The execution of Christa Pike, who was set to be the first woman put to death in Tennessee in over 200 years, was dramatically halted just an hour before she was due to die by lethal injection. This comes after judges raised “serious concerns” about whether the teen killer’s horrific childhood abuse was properly weighed by the jury that sentenced her to death.
Appeals court issues 11th-hour stay
The US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit issued an 11th-hour stay of execution for Pike, the only woman on Tennessee, USA’s death row. Her lawyer said: “The court has stayed this recognising the serious concerns about Christa’s scheduled execution.”
In its order, the appeals court said the execution is paused “until further order of this court”. The late intervention came after Pike’s case had appeared to hit a dead end.
Prior legal challenges rejected
Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee had already refused to step in, denying clemency, the Independent reported. And on Tuesday (September 29), the US Supreme Court rejected a last-ditch request from Pike’s attorneys to halt the execution.
Witnesses were already gathering at the prison in Nashville, Tennessee, as preparations were made for a 10:00am lethal injection. But at 9:00am, the federal appeals court stepped in, as per the Independent. The judges consequently want to examine whether Pike’s 1996 sentencing fully considered evidence of severe trauma.
Evidence of trauma and brain damage
The evidence claims she was raped repeatedly as a child and teen, “beginning before she could walk and continuing until she was 17”, and that she suffers PTSD, Memphis Flyer reported. Her lawyers also point to evidence of brain damage linked to heavy drinking during pregnancy, and stress she was only 18 when the 1995 murder she’s convicted of occurred.
Pike said in a statement included with her clemency petition: “I was a mentally ill 18-year-old kid. It took me numerous years to even realise the gravity of what I’d done. “I took the life of someone’s child, sister, friend.” But the victim’s family have fought for the sentence to be carried out.
Victim's family and torture argument
Colleen Slemmer’s mother May Martinez said she has waited decades, adding: “Every time I think about it, I think about Colleen feeling that pain and trying to get up and run.”
Pike’s lawyers argue the execution process itself could trigger PTSD “flashbacks” so intense it would amount to torture. In a plea, they said: “She will experience being held down and then being tied down… very similar to how she experienced being pinned and trapped and raped.” They added: “In this state, Christa would experience the subjective terror of being actively raped while being physically unable to resist. This is torture.”
Several organisations backed Pike’s challenge, warning that trauma flashbacks are not “all in their head”.
