Christa Pike is set to be executed on September 30, which would make her the first woman put to death in Tennessee in over 200 years. Meanwhile, her former boyfriend who was convicted for the same crime, will eventually walk free.
Christa Pike is now 50 years old. She is scheduled to be executed at the end of this month for a crime she committed when she was 18, in 1995, when she and her former boyfriend and friend murdered fellow Job Corps student Colleen Slemmer.
The former boyfriend, Tadaryl Shipp, was also convicted for his role in the same killing. Now Pike faces lethal injection, but Shipp has spent decades in prison, getting closer and closer to eventually being released.
How the chilling events unfolded
Pike and Shipp were both students at the Knoxville Job Corps center in Tennessee. They had reportedly developed a shared interest in the occult.
On January 12, 1995, Pike, Shipp, and their friend Shadolla Peterson lured the victim to an isolated area near the University of Tennessee, under the pretense of making peace with her.
Pike and Slemmer in their relationship in the weeks before the murder, with Pike accusing Slemmer of trying to steal her boyfriend and spreading rumors about her at school. It’s likely this tension is what made Pike’s offer to “make peace” seem believable enough for Slemmer to agree to meet her.
According to Pike’s own closest friend at the time, Kim Iloilo, the jealousy was based on nothing real. Before Pike arrived at the school, Shipp had briefly shown some interest in Slemmer, but once Pike entered the picture, he only had eyes for her.
Once Slemmer arrived at the site, the three other teens beat and stabbed her to death brutally over 30 minutes. Pike allegedly also carved a pentagram into her own chest during the incident and kept a part of Slemmer’s skull.
Why their sentences differ so dramatically
All three were arrested, and Pike eventually confessed to the killing.
Peterson testified against Pike and Shipp and received probation after pleading guilty as an accessory.
Shipp was convicted of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder, but the death penalty was never on the table for him, because he was 17 at the time of the crime, making him legally ineligible for capital punishment.
He was instead sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole.
Pike, who was 18 during the killing, wasn’t afforded that same legal protection. At just 20 years old when convicted, she became the youngest woman in modern US history to be sentenced to death.
Shipp’s request for release was denied
Shipp remains incarcerated, and his path toward release hasn’t gone smoothly. The Tennessee Board of Parole denied his request for release in October 2025, and his case won’t be reviewed again until 2031.
The stark difference between Pike’s and his punishments has become central to her legal team’s fight against her execution.
In a 2021 filing seeking to have her sentence commuted, her attorneys argued the disparity was disproportionate, describing her at the time as being in an abusive relationship with Shipp, whom they characterized as a leader in the crime.
The age gap has drawn attention from the courts, too. Sixth Circuit Judge Jane Stranch wrote in 2019 that had Pike been 17 instead of 18, like Shipp, she would never have been eligible for the death penalty in the first place.
Pike’s lawyers have also pointed to her background, arguing that her childhood, marked by what they describe as severe physical and sexual abuse, along with a later diagnosis of bipolar disorder, wasn’t properly considered at sentencing.
They say much of that history was never presented to the jury that decided her fate. A 226-page clemency petition is now before Tennessee Governor Bill Lee, requesting her sentence be commuted to life without parole.
Pike’s own reflection on the crime
In a handwritten letter, Pike has spoken about coming to terms with what she did.
“Think back to the worst mistake you made as a reckless teenager. Well, mine happened to be huge, unforgettable and ruined countless lives. I was a mentally ill 18-year-old kid,” she wrote.
“It took me numerous years to even realise the gravity of what I’d done. Even more to accept how many lives I affected. I took the life of someone’s child, sister, friend. It sickens me now to think that someone as loving and compassionate as myself could commit such a crime.”
Unless her sentence is commuted, Pike is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection on September 30.
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