Also,

Christa Gail Pike was born on March 10, 1976, in Beckley, West Virginia. According to Liliana Segura of The Intercept, she was raped by a neighbor at age 11, and in 1991 she was sent to a Juvenile Evaluation Center after being placed on probation for breaking into a community center to steal candy.[7]

The center was designed to reform troubled youth. Children earned or lost points based on compliance with rules, and their progress through the program depended on those points. It was promoted as an alternative to more punitive forms of juvenile incarceration. By the 1990s, however, the center had become increasingly punitive, relying on a uniform points‑and‑punishment system rather than behavioral change.[7]

The program proved ineffective for Pike: she repeatedly violated rules, generally in minor ways, and remained there for more than a year, far longer than most children. In the months leading up to her arrest, North Carolina social services removed her from her home after her mother's live‑in boyfriend physically and sexually abused her.[7]

Just going to leave this here - as with most criminals, she had a traumatic past.