Couple sentenced to life after ‘horrifying’ sex acts on children, Oklahoma officials say

An Oklahoma couple will spend the rest of their lives in prison after they were charged with 29 counts of child abuse, News 9 reported.

Gerrad Coddington, 25, and Christina Nelson-Coddington, 30, were arrested in June on “several charges including manufacturing child pornography, lewd acts with a minor, and violation of the Oklahoma Computer Crimes Act,” KFOR reported.

An investigation began after the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children received tips of a child being exploited on the internet.

“They were seeing activity on the internet that suggested there was a minor being exploited,” Oklahoma Attorney General Mike Hunter told KFOR. “The investigation discloses that the crimes that involve the minor child are incredibly distressing.”

Garvin County District Judge Leah Edwards sentenced the couple on 29 counts relating to child abuse including first-degree rape, incest, child abuse, manufacturing child pornography and lewd acts with a minor, among others, Hunter said in a news release.

“These two individuals engaged in horrifying acts of abuse and violence with innocent children,” Hunter said in the release. “These are evil people who presented a danger to society. I commend Judge Edwards’ decision to hold them accountable to the fullest extent of the law. I applaud the investigators with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, the investigator in my office with the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force and the attorneys who worked on this case to achieve a successful result.”

More than 6,000 pages of communication between the co-defendants were uncovered in the investigation, including evidence showing children were beaten, handcuffed and raped, the release said. There was also evidence that the couple conspired to commit incest with a child that hadn’t even been born.