Piscataway Man Loses Appeal In Murder Conviction Of Woman

New Brunswick NJ

11 February, 2022

3:39 PM

Description

PISCATAWAY, NJ — A Piscataway man convicted for killing a 31-year-old Raritan woman tried to appeal his murder conviction, but lost in court this week. However, he may start serving a shorter prison sentence. In 2018, Christopher Koller, 40, was convicted of the murder of Beth Bezek. Prosecutors say on the night of Nov. 1, 2016 he choked the young woman until she was unconscious and threw her body from the third-floor window of his Piscataway apartment, because she refused to have sex with him. He was also found guilty of distribution and possession of cocaine. In his appeal, Koller painted a very different picture of the events of that night, saying that Bezek came to him to buy cocaine, that she physically attacked him and that she threw herself out the window in a drug-fueled mania. You can read Koller's appeal here, but it was rejected by an appeals judge this week. Koller was sentenced to 66 and a half years in a New Jersey state prison. In his appeal, his lawyer argued that prison term was "excessive." While the appeals judge did not explicitly agree, they did agree to send his case back to a new judge for a re-sentencing. Koller will remain in prison while his new sentence is determined. Get great local NJ news. Sign up for Patch emails: https://patch.com/subscribe Contact this Patch reporter: [email protected]