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

The halt came about an hour before the execution was scheduled.

The 6th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals voted 2-1 to review Pike’s case.

The court will examine whether her claims of childhood sexual abuse and rape were fully considered at her sentencing.

Pike is now 50.

She was convicted of the 1995 stabbing and beating of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer, a classmate in Knoxville.

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

Tennessee’s attorney general immediately appealed the stay to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Witnesses and media stayed at the prison in case the high court allows the execution to proceed.

The attorney general’s office argued the last-minute halt traumatized Slemmer’s family.

It also said the halt rewarded “abusive delay tactics” by Pike’s lawyers.

Pike’s lawyers said ignoring her childhood violates any fair view of executions.

Pike does not deny the killing.

Her supporters say the state should weigh her age at the time.

They also point to her mental illness and severe sexual abuse, which included being raped from toddlerhood.

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

She said she was a mentally ill 18-year-old who only wanted to fight Slemmer.

She said she killed her in a frenzied attack.

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

She said she has waited decades and thinks about Colleen every day.

Prosecutors said Pike feared Slemmer was trying to steal her boyfriend.

They said Pike lured her to a wooded area on Jan. 12, 1995.

Pike cut Slemmer with a box cutter and beat her with asphalt.

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

He was 17 and received life in prison with possible parole.

Pike was the only one sentenced to death.