Christa Gail Pike, 50, is scheduled to be executed by Tennessee on September 30, 2026, which would make her the first woman executed by the state in more than 200 years. Pike has spent about three decades on death row after being convicted of the 1995 murder of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer, a crime committed when Pike was 18.
Her attorneys are challenging Tennessee’s lethal-injection protocol, citing her medical conditions and concerns about severe complications, and have proposed alternatives including a central-line-first procedure or hanging. A judge recently rejected the challenge, but the Tennessee Supreme Court still has the final say, leaving Pike’s execution date in place for now.
