Christa Pike: Final Weeks Before Execution | Tennessee Prepares to Execute a Woman After 200 Years

For the first time in more than 200 years, the state of Tennessee is about to execute a woman. Her name is Christa Pike. Her execution is set for the 30th of September, 2026. Every appeal she has filed has failed. Every court has turned her away. In just days, the sentence handed down three decades ago will finally be carried out.

 But to understand how she got here, we have to go back to 1995 to a job core campus in Knoxville, Tennessee, and to a jealousy that grew into something almost impossible to explain. Christ believed she had received a revelation. She believed the occult had chosen her to carry out a sacrifice. And the person she chose as her victim was a 19-year-old girl who had done nothing more than be friends with the wrong person.

 What Chris Pike did that night went far beyond murder. and what she carried away from the scene hidden in her jacket is something investigators still describe as one of the most disturbing details in the entire case. Welcome back to the channel. If you are new here, this video covers the full case history of Christa Pike from her childhood all the way to her execution date.

 Stay until the end because the details only get harder to believe from here. Colleen SL was born and raised in Orange Park, Florida. Those who knew her described a warm young woman full of energy and hopeful about her future. Looking to build a career, Colleen enrolled at the JobCore Center in Knoxville, Tennessee to study computer programming.

 She arrived 3 months before Christa Pike, ready to start a new chapter of her life. At JobCore, Colleen shared classes with a young man named Tateral Ship. The two became friends long before Christa Pike ever entered the picture. Colleen had no reason to think that friendship would ever cause her harm. It was simple, ordinary, and nothing more than that.

 But everything changed when Christ arrived at the center and began a relationship with Ship. Christa saw Colleen’s friendship with her boyfriend as a threat. Even though nothing romantic existed between them, Colleen and Ship both tried to reassure her, explaining again and again that they were only friends, Christa refused to accept it.

 What began as an innocent friendship between two classmates would soon be twisted into a motive for murder. Colleen Surmer had no idea that a bond built in a classroom would one day cost her life. She was simply a 19-year-old girl trying to build a future. Caught in the middle of a jealousy she never created and never understood.

 Christa Gail Pike was born on the 10th of March 1976 in Beckley, West Virginia. Her mother, Cararissa Hansen, struggled with alcohol and drug use. She spent much of her time chasing relationships and parties instead of caring for her daughter. With no stable parent at home, Christa was raised among different relatives, moving from one household to another throughout her childhood.

 As a teenager, Christa began drinking heavily and using marijuana. She eventually dropped out of high school without finishing her education. Hoping to help her find direction, relatives enrolled her in JobCore, a federal program offering vocational training to young people. At 18 years old, Christa moved into the job core center in Knoxville, Tennessee to study computer programming.

 It was there that she met Tateral Ship, a fellow student from Memphis, Tennessee. Ship had a deep interest in the occult. He wore necklaces with inverted pentagrams, carried a satanic Bible, and openly discussed his beliefs with other students. The two became a couple and Christa quickly adopted his interests as her own.

 Together they built a private altar and began performing rituals tied to their shared beliefs. These rituals and the intensity with which Christa embraced them would soon become warning signs of just how far she was willing to go to prove her devotion. As Christa Pike’s relationship with Tateral Ship grew, so did her jealousy toward Colleen Surmer.

 Every time she saw the two of them talking, she became convinced that Colleen was trying to take her boyfriend away from her. Both Colleen and Ship repeatedly told her the truth. They insisted there was nothing romantic between them, only a friendship built through shared classes. Christa heard these explanations again and again, but she refused to accept them.

 In her mind, the friendship was a threat that needed to end. On the 5th of January 1995, Christa confided in a fellow student named Shadola Peterson who shared her interest in the occult. Christa claimed she had received a revelation. She said the occult had chosen her to carry out a sacrifice and that Colleen Slmer was meant to be the victim.

 There was nothing spiritual about this claim. It was an excuse built from jealousy and designed to justify a murder she had already decided to commit. With her mind made up, Christa Pike began convincing others to join her plan. She first turned to Shadola Peterson who had already believed her claim of a revelation.

 Christa convinced her that the sacrifice was necessary. She then turned to Tedarel Ship. Christa told him that to prove true devotion to their shared beliefs, they needed to carry out a human sacrifice. Ship agreed to take part. Because Christa did not want to speak with Colleen directly, she sent Shadola Peterson to arrange the meeting.

Peterson told Colleen that Christa wanted to make peace and put their conflict behind them. She suggested they meet in an isolated area of campus, explaining that it would give Christa a chance to smoke marijuana without being seen. Colleen was thrilled at the idea. She had spent weeks hoping the tension between her and Christa would end, and this felt like exactly that.

 She had no reason to suspect the invitation was anything but genuine. Before we walk through what happened next, take a moment to hit subscribe. The details ahead are difficult to hear, but they are essential to understanding exactly how this case unfolded and how investigators later pieced together every moment of that night.

 Around 8:00 that evening, Colleen Surmer met Shadola Peterson and Tateral Ship at her dormatory. They told her that Christa was waiting for her nearby. Believing the conflict between them was finally over, Colleen agreed to go with them. The three left the JobCore campus together and walked along 17th Street, heading toward the University of Tennessee’s agricultural campus.

 Colleen walked with them freely. She had no idea what was waiting for her at the end of that walk. They arrived at a desolate area near an old steam plant on the campus grounds. There was no peace offering waiting for her there. The moment they reached the spot, Chrisapike attacked without warning, slamming Colleen’s head against her own knee.

Colleen tried to run. Tadel ship chased her down, caught her, and dragged her back so the assault could continue. What followed lasted between 30 and 60 minutes. Court records describe injuries almost impossible to comprehend. Pike and ship used a box cutter to inflict at least six deep cuts to Colleen’s neck, wounds that cut through fat and muscle.

More cuts followed across her back. To stop her from screaming, they tore off her blouse and bra and forced a cloth into her mouth. Colleen fought back with everything she had. Forensic evidence later showed extensive defensive wounds across her arms and hands. Proof that she struggled against her attackers for as long as her body allowed.

 During the assault, Pike and Ship carved a pentagram into her chest roughly 8 cm wide using the same box cutter. Even after everything already done to her, Colleen was still alive. She begged them to stop. Nearly an hour into the attack, Christa Pike lifted a large piece of asphalt lying at the scene and slammed it into Colleen’s head.

 The force of the blow was so extreme that the asphalt itself broke apart into several pieces. Pike and ship then used the broken fragments to strike her further as she lay dying on the ground. By the time it was over, Colleen SLMur had suffered injuries far beyond anything her attackers claimed was necessary for their so-called sacrifice.

 What had started as a promise of reconciliation had ended in one of the most brutal killings Knoxville had ever seen. And the horror did not end there. What Chris Pike did next in the final moments before leaving that scene is something investigators still find difficult to describe. After the killing, Christa Pike tore away a fragment of Colleen’s skull and took it with her, keeping it as a trophy from the attack.

 Around 10:15 that night, the three returned to the job course center as if nothing had happened. Christa could not stay silent. That same night, she confessed to her roommate that she had just murdered Colleen Slmer. As proof, she pulled the piece of skull from her jacket pocket and began describing the attack in detail.

 Witnesses said that as she spoke, Christa smiled, danced in circles, and sang. There was no sign of guilt, no sign of remorse. For Christa Pike, the night’s violence seemed to be something worth celebrating. The following morning, on the 13th of January, 1995, at around 8:00, two employees from the University of Tennessee’s grounds department discovered Colleen Slimmer’s body near the steam plant.

 The investigation moved quickly from there. Christa Pike’s roommate came forward and told authorities what Christa had confessed the night before, giving investigators their first solid lead in the case. Soon after, forensic testing confirmed that blood found on Tateral Ship’s shirt and pants matched Colleen’s genetic profile. Between the roommate’s account and the forensic match, investigators now had strong evidence pointing directly at the people responsible.

 The pieces of the case were falling into place, and it would not be long before arrests followed. On the 14th of January 1995, just two days after the murder, Christa Pike was arrested along with Tatterel Ship and Shadola Peterson. From the start, Pike confessed to the crime and admitted her role in the killing. During questioning, she also claimed she had heard voices telling her to act, though this claim did little to change the direction of the investigation.

 With a confession, forensic evidence, and witness accounts all pointing in the same direction, prosecutors had what they needed. The case against all three suspects was building quickly, and it would not be long before it moved from investigation to trial. Christa Pike’s trial began in March of 1996 in Knox County.

 After reviewing the evidence, the jury found her guilty on the 22nd of March of first-degree premeditated murder and conspiracy to commit first-degree murder. 8 days later, the court sentenced her to death. At only 20 years old, Christa Pike became one of the youngest women ever placed on death row in the United States. Tadel Ship was tried separately in January of 1997.

 He was also found guilty of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder. However, because he was only 17 years old at the time of the crime, Tennessee law barred him from receiving the death penalty. Instead, he was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole. In October of 2025, Ship appeared before the parole board for the first time.

 His request was denied because of the extreme seriousness of the crime. His case will be reviewed again in October of 2031. Shadola Peterson, who had served as a lookout during the murder, accepted a plea agreement with prosecutors. She pleaded guilty to accessory after the fact and received a sentence of 6 years. Peterson has been free since 2003, and little is known about her life since then.

 Three people took part in Colleen SL’s murder. Only one of them would spend the rest of her life facing the possibility of execution. Christa Pike’s decades on death row were far from quiet. On the 24th of August 2001, a fire broke out in the maximum security women’s unit. During the evacuation, Pike was placed in a holding cage alongside inmates Natasha Cornett and Patricia Jones.

 A verbal fight broke out between Jones and Cornet. Pike stepped in, wrapping a boot lace around Patricia Jones’s neck and applying pressure until Jones lost consciousness. Officers intervened before Jones died. Pike was later convicted of attempted murder and given an additional 25 years in prison. In 2011, Pike began exchanging letters with Donald Kohut, a personal trainer from New Jersey.

 Kohut became obsessed with her and began visiting regularly. According to authorities, he developed a plan to help her escape and recruited a corrections officer, Justin Heflin, allegedly in exchange for $20,000 to help obtain a copy of a prison key. The plan was uncovered before it could be carried out. In March of 2012, both men were arrested.

 Koh was sentenced to 7 years in prison. Heftlin cooperated with investigators, avoided prison time, and was fired from his position. In 2016, Pike was found with a smuggled cell phone. The device contained messages showing her attempts to manipulate several men, evidence that she was still searching for a way out of prison. By 2025, nearly three decades of appeals had finally run out.

 The Tennessee Supreme Court officially set her execution date for the 30th of September 2026 at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville because she was sentenced in 1996. The electric chair remained her legally applicable method of execution, but Tennessee law allows condemned inmates to choose lethal injection instead.

 Pike’s legal team chose lethal injection. In January of 2026, her attorneys filed a lawsuit challenging the state’s lethal injection protocol. They argued that a clotting disorder and small veins could cause her unconstitutional suffering during the procedure and asked the court for a stay. Then on the 21st of May 2026, the state attempted to execute another inmate, Tony Chapman.

 The procedure took more than an hour because staff struggled to locate a usable vein. Pike’s legal team pointed to this incident in a new motion to the Tennessee Supreme Court, asking the justices to halt her execution. The court rejected the motion, ruling that lethal injection remained a valid method for carrying out her sentence.

 On the 1st of September, the state opened applications for media organizations wishing to attend the execution as witnesses. The process closed on the 8th of September when the selected outlets were confirmed. With every appeal exhausted, Christa Pike’s execution date now stands only weeks away. More than 30 years have passed since the night Colleen Sleur was killed.

 What began as jealousy over a simple friendship ended in a murder so brutal it shocked an entire community. And it will end decades later inside an execution chamber. For Colleen’s family, this has meant 30 years of waiting for a sentence to finally be carried out. No amount of time can undo what happened to her, but for them, this moment closes a chapter that has stayed open for far too long.

Christa Pike’s execution also carries a weight beyond this one case. Tennessee has not executed a woman in over two centuries. Whatever happens on the 30th of September, 2026 will be a moment the state has not seen in generations. So, we want to ask you, what moment in this story hit hardest for you? Was it the murder itself, the trophy Christa Pike took that night, or everything that followed inside prison walls? Let us know in the comments below, and subscribe for more full case histories like this one.