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Speaker 1: Test one two that works, test one two three, test

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Speaker 1: one two three.

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Speaker 2: One two three four or five five four three two

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Speaker 2: one Okay perfect.

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Speaker 1: I probably won't be too too close to Melissa SA Okay,

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Speaker 1: let's hope this works.

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Speaker 2: HI, go ahead and ship that all the way.

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Speaker 1: When Beth, Kris and I went down to Knoxville in

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Speaker 1: August twenty twenty four, we met with Melissa Lee, a

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Speaker 1: former journalist. She and Beth met years ago when Beth

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Speaker 1: was working for Court TV. So your your family's Knoxville

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Speaker 1: from way back.

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Speaker 2: I have been able at this point to trace back

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Speaker 2: four generations. I don't know. We may go back further.

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Speaker 2: I don't know. In the South, you kind of don't

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Speaker 2: necessarily want to start digging around in your history too

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Speaker 2: awfully lunch, because you're going to find some relatives you

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Speaker 2: didn't know you had.

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Speaker 1: Melissa has what I would affectionately describe as a high

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Speaker 1: quirk factor. Today, instead of covering crime for a local newspaper,

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Speaker 1: she spends her days writing and designing what she calls

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Speaker 1: true crime coloring books. She recently self published her first.

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Speaker 1: It's called Scene of the Crime, and it depicts famous

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Speaker 1: crime scenes, including the assassination of fashion designer Johnny Versace

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Speaker 1: in Miami and the Cecil Hotel in Los Angeles, known

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Speaker 1: for a series of mysterious deaths.

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Speaker 2: That's how I vacation. If I go to a CDI

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Speaker 2: automatically look and see were there any interesting crimes that happened.

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Speaker 2: I always talk about the victims. I never talk about

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Speaker 2: the first and who parpetuati the crime.

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Speaker 1: We're here to talk about what it was like in

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Speaker 1: Knoxville when news broke back in nineteen ninety five that

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Speaker 1: Christa Pike had killed Colleen Slemmer. Melissa was in her

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Speaker 1: early twenties when Colleen was murdered.

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Speaker 2: There are a couple of crimes in Knoxville that really

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Speaker 2: define an area or leave an indelible mark. This is

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Speaker 2: one of those crimes.

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Speaker 1: The brutal details of the murder, the involvement of teenagers

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Speaker 1: in the torture of a nineteen year old girl, seemed

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Speaker 1: like a specific affront to the decency of the Knoxville community.

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Speaker 2: The only thing poor Colleen Slimmer wanted to do was

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Speaker 2: make her life better and just I mean, it's not

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Speaker 2: like there was a money motive. It was a jealousy

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Speaker 2: thing basis.

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Speaker 1: Awful Knoxville was shocked by Christa's killing of Colleen, but

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Speaker 1: they were even more scandalized by what Christa did in

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Speaker 1: the minutes and hours following the crime. Details leaked out

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Speaker 1: to the community as soon as Krista was in handcuffs,

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Speaker 1: and those details just got worse and worse.

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Speaker 2: They carved a pentagram into her chest. This was the

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Speaker 2: early nineties, and if anybody remembers, that was during the

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Speaker 2: time of Satanic panic, particularly in the South. Oh my god,

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Speaker 2: Oh my god, there's dabbles in here. So it got

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Speaker 2: a lot of coverage because of the heinous of the

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Speaker 2: crime and oh there's you know, lock your children up,

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Speaker 2: Satan's out to get them. Some people believe she was

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Speaker 2: a serial killer who just and I don't even really

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Speaker 2: want to call her a serial killer because I don't

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Speaker 2: know that she fits the exact criteria, and she's not

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Speaker 2: a spree killer, and she's not a well plus, she.

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Speaker 1: Only killed once.

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Speaker 2: Well she got called. Had she not gotten caught, she

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Speaker 2: might have gone on and killed some other people. I

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Speaker 2: don't know. That is a prevailing thought, and I don't know.

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Speaker 1: So the idea is that she was a budding serial

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Speaker 1: killer who was caught after her first.

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Speaker 2: Victim, yes, possibly.

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Speaker 1: Thirty years later, Melissa, like most of the Knoxville community,

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Speaker 1: finds it impossible to forgive Christna, to even entertain the

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Speaker 1: idea that she might deserve mercy.

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Speaker 2: I am a firm believer in rehabilitation. I do not

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Speaker 2: believe that there's any rehabilitating Christa Pick. There are no

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Speaker 2: redeeming qualities to Christa Pick.

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Speaker 1: The portrait that was constructed of Christa, a teenage girl

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Speaker 1: who is portrayed by the media as a monster, is

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Speaker 1: seemingly impenetrable decades later. So I asked you if you

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Speaker 1: thought Christa should be executed.

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Speaker 2: I don't know what purpose that serves at this point.

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Speaker 1: For almost thirty years, Krista Pike has been the only

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Speaker 1: woman on death row in Tennessee, waiting for the day

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Speaker 1: the state will end her life, but so far no

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Speaker 1: date has been said. Do you think it would have

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Speaker 1: served a purpose if they'd executed her immediately after her conviction?

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Speaker 2: To people in Tennessee, it would have I don't know

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Speaker 2: what you do with somebody like Chris Pike. She needs

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Speaker 2: a punishment to fit the crime, but I don't know

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Speaker 2: what that punishment is.

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Speaker 1: I'm Sarah Trelevin and this is unrestorable Season two. Proof

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Speaker 1: of Life an original podcast from Anonymous content and iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: Oh see you look down, there's another church, and Rod,

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Speaker 2: here's a church.

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Speaker 1: The afternoon, we meet up with Melissa. It's a steamy

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Speaker 1: ninety three degrees. After stopping for some sweet tea, she

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Speaker 1: offers to take us out to the scene of the crime.

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Speaker 2: Or in the south where there is a church literally

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Speaker 2: on every corner. Now that church down there is New Harvest.

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Speaker 2: That's an ame Zion church. That's a historically black church.

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Speaker 1: The drive from Melissa's house to the west end of Knoxville,

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Speaker 1: where Colleen was killed takes around fifteen minutes.

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Speaker 2: And I keep mentioning religion because I mean, you're in

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Speaker 2: the South. It's a huge thing and it plays into

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Speaker 2: this case where you had satanic panic and oh my

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Speaker 2: God and whatever.

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Speaker 1: Before we get to where the murder took place, Melissa

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Speaker 1: takes us to where the Job Corp dormitory used to stand.

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Speaker 1: This was the organization that both Christa and Colleen signed

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Speaker 1: up for, where struggling students were meant to get help

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Speaker 1: finding an occupation, but job Corps became better known for

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Speaker 1: being chaotic and violent. The building was torn down shortly

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Speaker 1: after the murder, and a handful of concrete barriers and

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Speaker 1: some overgrown grass now marked the location.

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Speaker 2: Well, if we will pull out here, Beth, and you're

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Speaker 2: gonna because you can only go lift. What we're gonna

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Speaker 2: do is we're gonna go right down here to the light,

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Speaker 2: and I'm going to take you on the route that

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Speaker 2: they took to get there. They walked, Yes, they didn't

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Speaker 2: have a car. And I got to tell you, the

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Speaker 2: thing that really hit home for me on this is

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Speaker 2: this is going to be quite a walk. And to

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Speaker 2: think that you had this malice in your heart this

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Speaker 2: entire way.

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Speaker 1: On January twelfth, nineteen ninety five, four teenagers from Job

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Speaker 1: Corps set out on foot. Colleen thought they were going

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Speaker 1: into the woods to smoke some weed. The others had

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Speaker 1: a different plan.

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Speaker 2: They would have walked up this way, walked over this bridge.

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Speaker 1: We drive for a while through the Fort Sanders neighborhood,

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Speaker 1: passed a mix of new condos and well kept houses,

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Speaker 1: lots more churches.

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Speaker 2: All right, now we're approaching Cumberland Avanue, which is the strip.

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Speaker 2: You're going to make a rye.

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Speaker 1: And when you say the strip, It's like the strip

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Speaker 1: of commercial for the University areas is. We pull into

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Speaker 1: Tyson Park and stop in a small grassy log close

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Speaker 1: to the spot Melissa says Colling was murdered. Even thirty

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Speaker 1: years later, it does feel secluded. On a Saturday afternoon,

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Speaker 1: There's no one around. There's no plaque or memorial bench

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Speaker 1: to mark the spot where Colleen was tortured and killed,

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Speaker 1: and so we stand around, uncertain of how to absorb

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Speaker 1: the gravity of the act. After Colleen was found lying

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Speaker 1: face down in a pile of debris, the Knoxville police

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Speaker 1: corned off the scene with yellow tape. The scene was

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Speaker 1: wet and muddy, and there were pools of blood, footprints

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Speaker 1: and handprints, drag marks, and other evidence to be analyzed.

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Speaker 1: The activity created an enormous stir in Knoxville, everyone wanting

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Speaker 1: to know what was going on.

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Speaker 3: Let's be clear how unusual this was on so many

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Speaker 3: different levels.

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Speaker 1: This is John North, a reporter in Knoxville who covered

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Speaker 1: Christa's case. As you can probably tell from his accent,

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Speaker 1: he's not originally from Tennessee. He grew up in California

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Speaker 1: and moved to Knoxville just a couple of years before

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Speaker 1: Colleen's murder.

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Speaker 3: After the killing, when the body was discovered, who shows

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Speaker 3: up at the crime scene and the yellow tape Krista

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Speaker 3: Pike does, asking a cop who's on the line, what's

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Speaker 3: going on? What's happened.

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Speaker 1: According to police testimony, Christa arrived at the scene the

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Speaker 1: next afternoon with several girls from Job Corps. Apparently, she

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Speaker 1: asked one police officer if any suspects had been identified.

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Speaker 1: That officer later testified that Christa was giggling, enjoying the moment.

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Speaker 1: Witnesses say she seemed unaffected by her violent.

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Speaker 3: As she was quite fascinated and almost excited by what

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Speaker 3: had happened. Who does that?

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Speaker 1: That idea spread fast, the perception that Christa wasn't just unrepentant,

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Speaker 1: but brilliant, like the murder finally gave her something to

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Speaker 1: be proud of, and this would not be the last

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Speaker 1: time Christa would go back to the scene of the murder.

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Speaker 4: I took her back to the scene, and she played

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Speaker 4: both parts.

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Speaker 1: This is retired detective Randy Yorke telling Beth about his

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Speaker 1: investigation into Colleen's murder. When he says both parts, he

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Speaker 1: means that Christa acted.

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Speaker 5: Out her role.

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Speaker 1: And the role of her victim, Colleen.

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Speaker 4: She would get down on her hands and knees and

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Speaker 4: act like she was the victim and tell us what happened.

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Speaker 4: And she'd stand up and she was very proud of

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Speaker 4: what she did. She was real cocky in her language

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Speaker 4: and stuff. You know that this is the greatest thing

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Speaker 4: that ever happened to her. She was a star.

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Speaker 2: And when you were getting the confession from her, was

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Speaker 2: she emotional?

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Speaker 4: No, she was giddy. She was happy. I've never seen

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Speaker 4: anybody like her. She was just as happy as a

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Speaker 4: lark that she was a star. She thought she was

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Speaker 4: a movie star. She was giddy the whole time I

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Speaker 4: interviewed her, and I never saw anything that indicated that

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Speaker 4: she had regretted what she did.

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Speaker 1: We don't have tape of Christa at the scene walking

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Speaker 1: through the reenactment with Detective York, but we do have

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Speaker 1: Christa's confession, which occurred around the same time.

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Speaker 4: There's some satanic overtures that come up in this case.

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Speaker 4: Are you involved in Satanism?

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Speaker 1: No, I've listened to the full tape and it definitely

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Speaker 1: doesn't sound giddy. Well, Christa doesn't express explicit remorse. She's

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Speaker 1: clearly extremely upset.

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Speaker 5: She's grabbing under my arm and grabbing under my hands,

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Speaker 5: trying to pull me in and there and here was Oh,

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Speaker 5: but I was looking at her scare out.

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Speaker 1: At times through sobs, She's a matter of fact about

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Speaker 1: what she did, volunteering details readily. Other times she expresses

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Speaker 1: horror at what happened.

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Speaker 4: I was like, Oh, my god, you know, what the

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Speaker 4: hell is wrong with me?

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Speaker 6: Her?

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Speaker 7: What's wrong with everybody?

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Speaker 1: Word also spreadfast about the supposedly Satanic elements of the case,

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Speaker 1: in particular the pentagram carved into Colleen's chest.

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Speaker 4: They admitted doing a Satanic chant around the body. The

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Speaker 4: pentagram was the trapdoor that were released to soul to satan.

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Speaker 1: Christa's boyfriend to Darryl, later admitted to carving the pentagram.

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Speaker 7: It received massive coverage, very lurid coverage. There was a

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Speaker 7: focus on the Satanic aspects supposedly of it, which was

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Speaker 7: an the motive.

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Speaker 1: Kelly Gleeson, one of Chris's attorneys, disputes the idea that

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Speaker 1: Christa had any real connection to Satanism.

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Speaker 7: To Daryl was into Satanism, but Christa was into To.

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Speaker 1: Darryl, christ had told a therapist that to Daryl had

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Speaker 1: gotten her into the occult that he had given her

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Speaker 1: a necklace with a pentagram on it. She was wearing

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Speaker 1: it when she was arrested. To Daryl told Christa that

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Speaker 1: he worshiped the devil that he used to sacrifice rabbits

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Speaker 1: back home in Memphis. He would show Christa how he

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Speaker 1: could move the clouds, conjuring monsters in the sky when

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Speaker 1: he was angry. When Christa was interviewed by Randy Yorke,

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Speaker 1: she seemed more concerned about protecting to Daryl than herself.

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Speaker 5: He's been going for all the whut Riley, I mean,

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Speaker 5: he's eve a crown to me like well here.

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Speaker 1: While in custody at the Knoxville Courthouse, Christa desperately tried

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Speaker 1: to stay in touch with to Daryl. Word soon got

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Speaker 1: out that she wrote it to Darryl three four times

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Speaker 1: a week, and that she signed the letters little Devil.

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Speaker 1: Krista told a psychologist that she loved to Darryl, even

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Speaker 1: though she knew it was the wrong kind of love.

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Speaker 1: He liked to watch her fight other men to dictate

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Speaker 1: what she wore. She liked having sex with him, but

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Speaker 1: the relationship made her cry an awful lot. Christoph felt

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Speaker 1: like he was powerful, like he was protective of her,

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Speaker 1: so she clung to him.

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Speaker 7: When she's talking about to Darryl, I just love him,

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Speaker 7: I just love him to death. And it's just it's

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Speaker 7: like classic childish love infatuation. And he has a chance,

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Speaker 7: he can be somebody. He's been crying real tears to me.

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Speaker 7: And you know, she thinks she's nothing. She thinks she's

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Speaker 7: not worth saving.

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Speaker 1: The story of the murder was everywhere. Whispers about satanic rituals,

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Speaker 1: questions about wayward teens bullying each other, rumors of a

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Speaker 1: love triangle. But when the results of Colleen's autopsy leaked out,

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Speaker 1: things got even uglier. The medical examiner counted the blows

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Speaker 1: to Colleen's head, two to the left side, one over

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Speaker 1: the right eye, and one in the nose area. There

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Speaker 1: were divots in Colleen's skull containing particles of the asphalt

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Speaker 1: chunk christ to hit her with. But there was one

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Speaker 1: detail that for many in Knoxville, sealed Christa's fate, something

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Speaker 1: she'd never be able to come back from. When the

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Speaker 1: medical examiner tried to piece Colleen's fractured skull back together,

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Speaker 1: she couldn't. She was missing a piece. Ye let me

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Speaker 1: ask you this.

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Speaker 4: I told you about a little piece of her skill

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Speaker 4: that I knew that you hated.

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Speaker 1: I don't have that.

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Speaker 2: You don't have it.

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Speaker 1: What would I want a piece of per school? According

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Speaker 1: to court records, after Christa smashed Colleen's head in, she

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Speaker 1: bent over and collected a piece of colleens fractured skull,

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Speaker 1: and she kept it. Krista put it in the pocket

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Speaker 1: of her black leather jacket. When she got back to

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Speaker 1: the job Cordorm, she showed it to at least two

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Speaker 1: other students. She even brought it down to breakfast the

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Speaker 1: next morning. Later, when police searched her clothes, they found it.

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Speaker 1: Detective Randy Yorke believes it was part of Christa's pact

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Speaker 1: with the devil.

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Speaker 4: You have a piece of skull, all the skulls you

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Speaker 4: have that person's power. That's the only thing I could figure.

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Speaker 4: I could never get it out of them why they

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Speaker 4: took the piece? But so, how would you characterize you know,

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Speaker 4: Krysto Pike. Well, I don't like saying this, but I

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Speaker 4: wasn't sure about demonic possession until I met that girl,

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Speaker 4: and now I'm over most norm behavior.

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Speaker 1: The skull became the most powerful detail in this case.

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Speaker 1: A story in the Knoxville News Sentinel a week after

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Speaker 1: the murder alleged that Christa took the fragment to trap

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Speaker 1: Colleen's soul in her body. For many, the skull was

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Speaker 1: as symboled that Krista wasn't wholly human, wasn't like the

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Speaker 1: rest of us. That as much as a piece of

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Speaker 1: Colleen had been taken, there was a piece of Christa

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Speaker 1: that was never there.

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Speaker 2: When the piece of skull got out, that's kind of

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Speaker 2: the death neal for Krista. You know, people can be like, Okay,

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Speaker 2: she was young. Okay, maybe we just give her a

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Speaker 2: laugh about parole and she can live her best life

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Speaker 2: behind bars doing whatever. The piece of skull. You're not

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Speaker 2: coming back from that In.

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Speaker 1: The South, Why what is the connection.

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Speaker 2: When you die in the South, The desecration of the

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Speaker 2: body in any way, shape or form is just not

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Speaker 2: It just ain't right. There are some times you're just

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Speaker 2: not going to come back from carrying around a piece

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Speaker 2: of somebody's skull. And I don't care that it was

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Speaker 2: only two days. I don't care that it was only

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Speaker 2: a day. I care that she took it, because what's

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Speaker 2: going on.

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Speaker 1: In that mind, Christa's lawyers see it differently.

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Speaker 6: So I would say, yeah, that the skull is there,

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Speaker 6: and if you isolate it, you've got a really bad fact.

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Speaker 6: But you've got to look at a little bit more

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Speaker 6: than that.

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Speaker 1: For Steve Ferrell, this wild act of violence, the taking

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Speaker 1: of the skull fragment, is evidence of just how unwell

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Speaker 1: Krista was, how broken she was a kid with severe

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Speaker 1: mental illness, a lengthy history of sexual abuse and deprivation.

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Speaker 1: It's not that she was irredeemable or unfixable, but that

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Speaker 1: she had been failed over and over by people and systems.

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Speaker 6: I think it's a symbol of I've taken a life

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Speaker 6: and I am proud of it, or I don't care,

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Speaker 6: or it's funny, or I don't know what exactly was

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Speaker 6: going on then, But I think it's that, and I

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Speaker 6: think that there's a reaction to someone that callous, is

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Speaker 6: irredeemable or unrestorable, as you all might say. And if

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Speaker 6: you look at it as such a simple story, which

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Speaker 6: is what the criminal justice system wants us to do, guilty,

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Speaker 6: not guilty, life, death, that's easy, and it's very easy

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Speaker 6: to get a limited snippet of something, draw conclusion and

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Speaker 6: stand firmly on it. If you look at that skull

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Speaker 6: as the desperate attempt of a sexually abused, stunted, mentally

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Speaker 6: ill little girl, you have pity. If that's all you

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Speaker 6: can do to get attention, if that's how you win

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Speaker 6: over your boyfriend, if that's how you impressed the kids

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Speaker 6: at school.

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Speaker 5: It's hard to say what was going on in Christa's

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Speaker 5: head at the time, but I do think that there's

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Speaker 5: a lot of evidence and testimony that she was going

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Speaker 5: through a manic period and was very agitated with the

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Speaker 5: bipolar disorder at the time, So I hesitate to say

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Speaker 5: that she even really thought about or was consciously knowing

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Speaker 5: what was going on.

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Speaker 1: This is Molly Kincaid, another one of Christa's attorneys.

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Speaker 5: Christa's life was just this locomotive of violence, instability, lack

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Speaker 5: of connection, lack of people she could trust, rely on,

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Speaker 5: feel loved, and then the train went off the tracks.

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Speaker 5: But that's like to be expected because she she had

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Speaker 5: nothing and she had no one.

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Speaker 1: The idea that Christa wasn't just someone guilty, but someone

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Speaker 1: irredeemable had quickly taken hold in Knoxville, and so when

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Speaker 1: prosecutors announced that they would be seeking the death penalty.

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Speaker 1: It felt to many like an opportunity for justice, like

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Speaker 1: killing Christa wouldn't just avenge Colleen's death, it would stop

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Speaker 1: Christa from doing more harm. And at Christa's trial, which

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Speaker 1: introduced a whole new layer of dysfunction to the case,

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Speaker 1: the debate was never over guilt or innocence, but whether

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Speaker 1: Christa should live or die. We know now that Christa

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Speaker 1: was sentenced to death, but her lawyers today say that

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Speaker 1: she never had a chance.

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Speaker 2: I should be to one in Percy, not for I

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Speaker 2: should be one they punished for.

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Speaker 4: This crab, not for.

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Speaker 1: Ye time on Proof of Life. Unrestorable is executive produced

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Speaker 1: and hosted by Me, Sarah Chulevin and Beth Carris. Our

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Speaker 1: producer is Kathleen Goldhart, Mixing and sound design by Reza Daya.

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Speaker 1: For anonymous content, Jessica Grimshaw is our executive producer, Jennifer

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Speaker 1: Sears is our executive in charge of production, and nick

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Speaker 1: Yannas is our legal council. For iHeart, executive producer Christina

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Speaker 1: Everett and supervising producer Abu Zafar