Killer Christa Pike is to be executed within days but her defence say she's a victim too

Christa Pike, now 50, faces execution by lethal injection in Tennessee for a brutal 1995 murder she committed at age 18, when she and her boyfriend tortured and killed 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer at a job training camp. Her defense attorneys have submitted an extensive clemency petition arguing that jurors never heard crucial evidence about Pike's childhood trauma, including severe neglect and repeated sexual abuse beginning in early childhood. Mental health experts later diagnosed Pike with bipolar disorder and PTSD, conditions that were untreated at the time of the crime and may have influenced her actions.