Tennessee prepares for a grim milestone: for the first time since 1820, a woman is executed in the state (5 photos + 1 video)
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So, friends, let's talk about equality? If the death penalty exists for men, then why can't it exist for women too? 
Krista Gail Pike, who was only 18 years old when she brutally murdered 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer in 1995, has been sentenced to death. The Tennessee Supreme Court has set the date for execution: September 30, 2026.
This is the first time in two centuries that a woman in the state has met the death penalty under the law. The last time this happened was with Martin Eve, who was hanged for complicity in murder. There, the madam helped her lover shoot her husband. And this happened in 1820.
But Pike's story also makes for a pretty decent film noir, or at worst, horror.
It all began in January 1995 in Knoxville, near the campus of the University of Tennessee. Pike, then a student, along with 17-year-old Tadaryl Shipp (her boyfriend), lured Colleen Slemmer into the woods. There, the nightmare began: Pike slit her victim's throat, mutilated her body with a cleaver, carved a pentagram into her chest, and grimly beat the corpse with a piece of asphalt. It's not entirely clear why she chose a piece of asphalt, but that's beside the point.
Even prosecutors, who had seen a lot in their time, called this murder ritualistic; it was so brutal.
Krista Pike, according to friends and acquaintances, envied Slemmer, considering her a rival for her love life. The trial in 1996 was swift: Pike received the death sentence, and her accomplice, Shipp, received a life sentence.
Krista Gail Pike and Colleen Slemmer
Pike's lawyers fought to the bitter end. They argued that the 18-year-old was a victim of violence, grew up in an abusive home, and suffered from mental illness. They argued that her young age and injuries should have mitigated her sentence. But the Tennessee court apparently decided that humanity wasn't their strong suit. Petitions were denied, appeals failed, and now, at the end of the day, Pike (who is already 49 years old, more than 30 of which she spent behind bars) faces the electric chair or lethal injection. The state hasn't executed women since the days when corsets were fashionable, and now it's setting a historic precedent.
Society is divided: some demand execution for the brutality, while others see Pike as a victim of circumstance. Her case is rife with rumors, from satanic motives to debates about how childhood trauma drives crime.
And this is the victim whose beauty Krista envied.
While civil rights activists cry out about injustice, state authorities are preparing to write Pike into a grim annals of history.
An execution 200 years from now is no joke.
