Christa Pike refused her final meal ahead of her scheduled execution in Tennessee, where she was set to become the first woman put to death in the state in more than 200 years. The Tennessee Department of Correction confirmed the 50-year-old death row inmate made no last-meal request, breaking with the long tradition of condemned prisoners choosing a customized final dinner.
No Last Meal Request
Death row inmates are typically offered the chance to choose a final meal, and the ritual has produced everything from simple comfort food to elaborate spreads over the years. But when Tennessee prison officials offered Pike the opportunity, she declined to submit any request at all, the New York Post reported, citing WJHL. The Department of Correction confirmed she had not asked for anything.
Pike was scheduled to die by lethal injection on Wednesday, September 30, at the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville.
$20 for Pizza for the Homeless
According to The Sun, citing the New York Times, Pike went further than simply declining: she asked that the $20 allocated for her final meal be spent on pizza for homeless people in downtown Nashville instead. The gesture drew wide attention as her final hours approached.
The 1995 Murder of Colleen Slemmer
Pike was only 18 when she, her then-boyfriend Tadaryl Shipp and a female friend lured 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer — a fellow student at a Job Corps training center — to an isolated area of the University of Tennessee's Knoxville campus on January 12, 1995. Slemmer was beaten and tortured to death in an attack so brutal it made national headlines; a pentagram was carved into her chest.
A jury sentenced Pike to death in 1996. In 2001, she was convicted of attempting to strangle fellow inmate Patricia Jones with a shoestring, adding 25 years to her sentence. She spent nearly 30 years as the only woman on Tennessee's death row.
Clemency Denied
Pike's lawyers argued she suffered severe childhood abuse and asked Governor Bill Lee for clemency, but Lee refused to intervene. In a letter to NBC News written before learning her last-ditch bid had failed, Pike said: "Whether my clemency is granted or not, I am at peace. I am not afraid to die. I'm only nervous about the process."
What Happened Next
The execution did not go as planned: two doses of pentobarbital failed to kill Pike on September 30, and she was rushed to a Nashville-area hospital unconscious and on a ventilator. The botched procedure led to the resignation of the state prison chief — a story The Morning Post covered on October 4.