Strapped to a gurney and minutes from death, convicted killer Christa Pike started to sing before the botched execution that the victim’s mother called “a mess.”
Behind the glass at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville on Sept. 30, witnesses watched as Christa Pike, 50, lay beneath a sheet with an IV running into her arm, waiting for the lethal drugs that were supposed to kill her.
But before the execution got underway, another sound drifted from the chamber. Pike was singing with her spiritual advisor, unaware that that by the end of the day, she’d be receiving “life-saving measures.”
Death of Collen Slemmer
More than three decades earlier, Pike had been sentenced to death for the brutal 1995 murder of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer.
On Jan. 12, 1995, Pike and her then-boyfriend, Tadaryl Shipp, attacked 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer after luring her to a secluded area near the University of Tennessee’s agricultural campus in Knoxville.
The teenagers knew each other through the Knoxville Job Corps, where Pike had become convinced that Slemmer was interested in Shipp, according to USA Today.
Slemmer was beaten, cut and killed during a prolonged attack, while another teenager, Shadolla Peterson, was also present. Shipp carved a pentagram into Slemmer’s chest, and Pike kept a piece of her victim’s skull as a souvenir, later showing it to students.
Death row sentence
Pike was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death, making her the youngest woman sent to Tennessee’s death row.
Shipp, who was 17 when Slemmer was killed and therefore ineligible for the death penalty, received a life sentence. Peterson testified against the pair and received probation.
A jury convicted Pike of premeditated first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit first-degree murder, sentencing her to death. Shipp received a life sentence, while Peterson testified for prosecutors and received probation.
‘I’m trying’
About 31 years later, and 10 days after what would have been Slemmer’s 50th birthday, Tennessee prepared to carry out Pike’s sentence.
She was originally scheduled to die at 10 a.m. on Sept. 30, but hours of legal maneuvering pushed the execution into the evening before the U.S. Supreme Court cleared the state to proceed.
Witnesses entered the viewing area shortly after 6:30 p.m., but another wait followed before the curtain finally opened at 7:27 p.m.
Pike lay on the gurney with an IV in her right arm. She coughed, spoke with Rev. Mikey Noechel, her spiritual advisor, and delivered her final statement before the lethal injection got underway, Fox5 reports.
Within minutes, however, witnesses could see that the execution was not proceeding as expected.
“The vein in my arm feels like it’s about to bust,” she said, according to the Nashville Banner.
