After more than three decades behind bars, after years of appeals and delays, after a crime that once shocked an entire state, a final date is now marked on the calendar but,
Christa Gail Pike, sentenced to death for the 1995 murder of Colleen Slemmer, is scheduled for execution on September 30, 2026, following approval from the Tennessee Supreme Court, therefore,
Convicted at just 18 for a killing that stunned Tennessee and later receiving additional prison time for attacking another inmate, Pike remains the only woman on the state’s death row as her attorneys argue that trauma, mental illness, and her youth at the time should still matter. If carried out, it would mark Tennessee’s first execution of a woman since 1820 — a decision that continues to divide opinion and raise difficult questions about justice, mercy, and time, but,