Nocturnal 
Christa Pike has turned down the offer of a final meal ahead of her execution, which is scheduled to take place on Wednesday (30 September). According to the Tennessee Department of Correction, the 50-year-old declined to select anything before she is put to death by lethal injection.
If the execution goes ahead as planned, Pike will become the first woman executed by the state of Tennessee in more than 200 years. It is due to take place at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville, with the Tennessee Supreme Court having set the date roughly a year in advance.
Her final bid for mercy was rejected this week after Tennessee Governor Bill Lee declined to grant clemency, and the US Supreme Court also refused to halt the execution.
The 1995 murder of Colleen Slemmer
Pike was just 18 when she was convicted of murdering 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer on 12 January 1995. The pair had met as students at a Job Corps training centre in Knoxville, Tennessee.
Court documents state that Pike, allegedly motivated by the belief that Slemmer was trying to “steal” her boyfriend, lured her to an isolated wooded area near the University of Tennessee’s agricultural campus. There, prosecutors said, Pike and her then-boyfriend, Tadaryl Shipp, who was 17 at the time, beat Slemmer for around 30 minutes. A pentagram was carved into her chest before Pike delivered the fatal blow. She was also accused of later showing another student a piece of Slemmer’s skull.
Pike was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death in 1996. Shipp received a life sentence with the possibility of parole because he was 17 at the time of the killing. A third student involved, Shadolla Peterson, pleaded guilty to being an accessory after the fact, testified against Pike and Shipp, and was given six years’ probation.
‘I am at peace’, says Pike
In a letter shared with NBC News, Pike wrote that she has made peace with her fate. “Whether my clemency is granted or not, I am at peace,” she said, adding: “I am not afraid to die. I’m only nervous about the process.”
Her legal team’s 226-page clemency petition argued that her age, a childhood marked by abuse and neglect, and later diagnoses of bipolar disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder should have been considered mitigating factors at trial. Pike has also reportedly requested an all-female lethal injection team, and Tennessee corrections officials have said they would try to accommodate some of her requests, including using female guards during her transfer.
Governor Lee, however, said in a statement, as reported by the BBC: “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.”
Where things stand now
Colleen Slemmer’s mother, May Martinez, has said she plans to attend the execution and has previously said the process has taken far too long, telling local outlet WBIR that her daughter has become “a forgotten victim” while Pike receives attention.
Barring any last-minute legal intervention, Pike’s execution is due to go ahead on Wednesday morning at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution, roughly three decades after she was first sentenced to death.
