COVINGTON, La. (AP) – A 64-year-old Louisiana man has been sentenced to 99 years in prison for raping and otherwise sexually abusing a child.
St. Tammany Parish District Attorney Warren Montgomery says in a news release Tuesday that a judge gave James Matthew Cole of Lacombe the maximum sentences for sexual battery of someone less than 13 years old, second-degree rape and molesting a juvenile.
The sexual battery charge carried 99 years, the others 40 years each. All are to be served simultaneously.
A St. Tammany Parish jury convicted Cole on Aug. 10. The girl said he fondled her for at least two years, starting when she was 9 or 10 years old, and raped her starting in September 2015.
Sheriff’s offices in St. Tammany Parish and Rockwall County, Texas, investigated the case.
