US Supreme Court Revives Christa Pike Execution at 11th Hour, Overturning 2-1 Stay
Updated
Updated · Boston.com · Sep 30
US Supreme Court Revives Christa Pike Execution at 11th Hour, Overturning 2-1 Stay
3 articles · Updated · Boston.com · Sep 30
Summary
Hours before Tennessee’s midnight deadline, the Supreme Court let Christa Gail Pike’s execution proceed, reversing a 2-1 Sixth Circuit stay issued after witnesses had already gathered in Nashville.
The appeals court had paused the case to review whether Pike’s claims of severe childhood sexual abuse were fully weighed at sentencing; Tennessee’s attorney general immediately asked the high court to lift that delay.
Sonia Sotomayor, joined by Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, dissented, saying the ruling could allow Pike to be executed before pending challenges to her conviction are properly considered.
Pike, 50, was sentenced to death for the 1995 killing of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer and would be Tennessee’s first woman executed in at least 200 years if the lethal injection is carried out.
The case has revived debate over executing young offenders because Pike was 18 at the time, while supporters cite mental illness and abuse history and Slemmer’s family says it has waited decades for the sentence to be enforced.