On January 12, 1995, Pike lured 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer into a wooded area near the University of Tennessee’s agricultural campus. Both were students in the Knoxville Job Corps program, but investigators later said Pike had become convinced that Slemmer was interested in her boyfriend, 17-year-old Tadaryl Shipp. Jealousy quickly escalated into a brutal, premeditated attack.

With the help of Shipp and another student, Shadolla Peterson, Pike slashed Slemmer’s throat with a box cutter, struck her with a meat cleaver, carved a pentagram onto her chest, and crushed her skull with a piece of asphalt. The crime stunned investigators and the public alike.

One of the most chilling revelations emerged when Pike showed detectives a fragment of Slemmer’s skull that she had kept as a trophy. Retired detective Randy York recalled that Pike was disturbingly cheerful during questioning and demonstrated how the skull fragment fit into the wound “like a puzzle.”

After decades of appeals, the state formally requested an execution date, now set for September 30, 2026. Pike’s attorneys continue to argue that her age, trauma history, and mental health diagnoses — including bipolar disorder and PTSD — should weigh heavily against execution.

Her defense team describes her childhood as marked by severe abuse and neglect and says she has since shown remorse. If carried out, her execution would be Tennessee’s first of a woman since 1820, underscoring the rarity and complexity of the case.