Tennessee may carry out its first execution of a woman in more than 200 years after<\/p>\n\n\n\n
the state supreme court approved moving forward with the death sentence of 49-year-old<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Christa Gail Pike. Pike, the only woman on Tennessee\u2019s death row,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
was 18 when she was convicted of murdering 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer in 1995.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Prosecutors said Pike believed Slemmer was interested in her boyfriend,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
leading to a planned attack in a wooded area near Knoxville.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Slemmer was killed with the assistance of Pike\u2019s boyfriend, Tadaryl Shipp,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
and another student, Shadolla Peterson. The crime shocked the public due to its brutality.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Investigators were further disturbed when Pike showed them a fragment of Slemmer\u2019s<\/p>\n\n\n\n
skull that she had kept. Retired detective Randy York recalled that<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Pike demonstrated how it fit into the wound \u201clike a puzzle.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Pike was convicted of first-degree murder in 1996 and sentenced to death.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Shipp received life without parole, while Peterson received probation after cooperating with authorities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Pike later received an additional 25-year sentence for attacking another inmate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Her execution is scheduled for September 30, 2026. Defense attorneys argue that her history of severe<\/p>\n\n\n\n childhood abuse, mental health conditions, and remorse should be considered. If carried out,<\/p>\n\n\n\n the execution would mark Tennessee\u2019s first execution of a woman since 1820.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Tennessee may carry out its first execution of a woman in more than 200 years after the state supreme court approved moving forward with the death sentence of 49-year-old Christa Gail Pike. Pike, the only woman on Tennessee\u2019s death row, was 18 when she was convicted of murdering 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer in 1995. Prosecutors said…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":17504,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17503","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17503","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17503"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17503\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17505,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17503\/revisions\/17505"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/17504"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17503"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17503"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/horizonvibe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17503"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}