Critics of Colleen Slemmer murder case argue Chirsta Pike doesnt deserve the death penalty

The cameras cannot see her face yet, but her tiny shoulders, hitching violently upwards, tell the story.Then the audible sobs fill the room.Inside the Knox County Criminal Court that day, on March 30, 1996, 20-year-old Christa Pike is becoming the youngest woman to be sentenced to death in the modern era.When she turns around, her face sprinkled with adolescent acne, the tears are freely flowing.“It is ordered that you shall be put to death by electrocution … on the 12th day of January, 1997, your body shall be subjected to shock by sufficient current of electricity.May God have mercy upon you,” Judge Mary Beth Leibowitz said.Panicked now, Pike begs for the smallest of mercies.“Can I please hug my mum before I go?” she asks Leibowitz.The answer is no.“Please, let me just hug my mum,” she wails as she is led away, her mother reassuring her that she is loved on the way out the door.It is a jarring scene.

A young woman, her hair tied up in a scrunchie, set to die at the hands of an executioner.Thirty years on from her day in court, Pike is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection in the execution chamber at Nashville, Tennessee on September 30.Whether she deserves it or not is disputed — and it matters now more than ever.Her story is anything but black and white.Court documents describe the “horrific” and “brutal” murder of Colleen Slemmer in great detail.“This case began with the horrific and brutal 1995 murder of Colleen Slemmer,” they read.“Pike and Slemmer were both students at the Job Corps Centre in Knoxville, Tennessee at the time.“They had a strained relationship; Pike claimed that Slemmer ‘had been ‘trying to get [her] boyfriend’ and … ‘running her mouth’ everywhere.“These bad feelings unfortunately resulted in the following events.”The Tennessee Supreme Court description, obtained by news.com.au, details how Pike lied to Slemmer about a trip to a Blockbuster video store before Pike and her boyfriend Tadary...