Death row killer Christa Pike’s lawyer reveals what she fears more than dying ahead of execution

On 30 September, Tennessee is set to execute its first woman since 1819, via lethal injection - but dying isn’t what she’s most scared of.

Christa Pike, 50, is an American convicted murderer who was the youngest woman to be incarcerated on death row in the US, after being convicted when she was just 18 years old.

In 1995, Pike and two oth­er teens killed their fellow Knoxville Job Corps student, 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer, in a heinous crime that made headlines around the country for its brutality.

Lawyers for Pike have filed for clemency, ask­ing for her death sen­tence to be changed to life in prison with­out the pos­si­bil­i­ty of parole.

The petition out­lines a case that her team has built over decades of appeals, which claims her actions at 18 years old can­not be sep­a­rat­ed from her child­hood, which was marked by repeat­ed rape, sex­u­al abuse, and neglect that went ‘unad­dressed by the adults and state sys­tems meant to pro­tect her’.

Christa Pike has been on death row in Tennessee for three decades (Tennessee Department of Correction)

However, with the execution date looming, there’s another legal fight going on, as Pike’s attorneys have also challenged some aspects of Tennessee’s lethal injection process, such as what would happen if execution workers struggle to establish an IV.

Assistant Federal Defender Stephen Ferrell told NewsChannel 9 that Pike has a history of difficult blood draws and is scared of what could happen if they need to use a central line.

He explained: "Her biggest fear is not the fear of dying. It's the fear of that process."

Ferrell pointed to the state's execution of inmate Tony Carruthers, whose execution was called off after workers couldn’t find a suitable vein.

As reported by The Guardian, he became the ninth person to survive a failed execution in the last 80 years.

Tony Carruthers was convicted in connection with three 1994 murders (Tennessee Department of Correction)

His lawyer, Maria DeLiberato, told reporters that she saw him ‘wincing and groaning’ as the execution team tried to find a vein, calling it ‘horrible’ to witness, with several puncture wounds and ‘a lot of blood’.

In response, Tennessee Governor Bill Lee granted Carruthers a one-year reprieve from execution.

Ferrell, who has represented Pike since 2012, said she is trying to prepare herself for the possibility that the execution will happen and ‘if it's quick and painless, she can accept that’.

There are 45 women on death rows across the US (Tyla)

Pleading her case, he also told the outlet: "Christa Pike at age 50 is not at all Christa Pike at age 18."

However, Ferrell doesn’t minimise what Slemmer and her family endured, and said: "It was a brutal crime. There's no way to change that and no way to say that it wasn't."

Slemmer was stabbed and bludgeoned, her skull was smashed, and a pentagram was reportedly carved in her chest.

Pike committed the crime with her then-boyfriend Tadaryl Shipp, who was 17 years old and therefore inel­i­gi­ble for a death sen­tence so he received a life sen­tence and is now eli­gi­ble for parole.

Pike brutally murdered Colleen Slemmer in 1995 (First Coast News/ABC)

Shadolla Peterson, who was 18 and kept lookout while the murder was committed, tes­ti­fied against Pike and Shipp and received probation.

Ferrell believes the jury that sentenced Pike didn’t know the important evidence about her childhood, mental health, and age.

"I hope that they are able to see the person who has grown and evolved," he added.