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American murderer (born 1976)
Christa Gail Pike is an American convicted murderer. In 1995, when she was 18, Pike murdered her 19-year-old Job Corps classmate Colleen Slemmer in Knoxville, Tennessee. Pike and her boyfriend lured Slemmer into the woods where they tortured and killed her. In 1996, at the age of 20, Pike was sentenced to death, making her one of the youngest women to receive a death sentence in the United States during the post-Furman period. As of 2026, 18 women have been executed nationwide since 1976, and a woman has not been executed in Tennessee in over 200 years.
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Lawyers for Christa Pike said she's unconscious and on a ventilator after a botched execution attempt. Pike is believed to be the first person to have survived the administration of lethal drugs in the modern era.
Pike survived a lethal injection execution Wednesday. She was sentenced to death for the 1995 killing of her classmate, Colleen Slemmer.
Christa Pike remains "critically ill," unconscious and on a ventilator in a hospital after a botched execution attempt Wednesday night, her attorneys said Friday.