Following the trial of Chris Coleman for the murders of his wife and two young sons.
Created by bnd on May 3, 2011
Last updated: 05/09/11 at 02:12 PM
Tags: Chris Coleman Sheri Coleman Garett Coleman Gavin Coleman murders strangulation Columbia Illinois Garret Coleman Garrett Coleman Tara Lintz Monroe County
Chris Coleman waives his rights to put on a case mitigating his responsibility for his family's deaths and for the jury to decide his fate. Circuit Judge Milton Wharton sentences Coleman to life in prison without parole.
On the second anniversary of Sheri, Garett and Gavin Colemans' deaths, jurors found Chris Coleman guilty of killing his family.
The defense took three hours after the prosecution took seven days. Jurors deliberated from 3 p.m. until 8 p.m.
Hofstra University professor Robert Leonard testifies that Chris Coleman's writing is consistent with threats against his family and the graffiti found in the house on the day of the murders. A Columbia police detective testifies that Coleman bought the same spray paint used for the graffiti months before the murders. Prosecution rests.
Tara Lintz, murder victim Sheri Coleman's good friend and her husband's mistress, testifies about the affair. Their trysts were planned around Chris Coleman's travel for Joyce Meyer Ministries, she testifies. On the witness stand she wore the promise ring he bought her but only looked at him when the prosecutor asked her to identify Coleman.
Chris Coleman begins trial for the strangulations of his wife, Sheri, and sons Garett and Gavin. Prosecutors said he killed them so he could be with his mistress, Tara Lintz, without exposing his infidelity and potentially losing his $100,000 job as security chief for Joyce Meyer Ministries. Defense says a stalker that sent threats broke in to his house and killed his family while Chris Coleman was working out early on May 5, 2009.
Jury selection starts in Pinckneyville to reduce the risk jurors were tainted by pre-trial publicity. Twelve jurors and four alternates are selected in the week-long process. They will be bused to Waterloo each day for the trial. Questioning by defense and prosecution attorneys focuses on the death penalty and jury candidates knowledge of the murders and experiences with crime.
Televangelist Joyce Meyer and her son, Danny, an executive with Joyce Meyer Ministries, are allowed to testify via videotape. They state they have a conference planned for the same time the trial is expected to run.
Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn signs abolition of the death penalty in Illinois. Prosecutors in the Chris Coleman case will still seek the death penalty because the crime was before the ban, but Quinn is expected to commute Coleman's sentence if he is convicted and given the death penalty. Quinn commuted all other Death Row inmates' sentences to life imprisonment.
Defense tries to stop Sheri Coleman's text and conversations with 11 friends from being used at the murder trial. She knew before she died her husband was having an affair with her close friend, Tara Lintz. Friends testify she was a sad, scared woman who said her crumbling marriage felt like suffering from cancer. The judge eventually ruled in favor of allowing Sheri Coleman's friends to tell jurors what she said about her husband.
Chris Coleman is arrested by Columbia Police and charged with his family's murders.
Chris Coleman, his mother Connie and father the Rev. Ronald Coleman view the murder victims' caskets at Evergreen Cemetery in Chester. The burial is delayed when Sheri Coleman's family gets a court order allowing them to bring the bodies to Chicago for a memorial service. The bodies are returned to Chester for burial.
Televangelist Joyce Meyer testified she called police about her bodyguard, Chris Coleman, and his erratic behavior. She said he called in sick the day before the murders.
Chris Coleman leaves his home at 5:43 a.m. Just before 7 a.m. he calls his neighbor, Columbia Police detective Justin Barlow. Barlow and other officers enter the Coleman home and find Sheri Coleman, 31, Garett Coleman, 11, and Gavin Coleman, 9, all strangled in their beds.
Sheri Coleman cooks the family chicken and pasta for dinner. They take their sons, Garett and Gavin, out for snow cones. Chris Coleman goes to the gym, arrives back at home in time for boys to say their prayers before bed. Sheri falls asleep in Chris Coleman's arms as they watch a movie.
Chris Coleman and Tara Lintz take nude video of themselves during a Joyce Meyer trip to Hawaii. Video shown to jurors states: "We're in Hawaii being bad."
Tara Lintz testified that she and Chris Coleman first had sex in mid-December while Coleman was guarding Joyce Meyer during a trip to Florida. At the same time Sheri Coleman confided in Lintz that she believed her husband was having an affair.
Prosecution: The destroychris@gmail.com address was created on Coleman's laptop. Message sent to him and others at Joyce Meyer Ministries: "I will kill them all while they sleep." Six more e-mails followed pushing televangelist Meyer to stop preaching or the Colemans would be harmed.
Coleman notes in his computer that this day is "the day Tara changed my life." Tara Lintz was a close friend of Coleman's wife, Sheri, from high school on.
Sheri Coleman told her friends that Chris Coleman beat her during the summer of 2008. She said he wanted to be rid of his family because he felt they were holding him back from the destiny God intended.
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