption during pregnancy that impaired her neurological development and impulse control. Independent United Nations human rights experts also called on Tennessee and federal authorities to stop the execution, citing the absence of mitigating mental health and trauma evidence during her 1996 trial and her three decades in solitary confinement.

In an interview with The Times, Pike compared her situation to other female defendants who experienced severe mental health crises.

I feel a kinship with Lindsay. We are both women who got into trouble because of issues that are unique to women. But there is a difference: times have changed a lot in terms of awareness of women's issues since I was tried.

Legal challenges over execution method

Pike's legal team raised separate legal challenges against lethal injection, arguing that the procedure poses severe physical and psychological risks. Trauma experts argued that the restraints and physical handling required for lethal injection would trigger flashbacks to her childhood abuse. Her lawyers also asserted that small veins and a blood disorder could obstruct intravenous line placement, pointing to an aborted execution in Tennessee in May 2026 when officials failed to locate a suitable vein for inmate Tony Carruthers.

The defense requested alternative execution methods, proposing hanging during an August 2026 hearing and requesting an all-female firing squad. Tennessee law does not authorize execution by firing squad, a method permitted in only five US states. Slemmer's family members are scheduled to attend the execution as witnesses.