A federal appeals court stopped Tennessee's execution of Christa Gail Pike on Wednesday.

It stopped it about an hour before the execution was planned.

The 6th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals voted 2-1.

The court will check if Pike's claims were fully considered at her sentencing.

Her claims are about childhood sexual abuse and rape.

Pike is now 50.

She was found guilty of killing 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer in 1995.

Slemmer was a classmate in Knoxville.

Pike stabbed and beat her.

Pike would have been the first woman executed in Tennessee in at least 200 years.

Tennessee's attorney general appealed the stay right away.

They appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Witnesses and media stayed at the prison.

They waited to see if the high court would allow the execution.

The attorney general's office said the last-minute stop hurt Slemmer's family.

They said it rewarded "abusive delay tactics" by Pike's lawyers.

Pike's lawyers said ignoring her childhood is not fair.

They said it violates any fair view of executions.

Pike does not deny the killing.

Her supporters say the state should think about her age at the time.

They say the state should also think about her mental illness.

They say she suffered severe sexual abuse.

This included being raped from when she was a toddler.

After the killing, Pike was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder.

She said she was a mentally ill 18-year-old.

She said she only wanted to fight Slemmer.

But she killed her in a wild attack.

Slemmer's mother, May Martinez, wants the lethal injection to go forward.

She said she has waited many years.

She said she thinks about Colleen every day.

Prosecutors said Pike was afraid Slemmer was trying to take her boyfriend.

They said Pike tricked Slemmer into going to a wooded area on Jan. 12, 1995.

Pike cut Slemmer with a box cutter.

She beat her with asphalt.

Pike's boyfriend, Shipp, admitted carving a pentagram into Slemmer's body.

He was 17.

He got life in prison with possible parole.

Pike was the only one sentenced to death.