Christa Pike’s Last Request Before Scheduled Lethal Injection

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — In the hours before Christa Pike was scheduled to become the first woman executed by Tennessee in more than two centuries, she made an unusual request about how the procedure would be carried out.

Pike, 50, asked for an all-female execution team if she were put to death by lethal injection, according to reports. She was scheduled to be executed at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville for the 1995 murder of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer.

Pike also declined to select a special last meal, according to the Tennessee Department of Correction.

In a letter shared before the scheduled execution, Pike said she was at peace with the possibility of dying but was concerned about the execution process itself.

Her request for an all-female team came as her attorneys continued challenging aspects of Tennessee’s execution procedures. Court filings show that Pike had raised concerns about the state’s lethal-injection protocol and whether a spiritual adviser would be permitted inside the execution chamber.

Pike was 18 when Slemmer was killed in January 1995. Prosecutors said Pike and her boyfriend, Tadaryl Shipp, lured Slemmer to a wooded area in Knoxville, where she was killed. Pike was later sentenced to death, while Shipp received life in prison with the possibility of parole.

Pike’s case has remained controversial because of her age at the time of the crime and evidence concerning severe childhood abuse and trauma presented by her legal team. Pike has acknowledged responsibility for Slemmer’s death while asking that her death sentence be changed to life imprisonment.

The execution was ultimately stopped

The lethal injection did not take place as scheduled.

On Sept. 30, shortly before Pike was due to be executed, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit issued a temporary stay. The court said it needed time to consider Pike’s latest legal filing.

The stay came one day after the U.S. Supreme Court rejected Pike’s request to halt the execution.

The Sixth Circuit’s order does not overturn Pike’s conviction or death sentence. Instead, the execution remains on hold while the federal appeals court considers the legal issues raised by her attorneys. Tennessee officials have indicated they will challenge the stay.

For now, Pike’s final request about the execution team remains part of a procedure that has itself been placed on hold.

The case is still moving through the courts, and there is no new execution date under the current stay.