Update in case as death row woman set to be first in 200 years executed in US state

Death row inmate Christa Gail Pike is attempting to pump the brakes on her planned execution.

She is set to face the ultimate punishment in five months time, more than 30-years after she brutally murdered her classmate Colleen Slemmer, 19.

But the killer - who is the only woman on death row in Tennessee - is hoping to dodge her doomed fate and has filed a lawsuit against the state in an attempt to stop it going ahead.

Pike will become the first woman to be put to death in Tennessee in two centuries if her execution proceeds as planned. She has been locked up since January 1995 in wake of the horror killing of Slemmer.

Pike, who was 18 at the time, is alleged to have believed that Slemmer was trying to steal her boyfriend, 17-year-old Tadaryl Shipp.

The former couple and their friend Shadolla Peterson lured their victim to her death by asking her to meet them in some woodland in the city of Knoxville in Tennessee before launching a ferocious attack.

Their pal acted as a lookout while Slemmer was savagely beaten, stabbed, and bludgeoned. Chillingly, a pentagram was carved into her forehead and chest.

Disturbingly, Pike reportedly kept a piece of her victim's skull as a 'souvenir' and showed it off to fellow pupils at the career-training program both she and Slemmer had attended.

Colleen Slemmer was brutally tortured and killed by her classmates in 1995 (WBIR10)

Court records share vivid details of the evil that the murderous trio inflicted upon the teenager and how Pike bragged about Slemmer 'begging' for her life while she sliced her throat with a box cutter, beat her and threw asphalt at her head. The documents go on to explain that Pike 'danced in a circle, smiling and singing' as she relayed this information to one of her school pals.

Horrifically, the groundskeeper who found Slemmer's lifeless body told police that she was 'so badly beaten that he had first mistaken it for the corpse of an animal'.

Upon her arrest, Pike confessed to torturing and killing her classmate but claimed she and her accomplices had only been trying to scare her.

She was found guilty of first-degree murder and sentenced to death in 1996, making her the youngest person on death row at the age of 20.

Shipp received a life sentence for Slemmer's murder as he was not eligible for the death penalty due to his age, while Peterson received probation after testifying against Pike.

In 2003, another 25 years was added onto Pike's sentence after she was found guilty of the attempted murder of a fellow inmate whom she had tried to strangle with a shoestring two years prior.

She has now been on death row for more than three decades and the state of Tennessee finally set a date for her execution in October last year.

Pike was just 18 when she committed the horror crime (WBIR10)

On 30 September, 2026, a lethal injection is set to be administered to Pike as punishment for Slemmer's brutal murder.

But earlier this year, her legal team launched a lawsuit in the Davidson County Chancery Court claiming that this execution method 'vio­lates her con­sti­tu­tion­al rights and con­flicts with her reli­gious beliefs'.

Tennessee formerly combined three drugs in a syringe to execute death row prisoners, but now solely use pen­to­bar­bi­tal.

Her lawyers explained their lawsuit against the state hinges on three points, which they previously explained to the Nashville Banner.

"First, given Christa’s unique medical conditions, we have serious reservations about the State of Tennessee’s ability to prevent a tortuous execution," the attorneys said. Second, the State’s protocol fails to make any contingency plans for when things go wrong. Finally, requiring a prisoner to select electrocution to avoid being isolated in the final two weeks of their life is particularly cruel and arbitrary — especially for a prisoner like Christa, who was forced to live in solitary confinement for over 25 years and suffers from severe mental illness."

Pike's lawsuit argues that there is a 'sub­stan­tial risk that she will expe­ri­ence unnec­es­sary super­added pain and suf­fer­ing, ter­ror, and disgrace', especially due to her health woes.

(WBIR10)

It claims she has a blood-clotting condition known as thrombocytopenia - which her lawyers say will leave her 'drowning in her own blood' as her lungs will be overcome by a 'bloody froth'. Pike is also said to suffer from bipolar disorder, PTSD and has 'small veins that make insertion of a needle difficult'.

She wants a per­ma­nent injunc­tion against use of the new exe­cu­tion pro­to­col, the addi­tion of a con­tin­gency plan includ­ing life-sav­ing pro­ce­dures if the exe­cu­tion goes awry, and the removal of the 14-day iso­la­tion peri­od.

But the state doesn't believe that Pike has much of a case.

In a response to the lawsuit which was shared on 19 March, it said that 'the Eighth Amendment does not guarantee a prisoner a painless death' and that 'some risk of pain is inherent in any method of execution − no matter how humane', while adding that there is an 'overwhelming history affirming the use of lethal injection generally and pentobarbital specifically', according to USA Today.

Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti reminded people that Pike 'carried around a piece of Colleen Slemmer's shattered skull in her pocket and showed it to her friends as a trophy after luring Colleen into the woods to torture and murder her', while previously speaking to the publication.

"Pike has offered nothing but speculation that the well-established, constitutional lethal injection method poses any unique risk in her case," he said.

"We wish Pike’s commitment to the sanctity of life had arrived in time to save Colleen Slemmer."