The toll of trauma: part one

(Editor’s note: This is the first of a three-part series covering sexual assault cases handled in Gunnison District Court. The next installment will appear in the Feb. 8 edition of the Times.)

It was a fall night, just over two years ago. A few girls gathered at a quaint home on North Colorado Street. They drank cocktails and danced around. It’s a familiar rhythm known to many in the Gunnison Valley: Find a warm space to share with friends and pass the long nights. 

Later that evening, two more joined the group — a friend, and a stranger. They’d come from a wedding reception at Garlic Mike’s. The friend had met the stranger earlier that evening at The Dive in Gunnison, and after a few drinks, invited him along to the wedding.

But this seemingly mundane night would have devastating consequences for a Gunnison local, leading to an allegation of sexual assault and, in the summer of 2023, a suicide.

Celeste Hendry was a longtime Gunnison local and chiropractor known to many for her healing work. According to an arrest affidavit filed on April 15, 2022, this “stranger” from Texas allegedly raped Celeste multiple times throughout that night. In December of 2023, following his arrest and extradition from Texas, he pleaded not guilty to all charges related to the alleged assault. (The Times chose to omit the suspect’s name from this article because he has not yet been tried and convicted of the charges. He currently lives in Texas.) 

Over the next year, Celeste tried to recover from the events of that night, leaning into her chiropractic work at her practice, Healing Waves. But privately, she suffered from profound fear, anxiety and shame — a devastating, but common reaction among victims of sexual assault. 

“We chose to bury the story as much as we could, apart from telling close friends, to preserve her privacy and her professional integrity as a healer in the valley … She did not want to be seen as a victim,” said Enid Holden, Celeste’s mother. “However, at this point, her life has been destroyed by this event, the consequences and the personal choices that came out of that trauma.”

In March of 2022, six months after the alleged attack, the suspect’s DNA, collected following Celeste’s attack, was found to match DNA from a years-old sexual assault case investigated out of the Austin Police Department. Over the next five months, Gunnison County Court issued an arrest warrant and the Gunnison District Attorney’s Office filed felony counts of sexual assault, criminal extortion and trespassing in regard to Celeste’s case. 

But immediately after the alleged attack, the man disappeared to Texas, and it took a year after the arrest warrant was filed for law enforcement to locate him. He was eventually extradited back to Gunnison on the morning of May 22, 2023. At a bond hearing two days later, the judge reduced the amount of the bond that the district attorney had requested — from $60,000 to $15,000. He was released back into the community on May 24, 2023 just after 9:30 p.m.

“With regard to the charges against him, [he] is innocent,” his lawyer Stephanie Grismer wrote in a statement to the Times. “We are looking forward to the upcoming court proceedings and finally clearing his name.”

Upon his release from the Gunnison County Detention Center, he had no obligation to check in with law enforcement or immediately leave the Gunnison Valley. The judge gave him six days to return to Texas and obtain a GPS monitor from local law enforcement. 

This is the story seen from the perspective of law enforcement and the courts — straightforward and austere. The rest, revealed in interviews, details the devastating emotional and psychological trauma Celeste suffered for years. 

On the day her alleged assailant was freed on bond, Celeste was terrified by the prospect that he was at large in the community, Enid said. But her fear was not new. By then, she had lived with the unseen wounds from that night for nearly two years.

A local healer

Celeste’s family moved to Gunnison in 2006 and she soon graduated from Gunnison High School. Afterward, she left the Gunnison Valley for the University of Colorado Boulder, where she completed a dual degree in molecular biology and integrative physiology. 

But it was her affinity for animals, caterpillars stowed away and kittens cherished in childhood, that pushed her into chiropractic work. During a gap year, she studied with animal chiropractor Jay Komarek in Crested Butte. Shadowing him changed the course of her life, Enid said, as it led her toward preventive medicine.

She went to the Sherman College of Chiropractic in North Carolina for four years before returning to intern with local chiropractor Jed Orgill, at Black Canyon Chiropractic. In 2018, she opened Healing Waves Chiropractic, on Colorado Street. 

“She kept her education alive. It wasn't stagnant,” Enid said. 

Soon, books exploring every aspect of human wellness crowded her home. Her personal journal was packed with obscure notes about how the body moves and how the mind can repair it: “Pain is picked up in the brain,” Celeste wrote in a bundle of notes. “If you are juggling a lot of balls — one more you get but can’t handle [sic] — drop them all.” 

Patient records show that she treated more than a thousand patients during her five years in business, Enid said. They traveled from Grand Junction and Salida just for the chance to work with her. Former patients approached Enid, sharing how her daughter had enabled them to walk again, or prevented them from having surgery.

“She always made you feel that you are completely unique and that you had a real connection,” said Beth Marcue, Celeste’s patient of three years.

But her life would take a pronounced turn in the fall of 2021, when she was allegedly raped in her own home. According to the arrest affidavit, the stranger arrived at her house with the friend he’d met at the Dive earlier that evening. This friend was Celeste’s receptionist at Healing Waves, and someone who was like a brother to her, Enid said. 

Celeste had two other friends over that night, and her husband was out of town. As the evening stretched on, her friends left one by one, leaving her alone with the stranger. She put on a movie.

He then forced Celeste into her bedroom, where he “physically pinned her down and restrained her with his forearm. [Celeste] reported that she was repeatedly sexually assaulted by [the suspect] seven or eight separate times in her bedroom … The assault lasted six to seven hours,” according to the affidavit. After the alleged attack was over, he walked out the front door and into the early morning.

Celeste reported what happened to the City of Gunnison Police Department that same morning, Sept. 19. She went to Gunnison Valley Hospital that afternoon to undergo a rape kit examination. DNA from this examination, collected in-part from bite marks on her body according to the arrest affidavit, later led to an arrest warrant.

By reporting her assault within hours and ensuring that physical evidence was preserved, she had done what so many who suffer from sexual violence cannot bear to do for years, months or a lifetime: she told someone.

Growing fear

In the two years following the alleged attack, Colorado law enforcement attempted to find him in Texas, without success. With the suspect nowhere to be found and the case under investigation, Celeste continued to work at Healing Waves. Privately, she suffered from anxiety and trauma from what had happened that night.

She got a permit to carry a concealed handgun, and started taking online self-defense classes, according to Enid. She practiced at the Gunnison Sportsman's Association Gun Club, to make sure she was handling the weapon safely. 

In her journal, Celeste laid out visions for her life, professional aspirations scrawled in to-do lists and personal reflections on how to stay well. “Wake up early, read or listen to something inspirational, exercise and eat healthy, nutritious food,” she wrote. “Make house perfect, pay off debts.” 

But a series of tragic events intensified her pain. In the fall of 2022, she and her husband, Ben Hendry, chose to divorce. Less than a year later, her father passed away unexpectedly. 

“She went from being a happy, fulfilled person to being a very anxious person,” Enid said. 

In May of 2023, police officers in El Paso, Texas discovered the active warrant for Celeste’s case, after an unspecified interaction with the suspect. He was then returned to Gunnison to face charges. His bond was set at $60,000. In Colorado, under the Victim’s Rights Act, victims of certain crimes must be notified of developments in their case. This includes when a suspect has been arrested or extradited back to the place where the crime occurred. 

When Celeste found out  the suspect was coming back to Gunnison, she was “in complete terror,” said Holly Zahand, her assistant at Healing Waves. She bought an ADT security system. She then went to her mother’s home, in search of her passport. She was going to leave the country, she told Enid on the phone. On a phone call with District Attorney Darren Struble, who was handling her case, she pleaded with him to not reduce the bond.

“She felt a lot of fear for her safety and that he shouldn't be released,” Struble said.

The reduced bond 

At an hearing on May 23, 2023, the suspect’s public defender, Daniel Lavrisha, requested that the judge reduce his bond to $10,000. Like many others in her position, Celeste chose to not be present during the proceedings. 

At the time, the charges against him included felony sexual assault and criminal trespass, as well as criminal extortion — to account for the threats he’d allegedly made against Celeste. According to the arrest affidavit, the suspect threatened her animals and forced her to look at his driver’s license so she could never forget him. 

As his legal advocate, Lavrisha argued that his bond should be reduced. The lawyer described his family, a fiancé and two children back in El Paso. Lavrisha also noted the defendant’s health issues — high blood pressure and a history of strokes. 

Struble objected, arguing that the bond should be reduced no lower than $30,000. Celeste had told the district attorney’s office that she would not feel safe if he were released into the community and that she would leave Gunnison if he were, Struble said.  

“I specifically noted that the victim was terrified of [the suspect], and was extremely concerned,” Struble told the Times. “We were as well because he had made threats against her life should she report.”

At the May 23 hearing, Judge Ashley Burgemeister, who was hearing the case, acknowledged that she was responsible for the safety of the community, which included Celeste. She stated she was concerned given the allegations and the suspect’s limited ties to the county. Court and police records reflect that he has spent some time in Tincup, northeast of Gunnison. But she went on to say that Celeste had a protection order in place and noted the defendant’s “limited” criminal history. 

At the time, the court was aware that the suspect had similar charges filed against him by the Austin Police Department. But that charge, which was initially filed as felony count of sexual assault, had been pled down to a misdemeanor, non-sex related charge. This “points to a lack of severity” of that charge, Lavrisha told the judge, despite the fact that Texas law enforcement referred to it as being “somewhat serious,” he said.

Burgemeister reduced the bond to $15,000 cash or surety (most Colorado bail and bond companies charge 10-15% of this amount to the defendant) with the requirement he wear a GPS monitor. He was given until May 30 to obtain it. In a hearing the next day, she called that decision a “significant” modification of the bond, compared to that of other defendants facing similar charges who did not have GPS monitors. 

Citing Celeste’s concern over the time the suspect would be unmonitored and potentially in the community, Struble asked the judge that the alleged attacker be required to check-in with law enforcement in Texas within 48 hours of posting bail. But the judge ultimately denied the request. Burgemeister explained that she has no authority outside Gunnison County, and without an active warrant, other law enforcement agencies would have little interest enforcing that rule.

At the bond hearing on May 24, the suspect stated he would book an afternoon flight out of Gunnison the next day. His lawyer Grismer told the the Times that he states he had no contact with her after he was released from jail. The bond requirements included no extra monitoring for the period of time between when he was released and when he was to get his GPS monitor. His trial is set for the week of May 20 in District Court. 

“She went into a panic mode. She couldn’t really focus at work. She was definitely fearful for her life,” said Zahand, her close friend and assistant. “She thought for sure that this guy was going to find her and hurt her and her family and animals. Those were words she used over and over again.”

Within 24 hours of her alleged attacker being released back into the community, and after two years of living with the anxiety and stress of her alleged rape, Celeste took her life. 

(Abby Harrison can be contacted at 970.641.1414 or abby@gunnisontimes.com.)