Woman Faces Execution After Tennessee Governor Rejects Last-Minute Clemency Bid

Tennessee death row inmate Christa Pike is scheduled to be executed Wednesday after Gov. Bill Lee rejected her request for clemency, leaving the U.S. Supreme Court as one of the final possible avenues for stopping her execution.

Pike, 50, is scheduled to be executed on September 30 at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville. If the execution goes forward, she would become the first woman put to death by Tennessee in more than 200 years.

The execution is scheduled for 10 a.m. Central Time.

Pike has spent roughly three decades on death row for the 1995 murder of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer, a fellow student at the Knoxville Job Corps.

Lee announced Monday that he would not intervene after reviewing Pike’s request to have her death sentence commuted to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

The governor said he had deliberately considered the clemency request and conducted a thorough review of the case before deciding to allow the sentence imposed by the state to stand.

The decision was a major setback for Pike’s attorneys, who have spent the weeks leading up to her scheduled execution arguing that her age at the time of the murder, history of severe childhood abuse and later mental-health diagnoses warranted mercy.

But even after Lee’s decision, Pike’s legal battle was not completely over.

Her attorneys filed a petition with the U.S. Supreme Court on September 25 along with an application seeking a stay of execution. That request followed a September 23 decision by the Tennessee Supreme Court denying another attempt to stop the execution.

Unless a court intervenes or another extraordinary action occurs, Tennessee is continuing preparations for Wednesday morning’s execution.

A Murder That Shocked Tennessee

Pike was 18 years old when Slemmer was killed on January 12, 1995.

According to court records, Pike, her boyfriend Tadaryl Shipp and fellow Job Corps student Shadolla Peterson left the Knoxville Job Corps campus with Slemmer that evening.

Prosecutors said Pike had become angry with Slemmer and believed the teenager was interested in Shipp.

The group traveled to an isolated area near the University of Tennessee’s agricultural campus, where Slemmer was subjected to a prolonged and violent attack before she was killed.

The circumstances surrounding the murder were particularly disturbing and became a major part of prosecutors’ case when they sought the death penalty.

A Tennessee jury ultimately convicted Pike of premeditated first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit first-degree murder in 1996.

During the penalty phase, jurors concluded that aggravating factors justified a death sentence, including their finding that the killing involved torture or serious physical abuse beyond what was necessary to cause death.

The Tennessee Supreme Court later upheld Pike’s convictions and death sentence.

The other defendants received different sentences.

Shipp, who was 17 when Slemmer was killed and therefore could not receive the death penalty, was convicted of first-degree murder and conspiracy and received a life sentence. Peterson pleaded guilty to being an accessory after the fact and received a probationary sentence.

Clemency Appeal Focused on Pike’s Childhood

Pike’s attorneys submitted a lengthy clemency petition asking Lee to reduce her punishment to life without parole.

The defense did not dispute Pike’s responsibility for Slemmer’s murder.

Instead, attorneys argued that circumstances surrounding Pike’s childhood, mental health and age should be considered when deciding whether the state should carry out her execution more than 30 years after the crime.

The petition described an upbringing marked by sexual assault, abuse and neglect. Her attorneys have also said Pike was later diagnosed with bipolar disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder.

They argued that modern research into adolescent brain development provides a different understanding of the judgment and impulse control of an 18-year-old than was widely available when Pike went on trial in the 1990s.

Her lawyers also emphasized how unusual her case has become.

Pike is the only woman currently on Tennessee’s death row and would be the first person executed by the state in its modern death penalty era for a crime committed at age 18, 19 or 20.

Her attorneys have also pointed to what they view as a major disparity between Pike’s death sentence and the sentences received by the other young people connected to Slemmer’s murder.

Pike Expresses Remorse Decades Later

In material submitted as part of her clemency effort, Pike described the murder as the catastrophic act of a reckless and mentally ill teenager.

She said it took years for her to fully understand the enormous consequences of what she had done and acknowledged taking someone’s daughter, sister and friend.

Her legal team says Pike has changed substantially during her decades in prison.

Those arguments, however, did not persuade Lee to commute the sentence.

Victim’s Mother Has Waited More Than 30 Years

While much of the recent attention surrounding the case has focused on Pike’s childhood and mental health, Slemmer’s family has lived with the consequences of the murder for more than three decades.

Slemmer was just 19 when she was killed.

Her mother, May Slemmer Martinez, has publicly supported Pike’s execution and has spoken about the lifelong devastation caused by the loss of her daughter.

That divide has become central to the final days of the case.

Pike’s attorneys and anti-death-penalty advocates argue that her youth, background and mental-health history justify commuting her sentence.

Slemmer’s family, meanwhile, has waited more than 30 years for the punishment imposed by the jury to be carried out.

What Happens Next

Tennessee correction officials have been preparing for Pike’s September 30 execution at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution.

The state has already selected media witnesses and established security and reporting procedures surrounding the prison.

Pike is expected to be executed by lethal injection if no court intervenes.

The most significant remaining legal development is her U.S. Supreme Court case. Her attorneys have asked the justices to halt the execution while the court considers their petition.

That means the case could remain unsettled until very close to the scheduled execution time.

For now, however, Tennessee’s plans remain in place.

Barring a last-minute stay, Christa Pike is scheduled to be executed Wednesday morning — more than 31 years after the murder of Colleen Slemmer and roughly three decades after a Tennessee jury sentenced her to death.