Kevin Cooper Death Penalty Case - Why the death penalty shouldn't exist

[Themius]

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/...y-case-n507866

California lifted a moratorium on executions in November and is now set to execute Kevin Cooper — even though several federal judges say he may be innocent.

Having exhausted all his options in court, Cooper, 57, is about to file a last-ditch appeal with Gov. Jerry Brown. In a new interview from death row, Cooper says he is pleading with Brown to bring "an open mind" about the evidence in his case.

"I am the only person in the history of the state to have five federal circuit judges say that 'the state of California may be about to execute an innocent man,'" Cooper told NBC News.

Cooper is referring to rulings by the top federal court in California, the Ninth Circuit, which found prosecutors illegally withheld evidence that cast doubt on his guilt. Still, the court upheld his conviction for an infamous quadruple murder.

It all began in June 1983, when four people were found brutally murdered in a ranch house in Chino Hills, a Los Angeles suburb.

Douglas and Peggy Ryen, their 10-year-old daughter Jessica, and 10-year-old Chris Hughes, who was staying at the house, were all hacked and slashed to death. They received over 144 wounds in four minutes, according to the coroner. Josh, the Ryens' 8-year-old-son, was found with his throat slit but managed to survive.

The boy's memory of the murders would prove to be pivotal in the case, cited by prosecutors to prove Cooper was the killer — and by those who insist Cooper is innocent.

Ryen initially said that three white or Latino men murdered his parents. That account, combined with physical evidence that suggested multiple killers, led police to release a criminal bulletin seeking three suspects who were "white or Mexican males."

Other early clues supported that theory.

On the night of the murders, two witnesses saw three white men driving a station wagon down the dead-end road away from the house. The family's station wagon was stolen that night.

Then a local woman, Diana Roper, told police she thought her estranged husband was involved in the "Chino Murders," according to records from the sheriff department.

The man, Lee Furrow, was a white convicted murderer. She said his hatchet was missing. And, most critically, she told police he left coverall pants, splattered with blood, at her house on the night of the murder.

Roper gave police the bloody pants, but they did not test them.

Instead they threw the pants out in a dumpster.

Destroying evidence was not only bad police work — it was also illegal, as the Ninth Circuit court would later rule.

But why did police scuttle a potential lead? They had begun zeroing in on Cooper. And they had a reason.



Police discovered that before the murders, Cooper escaped a minimum-security prison and hid out at a house right by the Ryen residence. As a local NBC anchor reported during at the time, police began to think "the murderer may have stayed in the house next door," then attacked the Ryens.

That led to a new theory: fugitive Kevin Cooper as the sole killer.

Authorities began with circumstantial evidence for the theory. It was undisputed that Cooper was nearby, had a criminal record of burglary convictions, and was on the run from the law. Prosecutors, however, usually need more than circumstance for a murder conviction.

At trial, they offered other evidence to physically link Cooper to the crime, such as blood, shoeprints and testimony from Josh Ryen, the 8-year-old survivor.

When Cooper was first arrested and his face was shown on TV in June 1983, Josh Ryen said that was not the man who killed his parents. On two occasions, in fact, he told his grandmother and a sheriff's deputy that Cooper was not the killer.

At trial, however, prosecutors were able to present different testimony.

Prosecutors said Ryen no longer thought three white or Latino people killed his family, and that he had come to realize there was one killer — Kevin Cooper. They introduced that version of the testimony at trial. (In later hearings, Cooper's lawyers would argue that he was denied the right to fully cross examine the one eyewitness accuser).

Prosecutors also argued that crucial shoeprints at the scene must be from Cooper, because they were prison-issued shoes which he owned that were not for sale to the general public.

It sounded like damning evidence — although the warden at Cooper's own prison said it wasn't true. Prosecutors hid that rebuttal from the jury, which an appeals court later held was illegal.

Then-Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger declined to intervene, saying evidence of Cooper's guilt was "overwhelming," and Cooper's execution was scheduled for Feb. 10, 2004. His only hope was intervention by a federal court.

As the date approached, that seemed increasingly unlikely, and Cooper recalls being led into the death chamber that day.

"I met their volunteer executioners," Cooper said. "They had me stand there butt-naked in that death chamber."

"You watch the clock as your life goes off, minute by minute," Cooper told NBC News. "I was ten feet away from being murdered."

Then with three hours left, the Ninth Circuit halted the execution.

The judges decided to convene a special review of the case by every member of the court — which happens in less than one percent of cases — and then they ruled that some evidence used against Cooper was flawed and illegal.

The court found that the warden of the prison where Cooper served, in 1983, said that prison did not give out special prison shoes. That undercut the prosecution's claim. And the warden said he told investigators that fact before the original trial, which they hid.


The court ruled prosecutors broke the law by withholding that evidence, and "Cooper was almost certainly not wearing" the shoes from the crime scene.

If they weren't Cooper's shoeprints, whose shoes were they? That question has never been answered.

It turned out that the state's original test on blood in the house did not match Cooper. Then a later test did, and the state changed the criminologist's original notes about the shift.

Then, when the state lab provided material for new tests under the 2004 court order, it accidentally sent out Cooper's original blood sample, drawn in August 1983, for testing. This was the first time that blood evidence was ever examined by independent experts who did not work for the prosecution.

What they found was, as a judge would later write, "truly startling."

The blood which had always been presented as a sample of solely Cooper's blood, drawn from his body, actually contained DNA from two different people.

That meant either the original blood sample was compromised, such as by lab error, or someone with access to the sample deliberately, illegally tampered with it.

It's a completely fucked up case, and hopefully they don't kill him with all these fuck ups

[Silverlock]

I don't really get how from the view of the state and tax payer how life imprisonment is better then the death penalty.

The rare exception does not really warrant a overhaul of the system.

[Revi]

I'm not fundamentally opposed to the Death Penalty, but don't think it should be possible to make it an option in cases where there's doubt, like this one.

Sounds like the whole case should be retried.

[ParanoiD84]

So better to imprison someone for 100+ years? it's far cheaper to just kill them and i bet no one likes to live the rest of their lives in prison anyways.

[Themius]

So better to imprison someone for 100+ years? it's far cheaper to just kill them and i bet no one likes to live the rest of their lives in prison anyways.

It's not cheaper to "just kill them" California was spending over 300 million for each death penalty case, which is many times more than what life in prison cost.

And why do you think he'd rather be death?

[Revi]

So better to imprison someone for 100+ years? it's far cheaper to just kill them and i bet no one likes to live the rest of their lives in prison anyways.

One execution is a LOT more expensive than a life sentence. financially it's a horrible idea.

If he prefers death, suicide is an option.

[lockedout]

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/...y-case-n507866












It's a completely fucked up case, and hopefully they don't kill him with all these fuck ups

There is already a thread about this and in that thread it showed what was left out and why he is getting executed IIRC.

[Rennadrel]

Quite frankly, anyone convicted of a major felony like murder or rape, should face a punishment equal to what they dished out. Nothing wrong with the death sentence and I think we need to bring it back in more countries.

[OnlineSamantha]

Can anyone please post the report that states it is actually MORE expensive to give someone the death penalty than to "just" imprison them for life?

[Themius]

There is already a thread about this and in that thread it showed what was left out and why he is getting executed IIRC.

There is no other thread that mentions "Kevin cooper" only 7 threads came up, this one and 6 others not about this.

[Revi]

Quite frankly, anyone convicted of a major felony like murder or rape, should face a punishment equal to what they dished out. Nothing wrong with the death sentence and I think we need to bring it back in more countries.

I don't think there's anything morally wrong with the death sentence, but there's a whole bunch of things that are practically wrong with it. Everywhere it's implemented it get's used in cases where there's doubt, and it ends being horribly expensive and getting innocent people killed by the state.

[ParanoiD84]

It's not cheaper to "just kill them" California was spending over 300 million for each death penalty case, which is many times more than what life in prison cost.

And why do you think he'd rather be death?

300 million? is it because of the lethal injection thing? should just hang them or use a firing squad then much cheaper. And i dont think anyone would like to spend 50+ years in prison and would rather die.

One execution is a LOT more expensive than a life sentence. financially it's a horrible idea.

If he prefers death, suicide is an option.

Did not know it was so damn expensive to kill someone.

[Themius]

Can anyone please post the report that states it is actually MORE expensive to give someone the death penalty than to "just" imprison them for life?

http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/cost...-death-penalty

Additional findings from the forthcoming study are as follows:

The state's death row prisoners cost $184 million more per year than those sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
A death penalty prosecution costs up to 20 times as much as a life-without-parole case.
The least expensive death penalty trial costs $1.1 million more than the most expensive life-without-parole case.
Jury selection in a capital case runs three to four weeks longer and costs $200,000 more than in life-without-parole cases.
The heightened security practices mandated for death row inmates added $100,663 to the cost of incarcerating each capital prisoner last year, for a total of $72 million.

[Septik]

great you just spoiled season2 of that murder making show on netflix.

[Themius]

300 million? is it because of the lethal injection thing? should just hang them or use a firing squad then much cheaper. And i dont think anyone would like to spend 50+ years in prison and would rather die.


Did not know it was so damn expensive to kill someone.

It's because you have to do this thing where you go through all these appeals to make sure you're actually killing a person who even did the act, and not an innocent person.

The DOJ found that conservatively 4% of all death row inmates are not guilty.

[Silverlock]

One execution is a LOT more expensive than a life sentence. financially it's a horrible idea.

If he prefers death, suicide is an option.

Only because we make it that way. A bullet is cheaper then a buck. No need for fancy needles.

[Noradin]

I don't think there's anything morally wrong with the death sentence, but there's a whole bunch of things that are practically wrong with it.

There is something morally wrong with anything that cannot be carried out without morally wrong consequences (such as killing of innocents by the state) and leaves no way for recompense.
So, if there is a systematic component to it that makes any implementation practically or morally wrong, then it is a morally wrong concept.

[Themius]

Only because we make it that way. A bullet is cheaper then a buck. No need for fancy needles.

Are you people like not thinking?

Do you think drugs and needles cost 300m?

[Noradin]

Only because we make it that way. A bullet is cheaper then a buck. No need for fancy needles.

So just shoot random people because someone presecutes them?
That would be cheap to, at least the bullets.

[Revi]

Only because we make it that way. A bullet is cheaper then a buck. No need for fancy needles.

Sure, if you don't mind the state shooting innocent people.