Christa Pike's ex-boyfriend Tadaryl Shipp, who escaped death penalty in Satanic killing, could be free in 5 years

Christa Pike's ex-boyfriend Tadaryl Shipp, who escaped death penalty in the Satanic killing of Colleen Slemmer in 1995, could go free in five years. According to a report of The Sun, 49 years old Shipp is now at Tennessee’s Northwest Correctional Complex. Citing prison records, the report claimed that Shipp could go free in five years, by October 2031. Shipp also said to have adopted a new alias as Abdul Khalip, the Sun claimed citing records.

Tadaryl Shipp was 17 years old when he and Christa murdered Slemmer and that's why he was not sentence to death. Pike, Shipp and a third companion lured 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer, a classmate at their Knoxville Job Corps vocational center, into a wooded area where they tortured and killed her in 1995.

The grisly nature of the slaying, which involved the perpetrators carving the shape of a pentagram in the victim's chest and taking a chunk of her skull as a souvenir of the carnage, drew intense media coverage at the time. Trial testimony indicated that Pike viewed Slemmer as a rival for the affections of her boyfriend, Tadaryl Shipp.

Pike and Shipp confessed to the killing, and both were convicted the following year of first-degree murder. Pike was sentenced to death, while Shipp received a life sentence with the possibility of parole. Shipp became eligible for his first parole in October 2025, but was denied at his first hearing because of “the seriousness of the offense”, Sun claimed.

The third accused in the murder case, Shadolla Peterson, was also 18 years at the time of the murder but he had acted as a lookout for the other two. During the trial, he appeared as a witness for the prosecution and received probation.

Meanwhile, Pike survived two lethal injections during a botched execution. She was reportedly “angry and confused” in the hours after regaining consciousness following Tennessee’s failed execution attempt, her lawyer said Wednesday.

“She is angry and confused about everything right now,” attorney Randy Spivey said during a news conference following a court hearing about preserving evidence.

Pike, believed to be the first person to survive after receiving lethal injection drugs during an execution, stunningly woke up as plans were being made to remove her from life support, just six days after she was strapped to a gurney in the death chamber, said Spivey.

Her lawyers said Wednesday that she has suffered enough and want the governor to commute her sentence. A judge in Nashville told the state on Wednesday to save evidence from the execution attempt as Pike's attorneys try to find out more.

The failed execution on Sept. 30 has renewed scrutiny of how states carry out the death penalty, in particular the use of lethal injection. Texas on Wednesday carried out the first execution in the U.S. since Tennessee attempted to put Pike to death.