Why Christa Pike wanted no men in the death chamber during her failed execution

Christa Pike, the 50-year-old convicted killer who survived an execution attempt by the state of Tennessee seemed to have an all-female execution staff. As per her attorney, Randy Spivey, it was apparently a dying wish. “What I saw was consistent with that,” Spivey said in response when asked if she granted the all-female execution staff as requested.

Pike had asked that only women attend to her inside the death chamber, citing her history of sexual abuse. She had said that being put to death by a man would be too traumatizing for her, according to her attorneys.

“That was her biggest fear as the victim of sexual abuse, that she would be pinned down, prodded, poked, cut,” another of her lawyers, Stephen Ferrell, said. "Which time she could be reliving her past trauma,” he added.


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The Tennessee murderer would have been the first woman the state put to death in 200 years. Pike was still pinned down for around an hour as medical staff struggled to set the two IV lines, as per Spivey.

Although Pike survived the execution attempt by two doses of pentobarbital, she is now in critical condition at a hospital, as per the attorney.

There were difficulties inside the death chamber, but as per her lawyers, Pike cooperated with the women trying to establish the IV lines.

“Pike was not just cooperative, but was trying to help instruct the people placing the IV lines where they could find [veins]. She over and over again said, ‘Please try up on my shoulder higher. Please try here, I think it will be okay,’” said the lawyer.

Pike had been on death row for murdering her classmate Colleen Slemmer when she was 18 in January 1995. She lured Slemmer into an isolated area on the University of Tennessee agricultural campus before killing her. A year later, she and her boyfriend, Tadaryl Shipp, were convicted of killing. It became one of the most talked about during that time, mostly because of the brutality of the event. Pite kept part of her skull as a souvenir, and a pentagram was carved into Slemmer's chest.