Who Is Mikey Noechel? Christa Pike Had Her Buddhist Spiritual Advisor by Her Side Helping Her ‘Relax’ During Botched Execution

New details have emerged about the religious group supporting Christa Pike, who remains in critical condition following her botched execution this week. In 1995, when she was 18, Pike took part in the brutal killing of her 19-year-old classmate Colleen Slemmer in Knoxville.

Slemmer was found dead in a disturbing state. Her body was discovered naked from the waist up, with a Satanic pentagram carved into her body. Pike reportedly also preserved a fragment of her victim’s skull as a souvenir. Among those accompanying Pike inside the execution chamber on Wednesday was her spiritual adviser, Reverend Mikey Noechel, a Tennessee-based Buddhist meditation instructor and addiction treatment specialist.

Guru Who Influenced Her

Noechel serves as co-director of the Wild Heart Meditation Center in Nashville, a nonprofit Buddhist organization that says it welcomed the death row inmate into its community, the Daily Mail reported.

Wild Heart was initially affiliated with Against the Stream, a California-based Buddhist meditation group that shut down its remaining West Coast centers in 2018 following sexual misconduct allegations involving its founder.

It remains unclear when Pike adopted Buddhism while in prison. However, she recently invoked her religious beliefs in a lawsuit against the state, a case that ultimately allowed Noechel to be present during the failed execution.

Multiple witnesses to Wednesday’s botched execution said Noechel remained beside Pike’s gurney, talking with her and singing a song that included the words “I love you” as officials tried to administer the lethal injection.

Noechel reportedly urged Pike to “relax” as medical personnel inserted the needles. Pike responded, “I’m trying.” The execution was abandoned several minutes later after officials failed to administer the lethal injection despite using at least seven needles.

Noechel and the Wild Heart Meditation Center have opposed Pike’s execution, pointing to Buddhist teachings that view killing as perpetuating a cycle of violence with potential karmic consequences, The Daily Mail reported.

Supporters of Wild Heart also gathered outside the prison for a vigil on Wednesday and promoted an online petition launched in 2022 calling for Pike’s life to be spared.

“Christa is a member of the Wild Heart Meditation Center sangha [community]. Wild Heart is committed to holding a vigil on prison grounds that morning to support both Christa and Mikey,” the group wrote on its events calendar ahead of the execution.

Against Taking Lives of Humans

Wild Heart was founded in Nashville in 2010 under the name Against the Stream Nashville by Buddhist meditation teacher Dave Smith. Local reports at the time described Smith’s teaching style as unconventional, noting his frequent use of profanity and referring to his classes as “punk Buddhism.”

In 2018, Noah Levine, who founded the wider Against the Stream organization in California, faced allegations of sexual misconduct. Smith’s Nashville center had operated as an affiliate after Levine encouraged him to adopt the national organization’s name.

Against the Stream commissioned an investigation, which concluded that Levine had likely violated the group’s teaching rule prohibiting sexual harm involving more than one woman, the outlet reported. Levine denied the allegations, and no criminal charges were filed. The organization later closed its California locations.

The Nashville center had already ended its affiliation with Against the Stream earlier in 2018 and adopted the name Wild Heart Meditation Center. In a public statement, however, the center said it supported the findings of the investigation into Levine.

According to The New York Times, Pike said she only began practicing Buddhist meditation in recent years as a way to “train my chaotic mind.”

Noechel told WPLN a week before the execution that he had been advising Pike for more than two years. He taught her Metta, a Buddhist meditation practice centered on deliberately wishing well for oneself and others, often through the repetition of short phrases.

Wild Heart says Noechel was given the Buddhist name Rogahari Sokatura, which means “healer of the broken-hearted.” “He is committed to bringing the Buddha’s teachings into nontraditional settings such as addiction treatment centers, jails, and a variety of settings,” the center says on its website.

It remains unclear whether Noechel or Wild Heart volunteered to provide Pike with spiritual guidance or whether Pike or state officials requested their involvement. Wild Heart describes Buddhism as a meditation and ethical practice based on the historical Buddha’s original teachings about ending suffering.

The center’s approach differs mainly in how those teachings are presented. Rather than holding traditional services inside a temple, Wild Heart conducts its sessions in informal settings and uses straightforward language.

Unlike Christianity, Buddhism does not include belief in a Satan-like figure as part of its religious tradition.