Kevin Cooper /// Part 1 /// 219 | Forensic Files

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[Applause] [Music] crime [Music] Joshua Ryan made the following statement during a US District Court Hearing in
San Diego in 2005 the first time I met Kevin Cooper I was 8 years old and he slipped my throat
he hit me with a hatchet and put a hole in my skull he stabbed me twice which broke my
ribs and collapsed one lung I lived only because I stuck four fingers in my neck to slow the bleeding
but I was too weak to move I laid there for 11 hours looking at my mother who was right beside
me I know now he came through the sliding glass door and attacked my dad first he was lying on the bed and was
struck in the dark without warning with the hatchet and a knife he was hit many times because
there was a lot of blood on the wall and on his side of the bed my mother screamed and Cooper came
around the bed and started hitting her somehow my dad was able to struggle between the bed and the closet but
Cooper bludgeoned my father to death with the knife and Hatchet stabbing him 26 times and axing him
11 one of the blows severed his finger and it landed in the closet my mother tried to get away but he
caught her at the bottom of the bed and he stabbed her 25 times and asked her seven all of us kids were drawn to the
room by my mom's screams Jessica was killed in the doorway with five ax blows and 46
stabs I won't say how many times my best friend Chris was stabbed and AED not because it's not important but because I
don't want a hurt his family in any way and they are here after Cooper killed everyone and
thought he had killed me he went over to my sister and lifted her shirt and Drew things on her stomach
with the knife then he walked down the hallway opened the refrigerator and had a
beer I guess killing so many people can make a man thirsty [Music] Franklin Douglas Ryan grew up on the
outskirts of De Moine Iowa he grew up to be tall strong and a well-liked man he became a marine and then went on to be
an MP a u military police officer by the way he went by the name Doug so we will
just call him Doug uh Peggy and Ryan was born Peggy and Howell she got her first
of many horses that she would own in her lifetime when she was just 12 years old
horses were her passion and she would be gifted several horses from her twice divorced mother this is Dr Mary Howell
Peggy was always strong and athletic and she grew up to be 5' 8 in tall Peggy loved to train horses and enter them in
competitions uh this is near her mother's Chiropractic practice in Pennsylvania not far from
Lancaster as a teen she aspired to become a veterinarian but her mother persuaded her to follow in her footsteps
so just like her mother Peggy attended the Palmer School of Chiropractics in Davenport Iowa she graduated in
1963 and then she went to work for her mother at the chiropractic clinic that she owned located in Santa Ana 3 and 1/2
years later later Peggy ventured out on her own opening up her own clinic in Santa Ana and in 1970 Peggy an met Doug
Ryan at an alumni reunion at Palmer and not too much later the two were married at a church in Corona delmare yeah
they'd be married December 20th 1970 eventually the two newlyweds decided to open up their own practice
together this is in Olympia Washington after relocating Peggy bought two hor while it turns out that Olympia was not
a great spot for the couple As far as their Chiropractic business or their equestrian hobby would be concerned it
was a great stop along life's big adventure for their family though because their daughter Jessica Kate Ryan
was born in Olympia on November 9th 1972 so their practice is failing at this point the Ryan accepted Peggy's
mother's offer to join her success uccessful and very lucrative Chiropractic Clinic back in Santa Ana
this is in the mid 1973 so the Ryan bought a home in Santa Ana this is with a big backyard big
enough to hold their two horses and they contined to purchase more horses now Captain I'm not certain here but I think
at some point they got up to like five or six horses in their backyard that's a lot of
horeshit well the neighbors are going to start complaining about all these horses
about them keeping them in their backyard probably because of the smell well this would be this would prompt the
eventual move to Chino Hills California so they find a Hilltop Ranch this is directly above Peggy's mother's house in
Chino Hills it came on the market M Doug and Peggy Ryan sold their home in Santa
Ana and they bought this new house now Peggy noted to friends that the property came with a gorgeous barn and a huge
riding ring the three-bedroom two bath house featured is sunken living room and a family room and a jacuzzi in the patio
off of the master bedroom jacuzzi so this secluded area of Chino Hills that Doug and Peggy Ryan uh moved into with
their 2-year-old daughter Jessica and their infant son Joshua this fulfilled a leld dream for Peggy Ryan joining a
small close-knit community this is all the community is of Arabian horse breeders who operated adjoining or close
by ranches so this is horsee moving to be near other horse people I think they're called centaurs their neighbors
refer to their ranches along Old English Road as the Arabian Horse Center of Southern California from their Hilltop
house the Ryan looked out over a maze of white fences and their neighbors ranches
in the Ryan Stables were more than a dozen white Arabian show horses the house was located at 2943 English Place
Chino Hills California and unfortunately it was going to be the location of a set
of Horrid murders Saturday June 4th 1983 by now the Ryan's daughter Jessica was 10 years old and their son Josh was 8
years old MH there were not many boys in this neighborhood the same age as Josh but there was one boy who had become
very good friends with Josh and this is 11-year-old Chris Hughes Chris and Josh had gone trick-or-treating together they
were very close Christopher Hughes was almost 5 foot tall and he had just completed the fifth grade Christopher
was a good student he had lots of friends he was on the swim team and he had a room full of trophies to prove it
he liked Star Wars and on this Saturday after an invite from his friend Josh He begged his mother that he be allowed to
stay the night at the Ryan's family home she agreed but told Christopher to to remember that he needed to be home in
time in the morning for church Christopher's mother watched the two boys ride away on their bicycles toward
Josh's home now that evening the Ryan with their guest Christopher they attended a potluck dinner with about a
hundred other equestrian Enthusiast that's hard to say equestrian Enthusiast and their Enthusiast and their families
at the Chino Hill home of George and Valerie blade this was pretty big part of yeah and again all horse people it
was a bob affair they arrived to the gathering with a bottle of pink sh that night at the party the blad son
Jas Jason pleaded with his parents to allow him to stay the night as well at the Ryan's home but he was not allowed
to because I guess like their grandmother was in town and visiting right so around 9:30 p.m. the Ryan and
Chris returned to the Ryan split level home after a while the children went to sleep the boys were sleeping in sleeping
bags on the floor in Josh's room and Jessica was in her room Doug Ryan watched some television before joining
his wife in bed probably about 11:00 p.m. so we have just a real quick recap we have the father the mother the
daughter which is older and then we have the son and then his friend yeah so the
daughter Jessica would be 10 years old right Josh is 8 years old and his friend Christopher is 11 the next morning
Christopher's mother Maryanne Hughes she became concerned because remember he's supposed to come home so they can go to
church in the morning he doesn't come home so she called the Ryan residents a few times but only got busy signals so
shortly after 9:00 a.m. Mrs Hughes went to the Ry home she noticed that the barn
was closed and it didn't look to her like the horses had been fed or let out or whatever it is you're supposed to do
with horses I I'm not going to pretend to know what well let's just assume that they need to be fed in the morning I
have dogs I feed them and let them out in the morning so I'm guessing horses are the same uh this is her account of
the um situation that the barn looked to have been closed no activity that morning that she could see uh she only
saw the Ryan's truck at the house they had a station wagon as well but she did not see the station wagon she knocked on
the door several times I there was no answer at about 11:30 a.m. Mr Hughes went to the Ryan home to investigate and
Mr Hughes went to the kitchen door looked inside tried the door but it was locked he continued around the outside
of the house until he reached the sliding glass door leading to the Ryan's master bedroom he looked inside the
glass GL door and he saw the body of his son he also saw the bodies of Doug and Peggy Ryan and Josh Ryan lying on the
floor between his mother and Christopher now apparently and when this is happening MH
so Mr Hughes is trying to get into this sliding glass door he he can't get into the door he can see Josh in there and
Josh kind of moves he's the only body that he sees move inside and he's trying to tell Josh I need you to get up and
unlock this door yeah but we would later learn Josh has sustained too many injuries he he can't get up eventually
Mr Hughes goes around to another door this is back to the door that's at the kitchen and he he kicks in the door and
then he goes inside and he finds he finds the bodies of of all five of these people
now four of them are dead including his son and he finds Josh who is very bloodied and very weak so he starts
asking or trying to ask Josh hey who did this but Josh's throat has been slit right mhm so he can't tell him yeah he
tries to talk but he he's like only moving his lips there's nothing coming out Mr Hughes tried to use the phone the
telephone in the house to call for help but the phone did work so he had to drive to a neighbor's house seeking help
the police arrived and Doug Peggy Chris and Jessica were pronounced dead Josh was found lying on his side his eyes
were open but he was unable to speak or move he was unresponsive Josh was flown by
helicopter to Loma Linda University hospital and thankfully Josh would survive now we're going to go through
the medical examiner findings this is going to be this will be difficult to hear so some of you may want to skip
forward a few minutes CU we're going to turn down the volume of the mics uh well this is going to be
gruesome stuff here uh so Doug Ryan suffered at least 37 separate wounds some inflicted by an axe or Hatchet and
some were stab wounds this is the father Yes five chop wounds to Mr Ryan skull were in a quote tight pattern indicating
his skull was stationary when the blows were delivered the blows appeared to have been administered in Rapid
succession within a second or two as Mr Ryan was kneeling by the side of the bed
one blow administered to Mr Ryan skull was consistent with being struck by the blunt side of a hatchet or axe causing a
depressed skull fracture where the bone was pushed into his head Mr Ryan's right
middle finger was amputated by a chopping blow his severed finger was found on the floor inside the Ryan's
bedroom closet another chop wound cut clear through the bone of his right forearm one Stab Wound penetrated his
sternum entering his heart one Stab Wound punctured his lung there were slicing injuries to the right side of Mr
Ryan's cheek and before he died Mr Ryan was stabbed on the left side of his neck
severing his cored artery and cutting his trachea so before we move on real quick what that means is we're seeing
obvious signs of defensive wounds here right so he's attacked presumably they're surprised in the middle of the
night but he is able to at least get up and attempt to defend himself and I say that I believe that these are defens of
wounds because we're seeing a several wounds to his hands and his forearms almost as if he's putting them up in
defense of himself mhm now the one thing that I think is important here too is the the wounds to his skull which they
titled as a tight pattern would almost indicate that they are made in Rapid succession by the same person by the
same hand same weapon same individual inflicting these wounds Peggy Ryan suffered 32 separate
identified wounds these wounds were primarily on her head chest and neck areas a series of three chopping wounds
to the right side of Mrs Ryan's head were consistent with having been administered while she was standing Mrs
Ryan had a defensive wound on her right hand Jessica Ryan the daughter suffered 46 separate identified wounds consisting
of a combination of chopping and stabbing or incision wounds Jessica suffered a stab wound to her neck the
wound resulted in massive bleeding unconsciousness from this wound due to Rapid blood loss would have occurred in
as little as 30 to 60 seconds and would have been fatal in a couple of minutes M
three stab wounds to Jessica's chest were near each other suggesting the wounds were delivered in Rapid
succession the wounds were consistent with having been delivered while Jessica was in the position in which she was
found Jessica suffered a grouping of carving injuries on her chest most apparently occurred after Jessica had
stopped bleeding so after she had already passed postmortem yes the injuries were consistent with a an ice
pick a nail or an all having been used to inflict these injuries these injuries were primarily inflicted while Jessica
was in the position in which she was found the position in which she died M okay so a little more information here
it looks like she suffered early on in the attack she suffered a wound that was great enough powerful enough for her to
be knocked unconscious because of the rapid blood loss mhm which she would die from that so a lot of these wounds that
she suffered we can assume where she suffered these wounds after she was already passing away as she was dying as
she was unconscious so she's we're not going to see as many defensive wounds on her because she didn't have the
opportunity the chance to defend herself right now one thing that I think's interesting here though Captain is we
are seeing the suggestion of a possible third weapon being used here so some of these injuries and wounds the medical
examiner suggesting were produced by a knife mhm and then we have other wounds that he's suggesting were produced by a
hatchet or an ax and then we have wounds to the girl girl that suggests that they
were they were created by an ice pick or a nail something to that effect but different from the knife and the hatchet
right now Christopher Hughes suffered 25 separate wounds a chopping wound to his
right wrist went through the bone of his forearm almost severing his hand from his wrist wow Chris also suffered a
chopping injury to his right hand the injuries were consistent with defensive wounds several of Christopher's wounds
were inflicted after the boy had passed Joshua Ryan the little boy that somehow survived his injuries included including
a hatchet wound to the top of his head a stab wound to his throat and a hatchet wound near his left ear now the coroner
this is Dr root who performed the autopsies believed that the injuries could have been inflicted quickly within
one minute for each of the victims he suspected each victim died within minute minutes of being attacked our survivor
will be able to report his limited memory of the murders this is a breakdown of Josh's eyewitness report
immediately after his rescue there was a clinical social worker at the hospital that interviewed the boy that afternoon
in the emergency room Josh was unable to speak he pointed at words and numbers on
this chart that were provided to him by the social worker right he's going to used this method to try to tell the
social worker what had happened what he had witnessed during the attack most importantly what he points out is that
three white men were in the house at the time of the attacks well like you said the coiner thinks that these attacks
happen within a minute of each other mhm so that that'd be one individual moving
pretty rapidly or suggesting that there's more than one attacker right so the the social worker says you know I
asked Josh how many people were there and Josh pointed to the number three he said I asked him if there if they were
male he pointed to yes yeah now I don't want to say that you're wrong but I do believe that when they said um how many
people were there that he actually pointed to three and four I mean that's just what I heard he also asked the boy
if the men were black and Josh pointed to the word no so this man added that Josh said that he had seen the men
before but did not know them now let's add this fact in here so we have San Bernardino County Sheriff's deputy this
is Irvin Dale Sharp he would later testify that he interviewed the boy twice on June 5th the same day sharp
said that the first interview took place in the emergency room and lasted about 15 minutes in that interview Josh Josh
said said that three white men were in the house when the killings occurred but in a subsequent
interview this is an hour later the boy identified the three men as possibly Hispanic each between 18 and 20 years
old possibly driving a low rider Chevrolet Impala and had been at his house on June 4th sharp later testified
that the youth told him the attack on his family took place between 4: and 5:00 a.m. there is thought that this
time frame would not have been consistent with the coroner's finding well he's 8 years old right right and
then on top of that he's been he has a head wound and a Severe you know slashing of
his throat mhm but I just wonder how much the head wound is causing these inaccuracies Well here here's the other
thing too you know so the coroner's finding the coroner suspects that the attacks likely took place a couple hours
earlier than what Josh is saying he believes the attacks took place 3 weeks after the slangs the boy was released
from the University Medical Center and left for the East Coast where he was going to be staying with his uncle now
later a custody of Josh would be granted to his grandmother Dr Mary [Music] Howell
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Captain I think we should probably introduce Kevin Cooper to everybody and you know we have the situation here
where we've titled this episode Kevin Cooper and other than Joshua's statement to the court we've not heard his name
yet and this case puts us in a difficult situation doesn't it Captain because we
usually try to title these episodes uh the victim's name MH because the victims are often forgotten about in these true
crime stories here we have Kevin Cooper who as you heard Josh's statement he says
killed my family but the reason why we title it Kevin Cooper is there is some question about this man's guilt and what
we really wanted to present to everybody is the facts of the case so everybody can form their own opinion is Kevin
Cooper guilty of having killed this family and after reviewing all of the evidence and after looking at this story
you presented this case to me and I had not heard of this case which I found a little weird because once I started
diving into it it seems to be a fairly popular case uh especially in the California area but after you told me
about this case and we're looking into it you know what kept running through my mind is that this is you know the the
famous show making a murderer mhm this this should have this should have been about Kevin Cooper um and I know I'm not
going to uh win a lot of people over with this statement but looking at this case um I think one could present
evidence to look stepen Avery looks a lot more guilty to me than Kevin Cooper but okay let's go through let's
introduce Kevin Cooper and then we will try to get to some of the evidence here Captain so Kevin Cooper was adopted as a
baby he suffered an abusive and troubled childhood in Pennsylvania he would run away from home at a very young age later
he said that this was to escape beatings the trouble he got into as a child involved shoplifting and marijuana
charges he never graduated from high school Uh Kevin Cooper really got into trouble this was in in Pennsylvania when
he stole a car from a teenage girl now apparently apparently the girl interrupted him while he was committing
this um he was committing some form of residential burglary okay she interrupts him committing this crime he then steals
the car but he he also took the girl with him and Kevin Cooper would later admit forcing the 17-year-old girl into
the vehicle now she says that he also hit her he threatened her he threatened to kill her and that he had raped her he
flatly denies hitting or raping her do we have any evidence of this um I don't know all I have is his statement where
he admits to stealing the car and forcing her into the vehicle I think this is a he said she said situation I
don't think there was a lot of evidence to point either direction and then you have a guy that is willing to admit to
some of the charges uh you know right unfortunately I think probably should have been
charged with kidnapping a minor but regardless of the charges he is going to do time for this Cooper would also be
arrested charged and convicted several times uh these are for theft related offenses he escaped from custody in
Pennsylvania numerous times then he goes to California in California Cooper is arrested charged and sentenced to state
prison for two counts of residential burglary now how old is he at this time um well this would have been in
1982 MH and this is all this is in Los Angeles County Cooper lied about his identity uh his background and his
criminal history by using the false name of David Troutman now on June 1st of 1983 Cooper was transferred to a min
minimum security portion of the prison in which he was being housed 2 days before the murders he escaped on foot
from the California Institute for men well so I just want to get this clear he's actually serving a sentence a
four-year sentence but under the name David Troutman correct yeah that's interesting
he lied about his identity and this it would make him appear so he got a pretty light sentence
and that being because of two things he lies about his identity because he's escaped from prison in Pennsylvania one
and he has a lengthy criminal history of of these you know some most of these are
pretty minor charges but he has a lengthy criminal history where he probably would have faced considerable
more amount of time there right and he's he's then shipped off to this minimum security portion of the prison this is
when he escapes from prison and it's just a couple days before this family is found murdered so when he escapes from
prison I mean this is just he just kind of walks through a field like runs away from a group of people or something do
we have much information on this well okay and this is why I say that this is the case that should have been featured
on making a murder not because I you know that's not a spoiler alert where I think Kevin Cooper is innocent what I
mean by that is the problem with this case and when you try to research this case is it gets presented in some
different lights and it depends on who you're getting your information from because there are some people out there
that are pretty hardcore that Kevin Cooper is innocent there's some other people on the opposite side of the fence
that he's very guilty and then there's some people these are the ones that I don't like to get any information from
because I don't feel that I can trust it there are some people that I believe that are just so much against the death
penalty and because Kevin Cooper would eventually be on death row for these murders I think that they skew the
information a little bit so some people would have you believe that his escape from this prison is as simple as he
finds a hole in the fence he walks up to it he goes through the hole and walks away
peace out yeah uh the hole in the fence P portion seems to be pretty true what doesn't seem to be true is
that he just kind of you know mosied on down the road and and walked to Chino Hills right the the reality is that he
did climb through this hole in the fence but he goes and he hides out in some like lumber yard and he waits for the
sun to go down because he's going to need to flee after dark he doesn't want to be seen and mind you he's wearing all
of his prison Garb he looks like somebody that just walked out of the prison right so he he's going to wait
till till Sundown and during the cover of Darkness he's going to go to this Chino uh Chino Hills sorry and he finds
this vacant house this house is owned by a couple of people uh Larry lease and these brothers Roger and Kermit Lang own
this house now some of the information out there will refer to this home as a an abandoned house this could not be
further from the truth this was a home that was being used these men would use this home this home was completely
outfitted and they actually rented it out from time to time so this was not an abandoned house he happened to find a
home that was empty you know had no no people staying in it right and he decides to stay there and make it his
Hideout so we'll refer to it as The Hideout house because that's kind of what it is he's on the run from the law
and he's hiding out at this house while he's there you know he's doing typical things that you would do throughout your
day he's you know using the restroom uh taking a shower he did say that he slept
that night the first night in one of the beds however all of the bedrooms have Windows he was concerned that somebody
would see him through one of the windows so he started sleeping inside the closet
of the bedroom while he was there he was you know he found beer and other things
to drink while he was there he he was smoking cigarettes now the key thing about this house though this house is
down the hill and it's actually nearest to the Ryan house right this is just 126
yards away now that should give you some idea of what kind of neighborhood we're
dealing with this is the nearest home and it's more than a football field away yeah but not much more than a football
field so Cooper slept in the closet of the bedroom of a bedroom that was nearest the garage there was a window by
a fireplace inside this home and that that window from that window you could get a very good view of the Ryan home
the house had two telephones and Cooper called Yolanda Jackson and Diane Williams from the house asking
them for help these are old friends of his they both decline now the telephone records would later show that the two
calls that two calls were made from the house to the uh Los Angeles area telephone number of Yolanda Jackson the
first call lasted 110 minutes must have been a good conversation uh this beginning on June 3rd at 12 127 a.m. and
the second call lasted 4 minutes beginning at 2:26 a.m. the same morning two calls were also made from the house
to Diane Williams who was in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania the first call lasted 3 minutes beginning on June 3rd at 11:46
a.m. and the second lasted 34 minutes beginning on June 4th at 7:53 p.m. Diane Williams told Cooper that she did not
have any money that she could give him now according to Cooper he decided to leave the house after this phone call
the final call was only an hour or so before the Ryan and Chris Hughes left the blade house from that potluck dinner
right the party to return to their home okay so there are there's some documents out there there's websites out
there dedicated to this case and a lot of times they spend a lot of time presenting evidence that that Cooper was
staying at the home before the murders I think that's a big waste of everybody's
time he admits to staying at the home before the murder there's no question about that right so we don't need to
pour through that evidence we have enough evidence in these actual murders that we're going to have to pour through
so what you're saying is according to Cooper he was at the house so there is no debating that yeah we we won't debate
that according to his own words he was at this home nearest the murder house about but that doesn't mean that you
were the murderer well correct but according to his own words he was there and left about 8 sometime between 800
and 8:30 that night the Ryans would have returned to their home around 9:30 to 10:00 that night then going to bed and
being attacked and murdered sometime during that night so question where is Cooper gone Cooper says that he had
planned all along to go to Mexico and this might be the truth because we know that Cooper checked into a hotel in
Tiana this is around 400 p.m. on Sunday June 5th 1983 using the false name of Angel
Jackson so from Tijana Cooper made his way to inata Mexico where on June 9th he met Owen and Angelica handy he
introduced himself as Angel Jackson and he asked them for a job he was going to go work for them on their boat the
handies then set sail for San Francisco and Cooper posing as Angel Jackson went with them during this time handy the
handies saw Cooper in possession of numerous items later identified as having been taken from the vacant house
nearest the Ryan's home they stopped at various places along their way to San Francisco Cooper stayed on the boat so
when when the handies would par park the boat they would they would get dock the
boat I guess you should say yeah they would get off the boat they would go on Shore they probably presumably going out
to eat shopping whatever they're doing he does not get off the boat at any of these stops MH he's laying low let's say
I'm on a boat then they decide to go to Santa Barbara for like three maybe four days on July 30th
1983 uh Santa Barbara County Sheriff's Department responded to a call for assistance of an attempted rape on a
boat that was docked next to the Handy's boat in Pelican Pelican Cove the 26-year-old female victim reported that
a man she identified as Kevin Cooper attempted to rape her at knife Point Cooper tried to flee when the
authorities came to the dock to arrest him the sheriff's observed Cooper throw an object into the water before he Dove
off the Handy's boat swam to a dinghy and and started to row for sure the sheriff's recovered a knife from the
water where Cooper attempted his unsuccessful Escape he was arrested so let's break this down very quickly
because if if you pour over every single minute detail we're going to be here for
days so a summary of what what's wrong with that of what we've covered well you're saying I smell no you smell fine
it's uh thank there's not a whole lot of ammo in the garage fridge if you know what I mean all right
so let's break down what we've covered so far four people are murdered in the middle of the night inside the Ryan home
one little boy 8-year-old Josh he survives survives he gives a description of three men all either Caucasian or
maybe Hispanic as being in the home during the murders police would later learn that an escaped convict Kevin
Cooper was hi fighting out in the home nearest the murder house for 2 days leading up to the murders he says he
fled to Mexico and law enforcement is going to say yes he fled to Mexico but before he did that he killed those four
people well why did he do that what's his motive well he's an escaped convict he needs to steal money and their car to
get out of Dodge so we know the car was stolen right now there's been this is this is one thing that you
and I have spoke about multiple times on this show there are so every report I've
come across never mentions anything being stolen from the Ryan home nothing ever mentions you know in fact there's
some reports that state outwardly State nothing was taken from the home we know the car was taken but you and I've like
I said we've talked about this before unless you have a running inventory of everything inside the home I don't know
that we can say with certainty that nothing was stolen from the home that's right I mean if these if one if the
husband or wife came home with $500 cash in their purse or pocket that day we wouldn't know that yeah but and also
think about how many times you come in the garage every week and guitars come in and out and instruments coming in and
out you probably notice it sometimes but you couldn't tell me what was different
no exactly and that's what I think I don't think anybody can point out with 100% certainty that nothing was stolen
from the home I completely agree with you now what about the car we know the car was stolen where was the car found
the car was eventually found in Long Beach California so if you went Long Beach California and then onto
Tijana it's a little more than 4 and a half hours by car from the murder house so this actually leaves enough time for
Cooper to commit the murders drive to Long Beach and then escape to Mexico and still check into the hotel on June 5th
at 400 p.m. so you're saying there's a chance well we also need to discuss quickly how the police got on to Cooper
because we have a weird situation here Captain don't we where this situation they they are looking for
Kevin Cooper it's not like he's arrested for this attempted rape charge and then
they back into evidence pointing that he committed these murders what actually would happen go ahead well hold on
technically they're looking for David Troutman looking for Kevin Cooper using the Alias possibly using the Alias of
Troutman the thing here though what's weird is they kind of they find some evidence to back into this thought that
Kevin Cooper's the one that committed these murders and it's it might be considered Loosey Goosey but like we
talked about what is a coincidence when we're talking about these cases is it evidence or is it coincidence right so
the situation is this they find a bloody footprint bloody shoe print I should say
at the home at the murder scene mhm this is believed to be from a type of shoe called a
proad now at this vacant home nearest the Ryan's house they find Loose to tobacco and it's believed that this was
roll right brand tobacco well why is that significant it's significant because this is the
type of tobacco that was given out for free to inmates of the prisons at the time the way that the system was set up
back then was this if you had money in your account you could buy whatever brand of cigarettes you prefer to smoke
right but to keep you got to keep these guys um orderly you know you don't want pure
chaos there people killing each other over cigarettes maybe we do so what they would do is they would hand out this
cheap loose tobacco and you could roll your own cigarettes MH well it's believed that Kevin Cooper would often
roll his own cigarettes with this roll right brand of tobacco provided to him for free at the prison so what does it
have to do with the shoe print well the shoe print the pro kids were SHO that were issued to prisoners mhm so they
have these two items that they find one at the crime scene one at the what I've been calling The Hideout house there's
also a question though where's this one footprint found the footprint that I there was there were several shoe prints
that are discussed in this case the one that I'm discussing right now is one that was found on a sheet inside of the
home of the Ryan's home so so they have some evidence pointing them to a possible prisoner or somebody that
would have you know would have this free tobacco from a prison would be wearing shoes that are issued at a prison so
their thought is well let's let's check to see if there's any people that have been recently escaped from prison that's
where they come up with this Troutman or Cooper as their possible suspect so they
have this situation where they had they think they're looking for the murderer and they think they know who the
murderer is they find him down uh in Santa Barbara after this alleged alleged attempted rape a local citizen
discovered a hatchet this was on June 5th 1983 on the side of English Road this is the only paved Road leading from
the Ryan home out of the immediate area the hatchet was covered with blood stains uh the head of the hatchet was
covered by dried blood and it had human hairs on it as well some of the hairs were consistent with those of Doug and
Josh Ryan now the Dr Irving root who performed the autopsies concluded that the hatchet could have inflicted The
Chopping wounds suffered by the victims MH well it's believed that this Hatchet came from The Hideout house H why
because like I said those men would rent out this home and we have the previous tenant saying that look when I lived
there and she she moved out of there at the end of May so literally just like what a couple days before Cooper decides
to show up at this house mhm she says while I lived there there was a hatchet that was inside this home and it matched
the one you know the description matches the one that was found on the side of the road that has the victim's blood on
it right but there's a lot of houses that have a hatchet true and let's just point out let's be clear this is 1983
let's also point out that the people that they're saying that that hatchet probably came from our place they are
white let's just put that out there okay um anyway this Hatchet according to her
and according to the owners of the home it was in their house before these murders took place
we also have the strange situation of the sheath that goes over the hatchet right Captain so this sheath was
supposedly found on the you know in in one of the rooms of this Hideout house right so meaning that somebody would
have to take off the cover once they take off the cover then they go up the hill they create the
murders as they drive down the hill in their car they're going to toss out this hatchet on the side of the road correct
correct and that is actually going to be pretty much the law enforcement's theory
on this case the theory being this Kevin Cooper was staying at this Hideout house
he decides that he needs money and a car to get him to Mexico he decides to break into this
home and when he breaks in he's confronted by I I guess the husband or the wife or some body and his reaction
is to murder everybody in the house and he only leaves that house after he thinks everyone is dead not knowing that
the 8-year-old boy would later survive right then he takes a beer from the fridge in the house where he killed
these people drinks the beer carries his items with him from this house where he
committed these murders back to The Hideout house where he's going to clean up and later take their car dispose of
the hatchet and make his way to Mexico but first he's going to stop in Long Beach and dump the car yeah so do we
have any evidence from the car then we do and and here's the thing though I apologize I think it wasn't until like 5
to 7 days after the murders that the vehicle was located I I I can't find it in my my notes here to be certain of
that but if memory serves me correct then it was about 5 to 7 days after the murders that the vehicle was found in
Long Beach inside the vehicle police found loose tobacco on the front passenger seat and floorboard they also
found blood stains and I want to I'm going to throw a caveat in here a buy or beware to everybody out there
listening regarding these blood stains inside the vehicle the Ryan's vehicle I found reports that are all
over the shop as to how much blood blood was found in the car and where the blood
was located some reports state that there were uh blood stains on the front passenger seat and on the driver's side
door jam there are also reports out there that suggest that blood stains were found in the back seat of the
vehicle as well MH so we have where we have one situation where the blood stains might suggest that only one
person one bloodied person stole this vehicle and moved it there's also evidence out there that suggests that
maybe more than one bloodied person was in that vehicle now the car did not appear to have been hotwired this is I
included this statement because I'm un if the keys were stolen for this car right I'm guessing that they might be
because we can we have to believe that the person that stole this vehicle was inside the Ryan home you know also if
you're kind of secluded from people that maybe you leave your keys in your car I
mean I've hung out with a lot of buddies that had lived on farms and stuff and they they never take their keys out of
their car yeah I I used to know somebody that would put it on the uh wheel yeah have you ever seen people do that they
put the the key on the wheel here you go I had a car once that uh congratulations
yeah uh the key was so like worn down MH I swear you could have put any key into
that ignition and it would have started like I and I think I actually did that one time I put the wrong key in it it
turned over still work yeah anyway but there were two cigarette butts that were found inside the vehicle M okay so one
of them was a hand rolled cigarette this was found in a in a crevice of the front
passenger seat M this is the same loose uh believed to be roll right brand tobacco which is provided for free to
the cim inmates right but you could buy this tobacco just on the like on the open
market right I no you couldn't according to my now I mind you I didn't smoke cigarettes back in 1983 or live in
California so I couldn't tell you roll cigarettes yeah I couldn't tell you with certainty but from what I found is this
roll right tobacco was provided for free to the inmates and not available for retail ah how would they know what kind
of brand of tobacco it would be uh okay in all honesty we have a lot of people that would testify later in court
that it appears to be this roll right brand of tobacco M I got to be honest with you Captain I
don't know how they would know that I I don't know how they would know that for I mean if you take if I gave you three
bags of loose tobacco you're not going to know which one is which well and what I mean by
that too not just if you gave it to me because I I don't don't know tobacco very well anyway but I'm saying if you
gave it to somebody that worked at a manufacturing plant which these are the types of people that testified at court
MH I think if you gave them if we broke open three cigarettes right now or bought three different kinds of loose
leaf tobacco like you said put them in different baggies and handed them to him they're taking the Pepsi Challenge and
they don't pass that test I don't see how they would identify those to be anything other than loose tobacco right
but I think that's the key here is you go okay we don't need to go to the fine you know Ballo pin right we just need to
we need to have a marker line right so we just need to go hey we have a loose tobacco mhm now in 1983 there's probably
more people rolling cigarettes than they are now or was at the height of when people smoked but it's still important
because that's a very smaller it's a lot smaller percentage well and then you have another issue here too they also
found a manufactured cigarette butt was found in the front passenger seat of the
car so MH so what we do know is we have a smoker yes and how do we know that those cigarettes
came from the person that stole the car we don't we we don't know that for certain and we can get into these
cigarette butts more later but the law enforcement is going to have an answer for this because here again just like
with the blood stains in the car captain that you could present an argument that
it was one bloodied perpetrator that was inside that car or it was multiple bloodied perpetrators that was inside
that car the two having two different types of cigarettes found in the vehicle might suggest more than one person
having been in the vehicle the problem with this though is we have Kevin Cooper who admittedly stayed at this Hideout
house well the owner of the the Mr lease who is one of the owners of the home said that he would leave vicroy brand
cigarettes in that house and that they were gone after Cooper had apparently stayed there right
so you have this thing where maybe he smoked some of that loose tobacco that he brought with him from the prison when
he escaped M and did he steal the Viceroy cigarettes while he was at the house if that's the case that could
explain a way that we don't have two different people smoking two different kinds of cigarettes we have one
individual just smoking whatever he can get his hands on at the time well and if
you have a bloody individual that goes inside the passenger seat goes into the driver's seat goes into the back seat
and that's going to make it seem like there's maybe possibly more than one individual as well while we're on the
topic of the cigarettes found in the vehicle Captain I do want to point out that several tests were conducted on
these cigarette butts so we have saliva test on the two cigarette butts in the Ryan station wagon these results were
consistent with cigarettes having been Smoked by a nonsecretor which we do know Kevin
Cooper is a nonsecretor only about 20% of the population are nonsecretors this doesn't mean that
it was exactly him so what the heck does that mean it just means that he is he has similar makeup to the person that
did smoke these cigarettes now the blood type of the person who smoked the manufactured cigarette that was found
was determined to be type A which is also consistent with Kevin Cooper's blood type mhm but now that we have DNA
why haven't we tested these items that's a good question um because it still doesn't prove the
murder but at least it proves um him inside their car well no I don't think that it does um Oh you mean if it were
tested for DNA right I just meant with the evidence that we currently have what I think's interesting about this
evidence though that they present here it doesn't specifically name Kevin Cooper as the person who smoked those
cigarettes and left them inside the Ryan station wagon but neither test excludes
him from being that person [Music] either we got a ton more to get to please join us back here in the garage
tomorrow until then be good be kind and don't [Music] litter [Music] you can live out your Master Chef
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that

Kevin Cooper /// Part 1 /// 219

Part 1 of 2

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Chino Hills, California, 1983 - In the dark of night, evil lurks around a house at the top of a hill. A sliding door was left unlocked and evil makes it's way inside the home. A sleeping family are surprised and slaughtered. One victim survives and tells a story that doesn't fit the evidence found at the scene. A suspect is quickly identified, and the manhunt began. Kevin Cooper is arrested, convicted and sentenced to death for the murders. The evidence is overwhelming. But was it suspiciously overwhelming? Did the police plant evidence? For more than 30 years, Cooper has proclaimed his innocence from a cell on death row. This week we discuss the horrific murders of the Ryen family and little Christopher Hughes. We will try to determine if Kevin Cooper is guilty of these murders. Beer of the Week - Grapefruit Double IPA by Claremont Craft Ales Garage Grade - 4 and a half bottle caps out of 5

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Brief Summary

The episode details the Ryan family murders and Kevin Cooper's controversial trial for the crime.

Key points

A Gruesome Attack. Joshua Ryan describes the brutal attack on his family, detailing the horrific events.
Medical Examiner's Findings. The medical examiner reveals the shocking details of the injuries sustained by the victims.
The Boy's Testimony. Josh, the sole survivor, identifies three attackers, raising questions about their identities.
Kevin Cooper's Troubled Past. Cooper's history of crime and abuse sets the stage for his involvement in the case.
The Escape. Cooper escapes from prison just days before the murders, complicating the timeline.
The Hideout House. Cooper hides in a house near the murder scene, raising suspicions about his involvement.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

I lived only because I stuck four fingers in my neck to slow the bleeding.

Joshua Ryan recounts his harrowing experience during the attack.

4:33WatchNov 16, 2023

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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