The Youngest Girl On Death Row

Right now in Tennessee, there's a notorious killer sitting on death row. "I've never been in a presence of anyone I thought was pure evil, but to me she's pure evil." This killer learned a young girl into the woods and subjected her to nearly an hour of horrific torture. Beat her, kicked her, smashed her face into the ground. "They told whether they played cat and mouse, whether they would let her get up, she would beg for her life. At one point they said that she told them just let me go. I'll not say anything." And they said, "You know we can't do that. Here is a young woman who must have gone through absolute hell. And I can't imagine anybody going through that. And I can't imagine enduring that as she did for that long." This killer used a blade to stop this young girl over 300 times before participating in this young girl having a satanic symbol carved into her skin while she was still alive, before finally killing her by using a large chunk of asphalt to crush her face. And then her killer took a piece of her skull as a souvenir. An autopsy confirms she was slashed repeatedly with a meat cleaver and some other small cutting device, perhaps a razor blade or box opener. Authorities say she was then beaten over the head with a large chunk of asphalt from this pile. When you imagine this killer, you might be thinking of the most depraved, sadistic serial killers in history. Ted Bundy, Jeffrey Dahmer, you would probably never believe that the crime I just described was committed by a teenage girl. This is the murder of Colleen Slammer and her killer, Krista Pike, the youngest girl in America to ever be sentenced to death. And my name is Brianna and I'm hot on the case. Krista Pike had a very terrible traumatic abusive life and the turmoil really began before she was ever even born. Krista was born on March 10th 1976 in Beckley, West Virginia to her parents Karesa and Glenn. Both of them were alcoholics and Krista's mother Karesa drank heavily throughout her entire pregnancy. So not only was Krista born premature, she was born with damage to her frontal lobe. And if you know anything about the brains of serial killers, then this is a major red flag. The signs of fetal alcohol spectrum disorder began to manifest very early on in Krista's life. She actually started having seizures when she was just an infant. Krista had a very troubled childhood. Both of her parents were very neglectful and lazy. They were always just out partying, drinking, using substances, ignoring their baby. The home was never clean. They also had a bunch of dogs that were also neglected. Family members said that they would come and visit and they would find Krista who was just an infant at the time on the floor, rolling around and playing with dog feces. Krista's father, Glenn, was a very lazy guy. He was unemployed, but of course never helped clean the house or look after their baby. Along with being completely neglectful, her father was also basically abusive to Krista. He would often whip her with a belt and call it discipline. And this would happen sometimes up to six times a day, causing scars that Krista has to this very day. Her mother, Krista, didn't care about anyone else but herself or her many boyfriends. After only two years of marriage, Krista's parents split up due to her mother's many affairs. Afterwards, Krista's mother was just always out partying and she had a revolving door of men just coming in and out of their home and their lives. And Krista was just a complete afterthought in her mother's life, not a priority at all. And then in the third grade, Krista attempted suicide for the very first time. It was earlier that same year when Krista was only nine years old, she was out walking around her neighborhood when a neighbor attacked her. She was not only attacked and assaulted by this neighbor, but this neighbor also raped nine-year-old Krista. This neighbor was walking his dog at the time and actually included his pet in the assault. Krista told her teacher about the incident and it was reported to the police. This man was arrested and he pled guilty so he fully admitted to doing this but still, Krista's mother didn't believe her daughter at all. Krista spent her entire childhood being bounced around from one home to the other to the other. If custody wasn't being split between her parents, then Krista was just dumped at either set up her grandparents' houses. And sadly, both of her grandparents' homes were just as bad as her parents' home, if not worse. Krista's grandmother on her mother's side just hated Krista from the moment she was born. Grandma was a lot like mom, she was an alcoholic, she was selfish and self-centered, and was also physically abusive towards Krista. Whatever Krista was dumped there just so her mom could go party. Sometimes her grandmother and her mom's side would just lock her in the closet for hours and this was just a little girl. The only good adult in Krista's life was her grandmother on her father's side. She was actually probably the only adult that actually ever loved Krista and Krista said that her grandmother was her favorite person in the entire world. But her grandmother's home wasn't always a safe place for Krista either. Her grandmother had a long-term boyfriend named Ernest that started sexually abusing Krista when Krista was only two years old. Obviously, her grandmother didn't know about this and when her grandmother found out she threw out Ernest and then this home was the only real safe place for Krista and her grandmother actually brought Krista into her home to live with her full time. And Krista remembers this being the only time in her entire life that she was ever truly happy. But then when Krista was 12 years old, her grandmother passed away from cancer. This sent Krista into a severe depression and she attempted suicide for the second time in her life. She's only 12 years old. By this time, Krista's father was pretty much just completely out of the picture. He had moved on. He found a new wife and started a new family with new children and just completely replaced Krista. And when Krista did try to stay at her dad's house with her dad's new family, her half-sister accused Krista of sexually assaulting her. I'm not sure if this is true but I honestly wouldn't be surprised if it was many victims of child sexual abuse. Sometimes commit child on child sexual abuse or COCSA. Regardless, she was just kicked out of her father's home and that was pretty much that. Then Krista was living with her mother. Krista and her mother's relationship had really changed since the last time they lived together. Krista, who is now a preteen young teen girl, started to heavily abuse drugs and alcohol to just mask the pain. She said this time she felt completely numb and just empty, like a zombie walking around life. But her mother, who loved the party, is finally paying attention to her daughter because they could drink and use drugs together. Real A+ parenting. Like I've mentioned, Krista's mother had a lot of men coming in and out of their lives and their home. Her fourth husband actually used to beat and whip Krista with a leather belt so often that he hung the leather belt on Krista's bedroom wall as a constant threat and reminder. Another one of her mother's boyfriends used to beat her and also grow her in her bed in the middle of the night. And then at a family party in front of dozens of witnesses, this boyfriend actually punched Krista in the face and he was charged with assault and this was reported to the police and to child protective services, but nothing ever really came from that. In another incident with this same boyfriend, Krista had a friend over that witnessed this guy drag Krista from her hair into her bedroom and then slammed the door shut. Moments later, Krista frantically ran from her bedroom while trying to pull up her pants. It was very much implied by Krista that her mother's boyfriend had or at least attempted to sexually assault her. Following this incident, CPS was notified again and Krista was removed from her mother's home for three months and then just put back in. There was one caveat. The state made her mother bring her to see a psychiatrist that diagnosed Krista with severe depression, PTSD and bipolar disorder. The state ordered that Krista see the psychiatrist for follow-up visits, but her mother just stopped taking her and the state never followed up. Like most troubled youth, Krista really acted out and rebelled, but it was very extreme. On top of heavily abusing drugs and alcohol, Krista was acting out at home, acting out at school, and also just skipping school. She was stealing and getting into lots of fights. And then at 15 years old, Krista was caught after committing a handful of small burglaries, and then she spent a year in Juvie. When she got out of Juvie, she was 16 years old, and she dropped out of high school. She really fell down a dark path really, really fast, and it's so sad to think about, if her grandmother hadn't passed away, it's very likely that none of these things would have happened to Krista after that point, and it's very possible that the tragic murder that Krista goes on to commit might have also likely not happened. Krista had several toxic and abusive boyfriends. She had a very unstable childhood. She got her GED in 1993, and at that point, she had gone to about 12 different schools, and then at 17 years old, Krista was once again attacked by a stranger. This man hit Krista over the head with a large rock, so she wouldn't be able to fight back as he threw her onto the ground and violently raped her. Hospital records confirmed that this attack did happen, but once again, Krista's mother did not believe her, and sadly, this man was never caught. At this point in Krista's life, she's been abused by at least seven different family members. She was repeatedly beaten and abused by her father, her maternal grandmother, and several of her mother's boyfriends. She's also been sexually abused and raped by about half a dozen individuals, and all of that has happened to her by the time that she's only 17 years old. And you have to accompany that with the fact that she has untreated mental health disorders, and brain damage that she suffered in the womb. But now we're at the part of the case where Krista Pike turns 18 years old. The age that she was when she committed the absolutely horrific crime that put her on death row. While in Juvie, Krista first heard of the job corps, a government-run program aimed to help low-income or troubled youth by offering vocational training and career skills. Krista wanted to train to become a nursing assistant or maybe even an RN one day. She went through a lot, but she still had really big dreams. She applied and was accepted into the fall 1994 semester at Knoxville, Tennessee Job Corps Center. This was really, really cool and exciting for Krista because all of the students that went to the Knoxville Job Corps Center all lived on campus together in like little dorm rooms. So she's really excited, thinking that she's gonna have a chance at like a college experience. But what Krista didn't know was that the Knoxville Tennessee Job Corps Center was incredibly underfunded. It was not well kept at all, it was very dirty. It was also a very toxic, violent atmosphere. Many students carried around knives or box cutters with them around campus. And Krista's first week at Job Corps, a boy was stabbed in the bathroom. This is not a situation where Krista is going to find the fresh start that she was looking for. And Krista, who is an incredibly, incredibly troubled young girl putting her in this very violent atmosphere, it was like putting gasoline on a fire. She wasn't gonna get any better here. She only got worse. Surrounded by troubled youth just like her, Krista became exceedingly more and more confrontational and aggressive. And she fell into really bad habits, fighting, drug use, and toxic men. I saw an interview with a Job Corps employee that worked at this exact Knoxville Center from 1991 to 1995. So this exact same timeframe where Krista was a student there. And he said that the Knoxville Center was for primarily, originally low income youth to give them a chance of getting into careers that they might not have the opportunity for. But then there was a different approach to juvenile criminals, where instead of going to Juvie or Jail, they would have a chance to instead go into the Job Corps. So now there was a different kind of young person coming into Job Corps. And this is why a lot of the violence and drugs was introduced into the Knoxville Center. And a lot of the students that were there actually trying to get an education and get on the right path and get their training, get their certificates, and then go into careers, were then being harassed, beaten up. They were the ones that were carrying box cutters and knives for protection, and a lot of those students ended up dropping out. So this is the kind of time period and situation that Krista was walking into and very, very early on into the fall 1994 semester, Krista started a new relationship. Tadarral ship was born in Memphis, Tennessee, and raised by a single mother. Just like Krista, Tadarral went down a bad path and he got involved with some really shady people. He dropped up high school his freshman year and then got involved with a gang. His mother intervened pretty much immediately. She wanted so much better for her son. So she took him out of Memphis and brought him about six hours away and enrolled him at the Knoxville Job Corps Center for the fall 1994 semester. Tadarral was a little bit younger than Krista. She was 18 and he was 17 years old. And when they met and their relationship started, it was very, very fast and very intense. And when Tadarral and Krista first met, he had a very unique pickup technique. He told her that he thought that they were destined to be together. Their first time meeting, he said that just a few days earlier, he had a dream and he dreamt about this beautiful girl. And he knew for some reason in his dream that this beautiful girl he was dreaming about was his soulmate. When he woke up out of his dream, he still couldn't stop thinking about this girl. So he had a friend who was very artistically gifted, draw a picture of this girl from Tadarral's dream just by Tadarral describing her kind of like a police sketch. And Tadarral tells Krista that it's the same day they meet and he actually pulls out the photo that his friend drew and showed it to her and would you believe it looked just like Krista? Tadarral and Krista's relationship was very hot and heavy from the very beginning. It was very fast, very intense and very toxic. Tadarral also had a very intense interest in the occult and in satanism and he saw himself as a sataness. And he introduced Krista to this entire new world. And they would, I guess, perform like little satanic rituals in their dorm rooms together and they had a copy of the satanic Bible. Tadarral and Krista would even call Krista his little devil and I'm like 99% sure that Krista even got little devil, like handpoked tattooed on her chest by a student at Job Corps. Tadarral was very controlling and overly protective. He even once pushed another Job Corps student up against a wall and put a razor blade up to their throat because the student accidentally bumped into Krista in the hallway. But the thing is, Krista, who other than her grandmother, never really felt loved by a person before. She never felt like she was someone's priority. You know what I mean? So Krista doesn't see this as toxic and dangerous. She feels like she's being loved by someone for the first time in her entire life. So Krista is all in and this relationship in a very immature and toxic way. There was a lot of insecurities and jealousy issues. Tadarral was respected if not feared. He protected me. He was probably the first man that I'd ever had in my life that wanted to protect me, that saw me as, you know, a treasure, something good. Instead of something that used and tossed to the side. There was a lot of drama at the Job Corps Center amongst the young students. Krista had a friend at Job Corps that she got really close to really early on who got pregnant in the first few months at Job Corps by another student. And this guy was not stepping up at all. Instead, he was reportedly sneaking around behind his pregnant girlfriends back and cheating on her by sleeping with a bunch of other girls at the Job Corps Center. And one of these girls that he was allegedly sleeping with or at least Krista thought he was hooking up with was a 19 year old Job Corps student named Colleen Slammer. Colleen was born on September 20th, 1975 and grew up in Florida with her sister, her stepfather, and her mother. She had a very different childhood than Krista had. Growing up, Colleen was very happy. She loved to do sports, her mom would take her roller skating. She was very clever, but she struggled in school due to a learning discipline. and not being able to keep up and frustrated about it, Colleen dropped out of school. She worked a few fast food jobs, but always felt like she was destined for more. Computers were a brand new frontier in 1994, and Colleen was deeply fascinated and passionate about computers. So she applied for the Job Corps in 1994 fall semester in Knoxville and was accepted into the computer training program. Colleen was doing really, really good at Job Corps for the first few weeks. She was excelling in her courses, something that she never really experienced in traditional schooling. She loved the work, she was making lots of friends, but then she met Christa Pike, and then things were not so great anymore. I have no way to know if this was true or not, but for some reason, Christa thought that Colleen was one of the girls that was sleeping with her pregnant friends boy. So one day, Christa confronted Colleen about this and pretty much told her to stop being a home wrecker boy friend stealer, and actually told her if she didn't listen to her, that she should watch her back. So Christa is threatening Colleen. And Colleen didn't back down. Colleen was always like really self-assured, very independent girl, so she doesn't back down from Christa. She actually tells Christa to pretty much get off her face and mind her own business. And after that interaction, these two young girls were pretty much sworn enemies, and it got even worse a few weeks later after Thanksgiving break. Christa went home for Thanksgiving break like a majority of the Job Corps Center. There was actually only a few students that were staying on campus during Thanksgiving. Her boyfriend, Tadarol, was one of them, but also was her new enemy. Colleen, they were some of the only students to stay at the Job Corps Center over Thanksgiving break. And then after the holiday, Christa came back expecting to run into her boyfriend's arms, but Tadarol was acting really weird. Something was off. He wasn't acting the same way towards her. So Christa confronts Tadarol, and again, there's no way to clarify this. But he admitted that over break, the very few students that were still at Job Corps all hung out together. And I think some of them even like smuggled a little bit of weed, so they all like smoked together. Some of them like I think smuggled some alcohol, so they all drank together. And some point over the break, Tadarol and Colleen hooked up, which was the absolute biggest betrayal. He not only cheated on her, but cheated on her with her sworn enemy. Christa actually had a lot of reasons to hate Colleen because before having this dream that him and Christa were supposed to be together, apparently Tadarol had a huge crush on Colleen to begin with. So this was huge. And the thing is, Christa didn't focus all her anger on Tadarol, her boyfriend, the person that actually owes her loyalty, no. She was immediately forgives Tadarol and focused all of her anger and hatred towards Colleen. It made it even worse because Tadarol claimed that Colleen was pretty much obsessed with him, even though I think it was the other way around. And she was following him around campus and practically threw herself at Tadarol. He had no choice but to hook up with her. It sounds like a bunch of bogus to me, but Christa completely bought it. With this, Christa started making Colleen's life a job corps, a complete hellhole. It was a living hell. She was yelling at Colleen any chance she got. She was stalking her, making fun of her, threatening her, bullying her any chance she got. And it was completely relentless. Christa is completely consumed by her hatred towards Colleen. It became an obsession. The bullying got so bad that Colleen called her mom and told her that there was a girl at a job corps that was making her miserable. And it had gotten so bad that Colleen wanted to drop out of job corps and give up her dreams of working with computers. And that really sucks because remember, this is 1994. Colleen would have pretty much been a pioneer for women working in STEM. So her mother wanted to support her daughter's dreams convinced her to say a job corps. You know, give it a little bit more time. A little bit longer at least. Her bully would get bored and eventually move on and it would all blow over. But that is not what happened. A little bit later, it was Christmas break and the students went home for Christmas break. And then after returning from Christmas break, it was the new year, January 1995. Christa opens up her dorm room to find that someone had broken in and completely trashed her room. It was a disaster. Things were thrown all over the place. Her belongings were smashed. Her clothes were like cut up and ripped. But the worst of all. The only photo that Christa had of her late grandmother. The only good person that she ever had in her entire life. Whoever did this. Ripped that photo up. Even though Christa had zero proof, she believed that Colleen was the one that did this. What Christa really wanted to do was immediately walk over to Colleen's dorm room and beat her up. But Christa had gotten so much trouble at a job corps already, even though it's only been like three months since she started like September to January three or four months. She was on her last strike. If she got in trouble on campus again, she was at risk of being expelled. And then she'd be separated from Tadarro. So that absolutely couldn't happen. She couldn't get in trouble on campus anymore. But she needed to get back at Colleen. So Christa started planning a way to get back at Colleen off campus. And this is the part of the case where I'm about to dive into the absolutely horrific murder that Christa committed that landed her on death row and made her the youngest woman to ever be sentenced to death in America in the modern age. If you look at the support website for Christa Gail Pike called mercy for Christa dot org, they go into paragraphs about Christa's traumatic upbringing. But the only sentence referencing the murder she committed was, and I quote, the night took a tragic turn when an argument quickly escalated and spiraled out of control. Now this is the most watered down description of what Christa actually did. And I find it absolutely deporable that this website asking for mercy for Christa completely glosses over the horrific brutal murder that she committed. So I'm going to tell you exactly what happened. I'm not going to hold anything back. So this is your warning that this is going to be a truly horrifying thing to imagine. On January 12, 1995, with the assistance of her boyfriend to Darryl and their friend, a teen year old Shadola Peterson, Christa planned to lure Colleen off the Job Corps campus and murder her. That morning, Christa approached Colleen, told her that her to Darryl and Shadola were going to leave campus later. They were going to go rent a movie and also smoke some weed in a park that was off campus. I bet Colleen thought this was really strange, but maybe she thought that this was Christa's attempt to bury the hatchet. It was a peace offering. So Colleen accepted Christa's offer to hang out off campus. 4 to 10 pm were free hours at Job Corps so the students could sign themselves out and head off campus and do whatever they wanted, as long as they were back, of course, by 10. So the four students all signed out together around 8 pm and they started walking over to Tyson Park. Tyson Park was a park that was tucked away in an isolated part of the city. Christa told Colleen that she had some weed hidden at the park, but it was like tucked away in the tree line. The four students headed into the thick wooden area beyond the park. If I had to guess, I would imagine that they were all chatting, laughing, but then, you know, the mood changes. Everyone kind of goes silent and, you know, the vibes really changed. Because Colleen realized without anyone having to say anything or do anything that something was wrong and she was in trouble. Colleen actually, she was walking ahead of Christa. They were walking like a line. And she turns around and she says, "What is going on? There's not any weed here. Is there?" And Christa said to her, "You're right. There isn't." And that's when Christa just started going off on Colleen, calling her a boyfriend stealer, lots of really, really bad names. She's yelling at her and insulting her and then she starts punching her over and over and over again. And Colleen is screaming for help and that's when Christa yanks her by her hair and slams her face into her knee, breaking Colleen's nose. Colleen is on the ground, screaming in pain, with blood gushing down her face from her nose. And Christa is kicking her over and over again and then she starts pulling her by her hair and slamming her face and head into the ground over and over and over again. Shedola Peterson was there to keep a lookout. The Darryl Ship joins in when Colleen tries to escape. He tackles her to the ground. And together, Krista and Tadaryl attack Colleen. At some point, they tear off Colleen's shirt and her bra. Krista brought a box cutter and a meat cleaver with her. She takes out the box cutter and her and Tadaryl take turns cutting, slashing, and stabbing Colleen all over her body for nearly an hour. It was torture. And Colleen was alive for the entire thing. There were so many cuts and stab wounds that during her autopsy, the medical examiner lost count. They had a hard time actually finding the amount of stab wounds and slashes and cuts on this poor girl's body. But they believe that it is over 300 stab wounds and slashes. 300. Colleen was alive for each of those 300 stab wounds. It makes me sick to imagine how terrified she must have been. How much pain she was probably in. And the entire time, Colleen is asking them why? She's begging him to stop. She's pleading for her life. She even tells them, if you stop right now, I won't tell anyone, you'll never see me again. I will grab my stuff tonight and I will hitchhike back to Florida tonight, you'll never see me again. But Krista told her it was too late. This was only going to end one way for Krista. So Krista and Tadarrel just kept going, kicking her, punching her, slamming her face into the ground and stabbing her with the box cutter. Colleen is profusely bleeding all of her body, but she is still alive. And that is when Krista holds her down. While Tadarrel carved a pentagram into her chest with the box cutter. And this happened while Colleen was still alive. This is when Krista pulls out the meat cleaver that she brought with her and she cut Colleen's throat. She cut Colleen's throat nine times, but still Colleen was still alive. Krista is screaming, "This bitch just won't die." So after nearly an hour, but probably closer to over an hour of torture. Krista picks up a large chunk of asphalt that she found nearby and used it to smash in Colleen's skull. And this is what finally killed 19-year-old Colleen summer. That was her final moments. This location that Colleen's slimmer was actually pleading for her life and Krista Pike showed her no mercy. The body of Colleen's slimmer ended up in this general area right over here. The victim's partially dressed body was found in this brushy area Friday morning. And autopsy confirms she was slashed repeatedly with a meat cleaver and some other small cutting device. Perhaps a razor blade or box opener. Krista used the asphalt on Colleen over and over and over again until her skull was literally falling apart. And then Krista took a piece of Colleen's skull, put it in the pocket of her black leather jacket as a souvenir. Now we've gone over the murder of Colleen's slimmer. Let's circle back to that support website. Mercy for Krista. I mean first, I have to say the obvious, where it was the mercy for Colleen. But the only way that the mercy for Krista website describes Colleen's murder is with the words, the night took a tragic turn when an argument quickly escalated and spiraled out of control. Does that sound accurate to you? It makes it seem like it wasn't premeditated. Like they were just fighting and it spiraled out of control. And then Krista to Daryl and Shadola just returned to the Job Corps campus. Krista definitely had the largest hand in Colleen's murder, but Daryl definitely took part. And even though Shadola didn't take any physical part in killing Colleen, she was there for the entire thing and never once tried to stop it. It went on for an hour and not once. Did any of these three teenagers stop and think, this is not worth it? Back on campus, Krista wasn't trying to hide her vicious crime. She was bragging about it. She went up to her best friend at Ken's door room. That was about five doors down from her dorm room. And she was so happy. She was ecstatic. She was singing and dancing and twirling around the room, smiling and laughing. This huge smile on her face as she told her friend that she just murdered Colleen. Krista bragged to a lot of people on campus about killing Colleen, so I'm not sure what her plan was. She even showed them all the piece of Colleen's skull. She was dancing around in a circle. Who was dancing around in a circle? Krista. Dancing around in the circle while she was telling you about this, was she doing it if I guess? She was smiling like in the other door. She was kind of saying, no, no. Colleen's body was discovered early the next morning by people just trying to take a morning walk in the park. Her remains were said to be hardly recognizable as being a human being. The pentagram haven't been carved into her skin, caused a frenzy and mass hysteria amongst the entire state of Tennessee. We're talking about the times of the Satanic panic, so it was believed that Colleen was killed by a Satanic cult in a ritualistic sacrifice. As Tyson Park was being taped off as a crime scene, Krista actually had the balls to show up at the crime scene to gawk at what she did and even spoke to a few of the investigators. It did not take long for this to be linked to Krista and her followers to Darryl and Chodola. Colleen's body was in such a terrible shape that she had to be identified through her dental records. But they weren't able to link her remains to a student at the Job Corps campus. There was a teacher that was brought in to see if they could identify the clothes on the body. And this teacher did identify the clothes as clothing that Colleen slimmer would wear. So they went and looked at the signout she'd from the night before and saw that four students all signed out at the exact same time, including Colleen, but only three of them signed back in. Krista, to Darryl and Chodola were all arrested that same day on first degree murder. Krista immediately confessed. She really enjoyed talking about murdering Colleen. She looked like she was having a lot of fun. She even got up for the investigators and acted it out in a play where she would play herself and Colleen. She really did look like she was having lots of fun in a way that made it seem like she truly enjoyed killing Colleen. This wasn't just revenge or anger or hatred. This was enjoyment. She truly enjoyed torturing this girl to death. Teenage girls becoming killers is not common, but Teenage girls do kill for a lot of different reasons. But because they enjoy killing, that is not common. Chodola, who had the least amount of involvement in Colleen's murder, was given a deal in exchange for her testimony and walked away with only probation, no additional jail time. She also served only six years of probation. To Darryl, who was only 17 years old at the time of the crime was found guilty and sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 25 years, which is a very different sentence than Christa Gott, who was a few months older at 18 years old. To Darryl's ship was up for parole in October for the very first time where he was denied parole. I don't think so. I don't think the first time that I thought this is my own skin, the first one is not the last one. But we're going to do everything, Chodola. That was a patient that's got one chance to be a hit. How do you handle it? All right, I'll get it one of those. During Christa's trial, her defense tragedy was to introduce Christa's terrible childhood as part of her defense, as well as her diagnosed, but un-treated mental health disorders. And I want to say this now. Just make sure I don't forget to say it later. I have a lot of sympathy for the child who Christa was being abused, beaten, sexually assaulted by multiple different people before she even turned 18 years old. But that sympathy I have for Christa ends when she murdered Colleen in cold blood. A lot of people have really bad, terrible childhoods, but they don't go on to commit murder, especially murders as horrific as the one that Christa committed. This was a different level of brutality. In a very controversial case, the prosecution actually brought Colleen's skull into Chris's trial to show the jury. Christa, who spent the entirety of her trial, acting like this was some huge joke, smiling, laughing, waving at her friends that were in the audience, actually showed some sort of emotion during the time that Colleen's skull was brought out to show the jury. She put her head on her hands and cried, or at least looked like she was crying. Shortly after her 20th birthday, Christa Gail Pike was found guilty on first-degree murder. During her sentencing, Christa looked like a little girl. She was dressed in pastel florals, and she had her, you know, big, curly, all-burned hair pulled up in a little scrunchy. This is practically unheard of, but it took the jury one and a half hours, which included an hour for lunch, to come back with their sentencing. For the crime Christa Pike committed when she was only 18 years old, she was sentenced to death by electrocution. I'll show you the video of her reaction to finding out that she will be sentenced to death. She will be transferred to custody for one of the Tennessee prison groups, and for the 12th day of January 1997, her body shall be subjected to shock, by sufficient current electricity, and by a merciless amount of money. This made Christa Pike the youngest woman in America in modern day to be sentenced to death row. She is also the only woman in the entire state of Tennessee on death row at this exact moment. Only minutes after finding out that she was being sentenced to death, Christa wrote her boyfriend to Darryl a letter. You can see in the video of her being sentenced to death that she has a lot of emotion for herself, but I'm gonna read you parts of this letter, and you can see just how little regret, remorse, and sorrow she has for her victim, Colleen. She actually believes that she did Colleen a favor. So in this letter, she tells Darryl how much she loves him and misses him. She also tries to get him to change his story to fit hers, so it looks like someone's lying. But she also writes, and I quote, "Please write me. I miss you so much." You see what I got for trying to be nice to that whore? I went ahead and bashed her brains out so she would die quickly. Instead of letting her bleed to death and suffer more, and they fucking fry me, ain't that some shit? Please write and tell me what you're feeling. Love you for the rest of my life. Signed little devil unquote. So yeah, an hour of torture, 300 stab wounds slicing her throat, nine times with a meat cleaver, and then bashing her head in. That is doing her favor. That is letting her die quickly instead of letting her suffer. Okay, Krista. Krista has been since the very moment that she was sentenced to death row, finding to be taken off of death row. She doesn't believe that she deserves to die. But Colleen did. That is unacceptable. And I realized that. But I don't deserve to die for the actions of three individuals. When I'm only one person. Krista argues that she's not the same person that she was when she was 18 years old when she killed Colleen. Krista believes that she's a changed person, but behind bars has done nothing but prove that she is the same exact person. In August of 2001, so how many years after killing Colleen, Krista attacked and nearly murdered another inmate. She strangled a convicted murderer named Patricia Jones with her shoelaces. And this nearly killed her. Krista was convicted of attempted first degree murder and received an additional 25 years on top of her death sentence. She has also been caught having sex with two prison guards. And of course both of these prison guards were fired. But one of them actually tried to help Krista escape prison in 2012. Behind bars, Krista has done many, many, many on camera interviews. And if they're not copyrighted, I'm going to put in as many of them as I can right now. Because you can just like the smog look on her face as she says in front of cameras that she does not believe that she deserves to die. She says it's so often. I'm 22 years old and this is it for me. And there's just so much more that I wanted to do with my life. He's sitting in a room by myself 23 hours a day. I should be out going to school or walking and having fun with my friends. Let's my mom and my stepdad. We can't take her. I'm just loving. I love my dog Ed. These are the only kind of stuffed animals we can have because we can't have the ones that are stuffed with things in them. I think we might hide something in there. Well breakfast is at about 6.30. Then I get up when it's time to go outside and exercise. Come back in and go to the shower. Come back and I'm in here for the rest of the day until I go outside tomorrow. Like I said, Krista is the only woman in Tennessee that is currently on death row. And if she is executed, she will be the first woman executed in the entire state of Tennessee in over 200 years. Since the very beginning of her sentence, Krista has been appealing her death sentence and has always been denied. Her lawyers argue that changes in law regarding youth and mental health considerations should apply to Krista's case, even though her crime was committed when she was 18 years old, which is a legal adult. Krista has since exhausted all of her appeals. I've been wanting to cover this case on Han the case for a very long time. And especially in the last handful of months because very recently in September of 2025, 30 years after Colleen Slammer was killed, her killer's death warrant has officially been signed and an execution date for Krista Gail Pike has officially been set for this year actually. If nothing else changes, Krista Pike will be executed on September 30th, 2026. Colleen Slammer's mother, Mae Martinez, has repeatedly asked Tennessee authorities that her daughter's skull be returned to her for proper burial. It has been in possession of the state as evidence since 1995 over 30 years. But authorities tell her that the skull of her daughter won't be returned while the case still remains open. So they are awaiting Krista's execution to return part of her daughter to her. It's not just terrible. I feel so bad. For Colleen's entire family, all of her friends, her baby sister, and her mother. Colleen's mother to this very day needs to take medicine just to sleep at night. She has nightmares thinking about her daughter's final moments. Victims loved ones are given the opportunity and many states of America, which includes Tennessee, to witness their loved ones killer's execution. Colleen's mother intends to be there, and she intends to hold up a picture of Colleen's face. So Colleen's face will be the last thing that Krista Pike sees before she is executed. Guys, this is such a terrible case on so many levels, and I'm so interested to hear what you think. Obviously, Krista Pike had a terrible childhood, and you know, she has that brain damage since she was a baby and a lot of mental health issues, but does that excuse murder, especially brutal, horrific, torturous murder of a girl for no reason? This was such a senseless act that really just did not need to happen. And it literally makes me sick to my stomach to think about this case on so many levels. So I'm so interested to hear all your thoughts and opinions on this one. I feel like there's going to be really, really strong opinions in the comments. So definitely let me know all your thoughts and opinions. But please always remember to be respectful because you have no idea who could be in the comment section reading your comment. It's really possible that someone who knew and loved Colleen's slumber in real life could be in the comment section. You have no idea. So please always remember to be respectful, but really interested to hear your thoughts. I read every single one of the comments that come in on YouTube, Apple podcasts, and Spotify. So let me know all your thoughts and opinions while you're there. Please let me know what case you want to see me cover next because I always take your case suggestions in the consideration. I have them in a long, long document. So let me know what case you want to see me cover next. Let me know your thoughts on this one Please make sure that you're subscribed following the show on YouTube Spotify and Apple podcasts Like right in review the show because that's what really helps push out these cases to even more people and that's all I have For this week's episode of hot on the case. I know it was a doozy I know it was really really bad and I will be sure to keep you guys updated on Her execution on all of my socials, but that's all I have for this week's investigation I will see you guys all next time next Friday when we are hot in the case once again