State of Louisiana v. Christopher Lee Coliston

• Court: Louisiana Court of Appeal
• Decided: August 27, 2025
• Docket: 56,332-KA
• Status: Published

Opinion

Judgment rendered August 27, 2025. Application for rehearing may be filed within the delay allowed by Art. 922, La. C. Cr. P.

No. 56,332-KA

COURT OF APPEAL SECOND CIRCUIT STATE OF LOUISIANA

*****

STATE OF LOUISIANA Appellee

versus

CHRISTOPHER LEE COLISTON Appellant

Appealed from the Second Judicial District Court for the Parish of Claiborne, Louisiana Trial Court No. 34120

Honorable Walter E. May, Jr., Judge

LOUISIANA APPELLATE PROJECT Counsel for Appellant By: Chad M. Ikerd

DANIEL W. NEWELL Counsel for Appellee District Attorney

CARY T. BROWN PERRIN NELSON SMITH, JR. Assistant District Attorneys

Before PITMAN, STEPHENS, and ELLENDER, JJ. ELLENDER, J.

Christopher Coliston appeals his conviction on seven counts of sexual

offenses inflicted on his girlfriend’s minor daughters. Contesting no

procedural rulings or the aggregate sentences of 48 years at hard labor, he

challenges only the sufficiency of the evidence to convict on all counts,

specifically the credibility of the witnesses against him. For the reasons

expressed, we affirm.

FACTUAL BACKGROUND

The victims’ mother, Tonika Burns, testified she had known Coliston

a long time. She also knew that, in 1999, he pled guilty to forcible rape of a

six-year-old girl and received a 25-year hard-labor sentence. However, after

his release from prison on good behavior in early 2018, she inexplicably

started dating him again. By this time, Tonika had four children, including

three girls: RB (born 1/3/03), TB (born 5/29/07), and FB (born 5/20/11).

According to Tonika, and confirmed by Dep. Perry, a detective with

the Claiborne Parish Sheriff’s Office (“CPSO”), the family led an itinerant

life, staying in seven different houses, apartments, or trailers over the next

three years. Coliston either lived with them or was a frequent overnight

visitor in these temporary homes, including a rent house on Isaac Creek

Road, in the St. John community; a rent house on Jessie T. Jones Street, in

Homer; and a trailer on Hwy. 2, east of Homer.

The house on Jessie T. Jones Street caught fire and burned down in

early 2019; Tonika was charged with, and pled guilty to, arson and insurance

fraud, receiving a probated five-year sentence. Tonika, Coliston, and the

children eventually moved to the trailer on Hwy. 2, but Tonika quit making her restitution payments for the arson conviction; her probation was revoked.

She also testified that Coliston had given her $700 toward the restitution but,

after she was sent to jail, he quit supporting her. After Tonika went to jail,

the girls were initially taken in by Coliston’s parents, the Cosbys, in Minden,

but, in early March 2022, the girls’ aunt, Bertha Emerson, obtained a

custody order and brought the girls to stay with her in Homer.

Once Ms. Emerson took in the girls, she noticed TB was “sad.” On

questioning, TB confided that Coliston had raped her. On hearing this, Ms.

Emerson called Homer Police. The report was relayed to CPSO, and Dep.

Perry made initial contact at Ms. Emerson’s house on March 10, 2022.

Through his interviews, he learned that Coliston had performed acts on all

three girls, when they were 16 years old or younger. Dep. Perry sent the

girls for interviews at Gingerbread House, in Shreveport, and to the CARA

Center, where they were examined by a pediatrician, Dr. Rodriguez.

As a result of these investigations, the state indicted Coliston on seven

charges against the three girls:

Count 1: Second degree rape of TB Count 2: Sexual battery of TB Count 3: Attempted sexual battery of TB Count 4: Sexual battery of FB Count 5: Indecent behavior with juveniles with RB Count 6: Indecent behavior with juveniles with RB Count 7: Indecent behavior with juveniles with RB

TRIAL TESTIMONY

The case went to trial over three days in September 2023. Pursuant to

a pretrial ruling which has not been contested, the state proved Coliston’s

1999 guilty plea to forcible rape, his 25-year sentence, and his release on

parole in 2018. Dep. Perry, the CPSO detective, identified documents

showing that Coliston was born in 1980, and then he meticulously 2 reconstructed the sequence of seven places where Tonika, her daughters, and

sometimes Coliston lived between 2018 and early 2022.

Ms. Emerson, the girls’ aunt, confirmed that she obtained a custody

order for the two younger girls and took physical custody of them on March

1, 2022; shortly after this, they opened up to her about Coliston’s sexual

misconduct with them.

RB testified that, when they were living on Jessie T. Jones Street,

Coliston started by touching her breasts and vagina outside the clothes, but it

progressed to skin-to-skin contact. In one incident, he “touched her,” put his

fingers down her boxers, and then into her vagina. She recalled being asleep

on the couch in the living room, on a Monday night, when Coliston came in

and penetrated her with his fingers. On another occasion, she came home

from school and was sitting on the couch when Coliston came over and

asked her, “You want to see something?” He then exposed himself; she ran

out of the house. She did not tell her mother about these incidents, but

shortly after, she quit school, ran away from home, and started dating a man

named DeJalo.1 School records from Homer High School showed RB’s last

day of attendance was January 24, 2019, when she had just turned 16.

TB testified that while they were living in St. John, Coliston would

visit and sleep with her mother, but on one occasion he touched TB in the

upper thigh and told her, “You’re the only one I want to be with.” She told

her mother about this, but Tonika inexplicably did not believe her, despite

being aware of Coliston’s prior conviction for raping a young girl. Later, at

1 DeJalo was not called to testify. However, he shared a Facebook profile with RB and saw that she had messaged with her sister TB. In a conversation from August 2020, TB said she needed to talk about “a guy named Chris” (Coliston); RB asked if he had touched her; TB replied yes, and she wanted to kill herself. This was what prompted CPSO’s visit to Hwy. 2 to interview the girls and Tonika. 3 the trailer on Hwy. 2, when TB was 13-14 years old, Coliston would come

over and play “wrestling games” with the girls.2 Later, still at the trailer on

Hwy. 2, Coliston told TB, “I want you to have my baby.” He took his finger

and touched her private parts, under her clothes; she told nobody about this.

Still later, TB was in her bed, wearing her pajamas, when Coliston came in,

got in the bed with her, and touched her on her privates. He first used his

fingers, and then inserted his penis, and ejaculated in her; it was her first

time having sex. Tonika walked in on this, but again she did not want to

believe what was happening. TB described yet another incident, after

Tonika was in jail, and she (TB) was staying at Coliston’s mother’s house, in

Minden, when he came in the room, held her down, choked her, and raped

her on the couch. TB confirmed that after Ms. Emerson got custody of

them, she told her what had occurred.

FB, the youngest victim, testified that when they lived on Hwy. 2, she

and TB shared a bedroom; Coliston would come over and play wrestling

games with them. He touched FB’s private parts and she told him to stop;

Coliston and Tonika got into an argument about this.3

Dr. Rodriguez, the pediatrician, testified that TB reported at

Gingerbread House that she had been assaulted by her mother’s boyfriend.

Dr. Rodriguez found some bleeding in TB’s panties, and other injuries

consistent with sexual abuse that had occurred before March 1, 2022, but her

hymen was still intact. Still, Dr. Rodriguez felt that something had

2 TB also testified that during these “games,” she saw him touching FB’s inner thigh; FB told him to stop, and this started a big argument between Coliston and Tonika. 3 She also testified that she saw Coliston touch RB’s bottom. 4 penetrated past TB’s labia. As for FB, Dr. Rodriguez agreed that all contact

was through the clothing.

Tonika testified, admitting that when they lived on Hwy. 2, TB told

her that Coliston had touched her privates, and FB told her he had touched

her thigh and private area. In spite of what her daughters told her, she did

not believe these accusations at the time. She also admitted she had caught

Coliston in bed with TB and confronted him about it, but he defused the

situation by saying it was “just a game.” On cross-examination, Tonika

testified she did not believe what the girls were telling her until they had

been “examined” (by Dr. Rodriguez). Further, while she was on probation,

Coliston had been paying some of her bills, but after she was sent to jail for

the probation violation, he stopped, around November 2021. She did not

think the girls were “upset with him” about this, but they blamed him for her

going back to jail. She also agreed that, in December 2020, because of the

Facebook messages, CPSO had investigated Coliston, but in that interview

TB and FB both denied he had touched them.

Coliston elected not to testify, but several family members (three

brothers, his mother and father) all testified they had seen him with the girls

and never saw him engage in any inappropriate conduct with them; they felt

the girls loved him and did not seem afraid of him.

Detective Byrd, of CPSO, testified that he investigated Coliston in

December 2020 about the Facebook messages disclosing that he had touched

TB. When Det. Byrd came to the trailer on Hwy. 2, both girls denied this

happened, but Det. Byrd felt TB showed signs of being “not truthful,” and

RB claimed the messages were “not real.”

5 ACTION OF THE TRIAL COURT

The jury took 27 minutes to find Coliston guilty as charged on all

seven counts. In early 2024, the court sentenced him as follows: Count 1, 20

years at hard labor without benefits; Count 2, 8 years at hard labor without

benefits, consecutive to Count 1; Count 3, 4 years at hard labor without

benefits, consecutive to Count 1 but concurrent with Count 2; Count 4, 35

years at hard labor without benefits, concurrent with Count 1 but

consecutive to Counts 2 and 3; Count 5, 5 years at hard labor, consecutive to

Counts 1 and 4, but concurrent with the others; Count 6, 5 years at hard

labor, consecutive to Counts 1 and 4, but concurrent with the others; and

Count 7, 5 years at hard labor, consecutive to Counts 1 and 4, but concurrent

with the others. In written reasons for judgment, the court stated its intent to

impose a total sentence of 48 years at hard labor.

After trial, the state filed a habitual offender bill of information

charging Coliston as a second-felony offender but withdrew this because it

was satisfied with the length of the initial sentence. Coliston filed posttrial

motions for acquittal, new trial, and to reconsider sentence, but these were

all denied. This appeal followed.

DEFENSE’S POSITION

Coliston raises one assignment of error: the state failed to prove he

was guilty of third degree rape, two counts of sexual battery, attempted

battery, and three counts of indecent behavior with juveniles. He concedes

the standard of review, under Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 99 S. Ct.

2781, 61 L. Ed. 2d 560 (1979), and does not contend the evidence was

insufficient as to any element of any of the offenses of conviction.

6 Instead, the argument is entirely one of credibility: the three sisters

made up these allegations against him because he stopped financially

supporting their mother, Tonika; as a result, she could no longer pay

restitution on her felony conviction, her probation was revoked, and she was

sent to jail. He argues that, according to Tonika, the girls blamed him for

her plight and raised these allegations shortly afterward. He further argues

that Tonika admitted she always disbelieved their earlier reports of his

misconduct, because they “lie”; and, she heard them deny making the

accusatory Facebook messages when Det. Byrd came to their trailer. In

short, the accusers were simply not credible.

Coliston also cites his family members’ testimony that they never saw

him act inappropriately toward the girls. Further, he argues Dr. Rodriguez

only “claimed” to see evidence of prior trauma in TB, but she could not say

when it had occurred; she conjectured it was some two months prior to the

examination, but this would have been earlier than the events described by

TB at trial. He suggests this expert testimony was inconclusive.

In essence, he submits the victims lied about everything, and this

negated the factual basis for the convictions. He asks this court to vacate all

convictions and sentences and enter a judgment of acquittal.

DISCUSSION

The standard of appellate review for a sufficiency of the evidence

claim is whether, after viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to

the prosecution, any rational trier of fact could have found the essential

elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt. Jackson v. Virginia,

supra; State v. Stockstill, 19-01235 (La. 10/1/20), 341 So. 3d 502. This

standard, now legislatively embodied in La. C. Cr. P. art. 821, does not 7 provide the appellate court with a vehicle to substitute its own appreciation

of the evidence for that of the factfinder. State v. Bourgeois, 20-00883 (La.

5/13/21), 320 So. 3d 1047; State v. Dotie, 43,819 (La. App. 2 Cir. 1/14/09),

1 So. 3d 833, writ denied, 09-0310 (La. 11/6/09), 21 So. 3d 297.

The trier of fact makes credibility determinations and may, within the

bounds of rationality, accept or reject the testimony of any witness, in whole

or in part. State v. Brown, 18-01999 (La. 9/30/21), 330 So. 3d 199; State v.

Combs, 56,232 (La. App. 2 Cir. 4/9/25), 410 So. 3d 405. The appellate court

does not assess credibility or reweigh evidence. State v. Kelly, 15-0484 (La.

6/29/16), 195 So. 3d 449; State v. Combs, supra. In the absence of internal

contradiction or irreconcilable conflict with physical evidence, one witness’s

testimony, if believed by the trier of fact, is sufficient support for a requisite

factual conclusion. State v. Reed, 14-1980 (La. 9/7/16), 200 So. 3d 291;

State v. Coffey, 54,729 (La. App. 2 Cir. 9/21/22), 349 So. 3d 647, writ

denied, 22-01574 (La. 12/20/22), 352 So. 3d 89. This includes the sole

testimony of a sexual assault victim. State v. Coffey, supra; State v. Small,

55,208 (La. App. 2 Cir. 8/9/23), 369 So. 3d 501.

The defense tried to develop, on cross-examination of Tonika, a

motivation for the girls to fabricate accusations against Coliston. Notably,

Tonika testified that she went to jail in September 2021 and, after that,

“probably November or maybe October or something like that,” Coliston

stopped paying her bills. Nonetheless, she admitted her girls probably “held

it against” him that he did not help her pay the restitution in the first place.

In short, the potential for bias on the victims’ part was exposed at trial but

the jury did not find it strong enough to undermine their credibility. As for

the credibility of Tonika, there were various reasons to disbelieve her; she 8 had a felony conviction for arson and insurance fraud, she made the

inexplicable decision to allow Coliston, a convicted rapist, to spend time

with her minor daughters; and she blindly accepted his denials of

misconduct, in spite of what the girls told her and what she saw with her

own eyes. Still, she was now convinced the girls were telling the truth. On

this testimony, the jury was entitled to find the victims lacked bias or animus

to fabricate false accusations against Coliston.

This court also notes that the victims’ descriptions of his conduct were

direct and unwavering, and consistent with earlier statements to Tonika and

later statements to Ms. Emerson and Dr. Rodriguez. Finally, Dr.

Rodriguez’s exam of TB was consistent with the history she provided;

owing to the time since the events occurred, a more precise evaluation was

not possible. On this evidence, we find no basis to disturb the jury’s

decision to accept the victims’ testimony.

As noted, beyond the general attack on the victims’ credibility

Coliston has not asserted the state failed to prove any essential element of

the charged offenses. However, for the sake of completeness, we have

reviewed the entire record and find the evidence sufficient to prove each

offense under Jackson v. Virginia, supra. Briefly, as to Count 1, second

degree rape of TB, the victim provided a stark account of Coliston coming

into the bedroom in the trailer on Hwy. 2, pulling down her clothes, forcing

her onto the bed, and fingering her privates before finally inserting his penis

and ejaculating into her and onto the bed. This satisfies the essential

elements of oral or vaginal sexual intercourse deemed to be without lawful

consent because the victim was prevented from resisting by the use of force

or threats of violence. La. R.S. 14:42.1 (A)(1); State v. McFarlin, 54,754 9 (La. App. 2 Cir. 1/25/23), 354 So. 3d 888, writ denied, 23-00261 (La.

10/17/23), 371 So. 3d 1078. Count 2, sexual battery of TB, she described an

incident in St. John when Coliston came into the room, told her she was the

only one he wanted to be with, and felt her upper thigh; TB would have been

11 or 12 at the time. This satisfies the essential elements of intentionally

touching the genitals or anus of the victim by the offender, directly or

through clothing, when the offender acts without the consent of the victim or

when the victim is not yet 15 years old and at least three years younger than

the offender. La. R.S. 14:43.1 (A)(1); State v. Naulty, 24-0118 (La. App. 1

Cir. 2/27/25), 406 So. 3d 1231, writ denied, 25-00374 (La. 5/20/25), 409 So.

3d 220. Count 3, attempted sexual battery of TB, she described an incident

on Hwy. 2 when Coliston came into the room, got in the bed with her, pulled

down her clothes, and choked her, but she was able to push him away. This

obviously meets the criteria for an attempt, La. R.S. 14:27 (A), to commit

sexual battery.

As for Count 4, sexual battery of FB, the victim testified that during a

“wrestling game,” Coliston touched her private parts; she would have been 9

or 10 at the time, and Coliston was about 40. This satisfies the essential

elements of intentionally touching the anus or genitals of the victim, directly

or through clothing, without the consent of the victim, and when the victim

is not yet 15 years old and at least three years younger than the offender. La.

R.S. 14:43.1 (A)(1); State v. Naulty, supra.

Counts 5 through 7 were for indecent behavior with juveniles with

RB. The victim described an incident on Jessie T. Jones Street, on a

Monday night, when she was on the couch and Coliston came over to her,

touched her breasts, pushed her down, and penetrated her with his fingers; 10 she said this was not the only time something like this happened. She also

described an occasion when she came home from school, Coliston was alone

in the house, and exposed himself to her. These all occurred before she left

school, in January 2019, at the age of 16. This evidence satisfies the

essential elements of a lewd or lascivious act, performed by the defendant on

the person or in the presence of the victim, when the victim was under the

age of 17 and at least two years younger than the offender, the offender was

at least 17 years old, and there was specific intent to arouse or gratify his

own or the victim’s sexual desires. La. R.S. 14:81 (A); State v. Masters,

55,705 (La. App. 2 Cir. 7/17/24), 399 So. 3d 564, writ denied, 24-01065 (La.

12/11/24), 396 So. 3d 963. The evidence was, for all counts, sufficient

under Jackson v. Virginia, supra.

The assignment of error lacks merit.

CONCLUSION

For the reasons expressed, the convictions and sentences are affirmed.

CONVICTIONS AND SENTENCES AFFIRMED.