Tennessee | Governor permits Christa Pike execution: 'I am upholding the sentence'

Gov. Bill Lee does not plan to stop Christa Pike's execution.

Pike, 50, is scheduled to be killed by lethal injection 10 a.m. Sept. 30 at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville.

“After deliberate consideration of Christa Gail Pike’s request for clemency, and after a thorough review of the case, I am upholding the sentence of the State of Tennessee and do not plan to intervene," Lee said in a statement released Sept. 28.

Pike's attorneys lamented the news.

“We are deeply saddened and heartbroken by Governor Lee’s decision to deny clemency for Christa Pike," the lawyers said in a statement.

"Moving ahead with her execution puts the State of Tennessee on singular footing: Christa will be the first person Tennessee executes in the modern death penalty era who was a teenager at the time of the offense and the first woman executed by the state in more than 200 years."

Pike's clemency petition had focused on her traumatic, sexually abusive upbringing and her rehabilitation while in prison.

The statement was from her attorneys Stephen Ferrell from the Federal Defenders Office of Eastern Tennessee and Kelly Gleason and Randy Spivey from the Tennessee Office of the Post Conviction Defender.

Pike has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to stop her execution. That case is pending.

Pike was convicted and sentenced to death for the 1995 killing of Colleen Slemmer in Knoxville.

Slemmer was 19 at her death. Pike was 18, the youngest age at which someone can be sentenced to death. She is set to be the first person put to death in Tennessee for a crime committed at age 18 since capital punishment was reinstated in 1976.

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STATEMENT BY CHRISTA PIKE’S ATTORNEYS ON GOVERNOR LEE’S CLEMENCY PETITION DENIAL

Statement from Stephen Ferrell, Federal Defenders Office of Eastern Tennessee, and Kelly Gleason and Randy Spivey, Tennessee Office of the Post Conviction Defender, attorneys for Christa Pike

“We are deeply saddened and heartbroken by Governor Lee’s decision to deny clemency for Christa Pike. Moving ahead with her execution puts the State of Tennessee on singular footing: Christa will be the first person Tennessee executes in the modern death penalty era who was a teenager at the time of the offense and the first woman executed by the state in more than 200 years.

Throughout her childhood, Christa was failed by people and institutions that should have shown her care and meaningful intervention. Instead, her childhood was marked by repeated, documented rape and sexual abuse, neglect, and violence.

The 18-year-old girl suffering from severe mental illness and near-debilitating trauma no longer exists. Christa is a 50-year-old remorseful woman who understands her actions, receives proper treatment for her mental illness, and provides for and guides fellow incarcerated women.

With this decision, the State of Tennessee is ignoring what both science and our legal system have decided: an 18-year-old brain is not an adult brain, and 18 is too young to face execution. This decision also leaves unanswered vital questions about Tennessee’s execution protocol.

We will continue to support Christa through every remaining avenue and advocate for a system that is transparent for the people of Tennessee.” — Tennesseans for Alternatives to the Death Penalty

Source: tennessean.com, Evan Mealins, September 28, 2026

"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted."
— Oscar Wilde

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