Left: Cheryl Coe (Coweta County Sheriff”s Office). Right: Luther “Luke” Coe III (McKoon Funeral Home).
A 55-year-old woman from Georgia has been sentenced to life imprisonment for the fatal shooting of her husband after a conflict arose regarding her relationships with other men in their open marriage.
Cheryl Coe was found guilty on charges of murder and aggravated assault in the killing of 48-year-old Luther “Luke” Coe III in Coweta County. The court ruled that she would serve a life sentence without the chance of parole, as stated in a report from the Newnan Times-Herald.
On June 23, 2021, at approximately 7:30 p.m., deputies from the Coweta County Sheriff’s Office arrived at the Coe residence on Tommy Lee Cook Road in Newnan. This response followed Cheryl Coe’s 911 call, where she claimed to have shot her husband, mistaking him for an intruder.
According to Coe’s statement to the police, she had consumed four or five Angry Orchard Hard Ciders on the porch while her husband was occupied in the detached garage. She mentioned that she went to bed roughly around 7:15 p.m. and awoke about 10 minutes later when someone suddenly opened the bedroom door.
Thinking it was an intruder, she opened fire.
“I was just trying to protect myself,” she reportedly told investigators at the time.
She claimed she didn’t realize she shot her husband until he reportedly said “Cheryl, you shot me.”
Coe’s narrative quickly unraveled when investigators found that her husband had been shot at close range, indicating that the gun was discharged while pressed against his body, contradicting her account of a distant shot.
Coe later asserted that her actions were in self-defense. She claimed that her husband angrily entered the room, attempting to pull her out of bed, and after he left momentarily, she seized a gun from the nightstand. Coe said she fired a warning shot that allegedly enraged the victim before she fired again.
“I was just trying to hit the wall behind the TV so it would scare him off or make him leave,” she reportedly said. “I wasn’t trying to hit him.”
But she did. After Coe helped paramedics render aid to her husband, he later died at a hospital.
Investigators then discovered simmering issues within the marriage. A series of text messages in the days leading up to the shooting reportedly showed the couple fighting about their open marriage.
Cheryl Coe asked her husband for permission to see another man later that week. He then reportedly asked if she was also planning on seeing a second man that same day to which she responded “lol.” The victim reportedly said her response “turned his stomach.”
She suggested they end their open marriage because it was causing issues, but he reportedly wanted to keep it going with more ground rules. Luther Coe reportedly became even more upset when he learned that his wife was talking about their issues with a friend.
The defendant reiterated her self-defense claim when she took the stand at her trial. She reportedly told jurors he was “more enraged that he’s ever been at me.”
Asked why she initially told cops the shooting was an accident, she reportedly claimed it was because she did not want to tarnish her husband’s reputation.
Prosecutors during closing arguments pointed out her conflicting narratives.
“She brought a gun to a verbal spat,” prosecutor Laura Lukert reportedly said.
According to his obituary, Luther Coe served in the U.S. Army and owned a demolition and road grading company.
