Chris Coleman Murdered His Wife and Two Sons | Then Went to the Gym

 

Chris Coleman Murdered His Wife and Two Sons | Then Went to the Gym

Sheri Coleman was 31. Garrett was 11. Gavin was 9.

On May 5, 2009, all three were found strangled in their beds inside their Illinois home. Sheri was Chris Coleman’s wife. Garrett and Gavin were his sons.

Prosecutors said Coleman wanted out of his marriage while maintaining his career and pursuing a relationship with another woman. So, according to the case presented at trial, he constructed an alibi.

For months, threatening emails had been arriving. Coleman claimed someone was targeting his family because of his security work for televangelist Joyce Meyer. Investigators ultimately traced threatening messages back to Coleman’s own computer.

On the morning of the murders, Coleman went to a gym. He later called a police-officer neighbor and asked him to check on his family because he said he couldn’t reach them.

Inside, police found Sheri, Garrett and Gavin dead.

The walls had been spray-painted with threatening messages—an apparent attempt to make the killings look connected to the threats Coleman had already reported.

The alibi fell apart.

In 2011, a jury convicted Christopher Coleman of three counts of first-degree murder. He was sentenced to three consecutive life sentences without parole.

Coleman has maintained his innocence.

Sheri. Garrett. Gavin.

They weren't props in somebody else's escape plan. They were a woman and two little boys who deserved to wake up that morning.