Christa Pike case highlights women on death row

Key Points:

• A woman is set to be executed in Tennessee on Wednesday, marking the first female execution in the state in 200 years and highlighting the rarity of female executions in the U.S., with only 18 women executed since 1977.
• Women represent just 1% of all executions in the modern death penalty era, largely because they commit fewer violent crimes and juries may be more reluctant to impose the death penalty on women.
• Many women on death row have histories of sexual abuse or domestic violence, but these factors are often minimized or dismissed by prosecutors, and female death row inmates frequently face isolation due to their small numbers.
• Currently, 45 women are on death row across the U.S., with California having the most, though executions there have been halted since 2019; historically, New York and Texas have executed the highest numbers of women.
• Christa Pike, convicted of murder at age 18, is scheduled for execution in Tennessee on Sept. 30 and would be the only person executed in the state in the modern era for a crime committed at that age.