The Death of Cooper Harris : Part 1

Known as the "Hot Car Death", Justin Ross Harris was convicted of killing his 22 month old son Cooper. We heard from the prosecution in Part 1. Mixed by: ResonateRecordings.com

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
The case being discussed in the next couple of episodes
of Sworn was an emotional case. It was a horrific case.
It was a highly publicized and emotional case. But the
purpose of this podcast is not to relitigate guilt or innocence,
and nothing that I say should be interpreted as an
expression of my opinion about the guilt or innocence of anybody.

(00:24):
Neither I nor this podcast is intended to relitigate the
issues at trial. The jury has spoken. This is about
what the case looks like from the inside looking out.
The case was extensively litigated by very good lawyers on
both sides. A jury reached a verdict, and it's not
our place to relitigate those issues. But we do want

(00:46):
to bring you inside the case for an insider's look
at the case of the State of Georgia versus Justin
Ross Harris. Place your left hand on the bay of
Bible and raise your right hand and repeat after me.

(01:07):
I do solemnly swear the jury trying it. Attendant not
scared this weekend and around the country. It makes no sense.
If it doesn't fit, you must have quit. Judge, you
are the last line of reason in this case, very
one of us took out all the shuffles, and we're

(01:29):
sworn to uphold the Constitution. From Tenderfoot TV in Atlanta,
this is sworn. I'm your host, Philip Holloway. I'm thinking
worst case scenario, it's a really bad accident gone wrong.
But then as I sat there and I listened to
the evidence, I was like, Oh, my goodness, have you

(01:59):
ever won of what it's like to be a lawyer
who has to represent someone who is accused of something horrific,
who is seen as a monster and a reprehensible human being.
What would it be like if you were the lawyer
and you believe in your heart and your soul that
that supposed monster is innocent. On the Atlantic community tragically

(02:23):
lost a beautiful soul with the horrifying death of twenty
two month old Cooper Harris. Little. Cooper's death was traumatic news,
distressing to everyone who heard it as it made its
way around the entire nation and in fact, the world.
This case had widespread media attention from the very beginning.

(02:44):
Everyone has strong feelings about Cooper's death, and everyone seemed
to have their own opinions on the case. The Baby
on the ground stand where in your con Okay, okay, ma'am,

(03:15):
We're not to sing like a no where I think
babee anybody around them? You're in, daddy? Can you see
the baby from when you are? From where you are
on your baby appear to be? Can you you're forced
me about your phole and can you see him? Bring

(03:37):
me hi? I'm married A Stedman, a producer on sword.
On the afternoon of June eighteen, two fourteen, cob County
Police received one call from a woman witnessing a baby

(03:57):
who appeared to be having a seizure being pulled from
a car in the parking lot of a shopping center.
Due to the screams coming from the father, twenty two
month old Cooper Harris was quickly surrounded by onlookers. A
few people tried to help. CPR was attempted. M Cooper
Harris was pronounced dead at the scene. Cooper Harris was
the son of Justin Ross Harris, known as Ross and

(04:17):
Leanna Harris. They lived together and married Atta, Georgia, a
suburb north of Atlanta. Ross Harris was a thirty three
year old web developer for home Depot and the lead
guitar player at his church. Leanna Harris was a thirty
year old dietitian. They met in Alabama, and at the
time of the incident, the two had been married for
roughly eight years. By all accounts, Ross and Leanna were

(04:38):
kind people, active churchgoers, and a happy family. Around nine
am on the morning of June eighteen, Ross Harris and
his son, Cooper went to Chick fil A on Cumberland
Parkway in Cobb County. After breakfast, he placed his son
back into the rear facing car seat and his henday
two son and headed off to drop Cooper at daycare.
Around four pm, Ross left his work and his wife, Leanna,
headed to pick up her son from day care. Glanna's surprise,

(05:02):
Cooper wasn't at the Little Apron Academy where he was
supposed to be. After driving for about seven minutes, Ross
pulled over at the Acres Mill Square Mall, screaming Cooper
had been in the car all day. The Acres Mill
Square Mall in Cobb County, Georgia is a busy place
with many different shops and restaurants. When Ross Harris pulled

(05:24):
his twenty two month old son out from the back
of the car seat, there were dozens of witnesses and
working lot. Early Wednesday morning, exactly one week ago, justin Ross,
Harris was seen at this Atlanta area Chick fil A.
Harris was seen strapping his twenty two month old son, Cooper,
into his car seat. He drove less than a mile
away to this home depot store support center where he

(05:46):
works as a web designer. Normally, Harris takes Cooper to
a daycare center on site, but not on this day. Instead,
Harris headed inside the office and left his toddler in
his rear facing car seat in the back in the
blazing Georgia's His twenty two month old son was dead,
probably long before he tried to resuscitate him. It was tough.
It's it's tough to see anyone pass, but especially a

(06:09):
small child and made it especially tough. I don't know.
He kept saying, what have I done? What have I done?
And but that's all I could entertained that he was said,
kind of emotions go through your mind seeing something like that.
You know, I just hope it's not the obvious. Hopefully
he didn't do anything to to harm the child. Um,
but I guess we'll know momentarily. It was an extremely

(06:32):
tragic accident resulting in the death of a young child.
No one could conceive the pain and the guilt apparent
must feel after such a devastating lapse in memory. But
at ten pm that same night, Ross Harris was arrested
for murder. After searching his office, police arrested the grieving
father and charged him with felony murder and child endangerment.

(06:54):
He's pleaded not guilty. Father's arrest is causing outrage, some
agreeing with police and shocked at what happened, many saying
the father has suffered enough. The justice system can't punish
Ross worse than he is punishing himself, and it will
only cause more pain for a grieving family. Harris Is
supporters online have raised more than eighteen dollars for his defense.

(07:18):
I remember that day very clearly. I was in my
car on my way back from my law office and Marietta, Georgia,
and there was a lot of traffic way, more than usual.
I heard the traffic reporter, who's a friend of mine,
say on the radio that it was due to police
activity in the area and that they were investigating the
death of a child left strapped in the back of

(07:39):
a hot car. On this very hot summer day. That
precious child was Cooper Harris. The heartache that I felt
is indescribable, and it was a media and I turned
around to look at the empty car seat in the
back of my own car, where my own son sometimes sits.
I thought, what a tragic accident this had to be.

(08:02):
But later that night it was eventually reported that the
father of this child, Justin Ross Harris, was accused of murder.
I was stunned. How could this man be charged with murder?
Based on the information provided to me at that time,
I was not convinced that Ross Harris was a killer
of any kind. I even chimed in on a couple

(08:24):
of news stations about it. Justin Ross Harris thirty three
years old, now indicted on eight counts, including malice murder
for the death of his twenty two month old son,
Cooper journey and now was Philip Halloway, a criminal defense
attorney and former Atlanta prosecutor. Defense attorney Philip Halloway joins us.
Now I want to bring in Phil Holloway. Phil give
us a sense of what's going on right now. Malice

(08:46):
murderer is something that is an intentional death that it
indicates premeditation. It indicates deliberation, something that was planned in
advanced and particularly cruel. An abandoned and malignant heart is
what Georgia Code calls mal The arrest of Justin Ross
Harris and the death of Cooper Harris sparked lots of

(09:06):
national interests and awareness about the issue of leaving children
in hot cars. As time went on, people basically split
into two camps, those who were absolutely convinced that he
was guilty of murder and those who believed that it
had to be a tragic accident. Nonetheless, the story was
out and people were talking. Many people had doubts about

(09:31):
Ross Harris's guilt. To gather some additional perspective on this case,
I talked to a friend and colleague of mine named
Vinny Polton. Vinny is an anchor at eleven Live News
here in Atlanta, and he's a former correspondent for Court
TV and at HLN. Vinny and I literally sat together
during the probable cause hearing for this case with a

(09:52):
CNN news crew right outside the courthouse. Leading up to
the probable cause hearing, I was not convinced that this
was really a murder case. I'm thinking worst case scenario,
it's a really bad accident gone wrong. There's no way
I could have even considered that a father would intentionally

(10:15):
leave his son there. But then as I sat there
and I listened to the evidence that was going to
be part of this case and the evidence against Ross Harris,
what they uncovered in his searches and everything else, I
was like, oh, my goodness. First, you look at that

(10:40):
day that morning, and you watch all the videotapes because
you can track all of his motions and things that
he did through surveillance. And there's two parts of it
that are to me very revealing. The one part that
everyone was talking about where he's dropped off by his
friends and he goes to put the lightbulb into his suv.

(11:02):
He opens the door of his suv in the middle
of the day at lunchtime and is able to put
those light bulbs in, but never looks inside the car.
To me, that was so unusual, awkward, counterintuitive that you
have light bulbs in your hand, you're placing him in
your car, and you open the door, don't look inside,

(11:24):
and toss the light bulbs in and close the door
and then turn around and walk away. But the most
revealing part of the surveillance video comes after that moment
as he's walking back to his office from his car
where his son is dying or is already dead, and
he passes someone. And as he passes that person, that

(11:47):
person is walking towards the vehicle where Cooper is. As
the person who passes Ross Harris starts to pass Ross
harris suv, you can see Ross Harris stop and peek
over his shoulder to take a look at that guy.
Why why is he looking? Is he is turning and

(12:07):
looking over his shoulder to see if that person sees
inside the window you can see the little Cooper's inside
his SUV. To me, very revealing at that probable cause
hearing the testimony was that Mr Harris went to his
car multiple times throughout the day, and the idea at

(12:29):
the time that he could not have possibly been aware
of what was happening in the back of his car
seemed particularly questionable. The part of the evidence to me,
that is so real for a juror to understand and
so simple for a juror to understand. We've talked always

(12:52):
about Ross Harris's SUV. SUV SUV. It's not a Chevy suburban.
This is not some super stretch suv. This is a
compact suv. I wouldn't even call it an suv because
that think that's so misleading. This car is tiny. And
when you take a look inside and you see the

(13:12):
photos that were presented by the prosecution of the interior
of Ross Harris's vehicle, you can see how close that
car seat is to the driver's seat. It is virtually
inconceivable that you could sit in the driver's seat of
that vehicle and not notice or understand that there's a

(13:33):
child seat right next to you. Because remember it's it's
rear facing, so it is right there, within inches of
the driver's seat. And if you're leaning over to grab
your bag, if you're turning forty degrees to your right,
there's no way you don't notice that child's seat. It's
right there. So how on earth could he drive for

(13:54):
more than ten seconds and not remember that there's a
child seat there. He didn't have a rear facing care
He's got to take a peek over his shoulder, and
as soon as you turn the slightest bit over your
right shoulder inside, there's no way on earth you don't
see the car seat. One of the big issues in

(14:17):
the case was Mr Harris's physical size and the small
size of the suv. How could he have not noticed
the child in the back of the car when he
left work that day? In other words, was this just
a freak accident or did Ross Harris intentionally leave his
son to bake to death in the back of a

(14:38):
hot car. One thing that was constant from the beginning
of the case all the way through the conclusion of
the trial is that Justin Ross Harris maintained his innocence.
On the day he was arrested. He expressed those exact
feelings to his wife while he was in the interrogation
room at the Cobb Police headquarters. Right you got my

(15:02):
card and right do my poll out? I try to something.
I try to just seek good news comes post. I
don't know what a ring well most out her baby

(15:30):
hat over her? It never Oh well, pet, can we
talk to him? It's the co he has. They're coming.
You're gonna charge me. My curls and child curld him.
That's where they put it up there as count the

(15:51):
cheese to a bolt. That's all I purpose I feel.
I don't want as a general practice, the cameras inside

(16:23):
police interview rooms or interrogation rooms are always running. This
interrogation video, along with several others, later became a key
piece of evidence in the trial, and one thing that
in particular really stood out to the investigators. Leanna, mr

(16:47):
Harris's wife, asked him in the interview room, among other things,
did you say too much? Two investigators? That was an
odd us and the demeanor of Mr Harris and his
wife didn't add up in the eyes of the investigators.

(17:07):
The tears and the emotion that was displayed during that
interaction between Leanna and Ross Harris was not genuine, and
that was a source of much debate both before the
trial and during the trial. The bus shocking part of
this case for me was finding out who justin Ross
Harris really was. More to come after the break, It's

(17:35):
still really hard to get your head wrapped around why
would a person intentionally leave their son to die in
one of the worst ways possible? What could possibly be
the motive. When it first happened, people sort of forget
the initial reaction. You know, you had an aggressive prosecution
team who's charging this father, apparently not giving him time

(17:59):
to grieve. It's the way in the media and publicly
initially was that this father was almost being victimized by
the system, by the prosecution, who had jumped to a
conclusion and was being overly aggressive and and was was
trying to turn this into something that it wasn't. And
then that got turned around very quickly because of the

(18:21):
shocking revelation of who Ross Harris was and the life
that he was leading and and what his true focus was.
This was not a guy who was living anything close
to a traditional life. It was absolutely a shocking moment
because you learned so much more about who he was
and this this double life that he had, and there

(18:44):
was something that that I would consider a motive, and
you know, you think about a father and as something
why would a father kill his son? And to me,
that's a question that had to be addressed before you
could even think about this being in an intentional murder.

(19:04):
Behind the scenes, police were uncovering information that would begin
to paint Justin Ross Harris in a completely different light.
The Cop County father accused of intentionally leaving his twenty
two month old son, Cooper, had a hot car to die.
Just two weeks before Cooper died, Harris started an online
sexual relationship with a woman, and it continued during the

(19:26):
day that the toddler died yet again, another woman met
randomly first threw an app from a phone called Whisper.
During the police investigation, law enforcement discovered that Justin Ross
Harris was not only engaging in explicit sexual conversations and

(19:48):
sexting with multiple women, some of the miners, he was
also having extramarital affairs, including sex with prostitutes. There's a
difference between and being a bad father and being a
bad husband. Being an adulterer, a philanderer, a cheater, and
even sexting with underage girls doesn't necessarily mean that you're

(20:10):
a murderer, does it. It was apparent to everybody, at
least those in the legal community following this case, that
this information, if it made its way into an indictment,
would most certainly cause a jury to hate Justin Ross
Harris at a minimum. Yeah, there are husbands who cheat
on their wives, there are husbands who have mistresses. But

(20:34):
this is a man who became so obsessed with sex
and his pursuit of women. It was like it was
like seven, this was the most important thing in his life,
and for me, that's the shocking part that a father
of a young child like that could be overtaken in

(20:56):
his mind with with something other than the well being
of his own child. And and the most important thing
in Ross Harris's life on the day his child died
was again pursuing sex with random women that he's meeting.
And it was that obsession to me, that was the
most shocking part of this. That was the big revelation.

(21:18):
Once you find out what was going on in his
life and what he was doing and what he was
up to, and this secret double life that he had,
you could understand that in his mind there somehow you
could form a reason why I would want to get
out of that life and take the life of my
own son. It reminded me of Scott Peterson. Scott Peterson

(21:44):
was a husband and assumed to be father who killed
his nine month pregnant wife out in California. He's sitting
on death row right now. I saw that the similarities
between the two cases and that Scott Peterson wanted to
live a life if that he could not live as
a husband and father, And for Ross Harris, same thing.

(22:10):
There was a life that he wanted to lead that
was so different than being a responsible husband, so different
than being a responsible father. That the way to get there,
it's it's sick, I know, but the way to get
there would be to take the life of his own child.
This guy, this father, intentionally left his son inside that car.

(22:53):
During the investigation, a few unsavory details came out about
Ross Harris and the events of that day. Firstly, Harris
claimed to forget his son was in the car during
the drive from breakfast to his workplace. However, that drive
was only point five miles, maybe five minutes, conceivably less. Secondly,
Harris had gone to his car that day once in

(23:15):
between breakfast and leaving work. He had lunch with some
coworkers that day, and after lunch he had gone to
his car to put some light bulbs inside, but even
then he said he didn't see Cooper. Thirdly, and maybe
most disturbingly, Harris had been sexting with multiple women that day,
including one underage girl. Chuck Boring, the lead prosecutor in

(23:44):
the case of the State of Georgia versus Justin Ross Harris,
agreed to talk with me about his part in the trial.
As a prosecutor, I think you have a higher duty
and a higher burden on your shoulders. We have a
our oath and our duty is not just too to
try to seek convictions, but to do justice, whatever that
may be. I think we have an ethical obligation to

(24:04):
both the state bar and the general bar, but also
our duties as a prosecutor to make sure that justice
is done. Whereas with a you know, a criminal defense
attorney or a civil litigant, you know, their duty is
to their client to represent them to the utmost within
the confines of the state bar rules and the law.
But their duty is to their client. Our duty is too,

(24:24):
I guess, more of a general cause of trying to
do what is right. Is there one particular case that is, say,
the most high profile that you've ever tried. I mean
that's probably as of recent times. It was the Justin
Ross Harris case that we tried last fall, and I'm
sure that was probably it garnered the most media attention,
no doubt. Would you consider this to be an unusual case, Yeah,

(24:45):
I mean I think this is obviously it was a
case that we haven't seen this exact circumstance. But in
a lot of the uh, the cases that involved deaths
of children, none of them are the exact same, but
this was definitely something that was out of the norm
I would say generally doing child crimes. One of the
particular hurdles that we have that we have to get

(25:06):
over is general Society's not like you and I who
see this stuff on a daily basis. But you know,
general society doesn't understand the things that we see, and
I don't think they want to believe the evil that
exists out there and the terrible things that go on
in our community, you know, every day. And so that's
one of the hurdles we have to look at and

(25:27):
have to take into consideration. Uh, not so much in
charging a lot of times, but in how we're going
to approach the argument. How how are we going to
get through to the jury that you know, evil does
exist and this person was capable of it. In most
cases you see in the media, Uh, there are times
where there are things that may be accurate, inaccurate, half accurate,

(25:49):
and you know, it's tough sometimes to sit back and
and just let it happen, but that's what you have
to do. You know. As a prosecutor, we we couldn't
come up and say, you know what we see this
sentence here in the the newspaper on TV, and we
want to say that we need to correct that. We
we can't do that at the time. We have to
let it come out in the courtroom. Well, I think
you know that one thing is you don't want to

(26:10):
attain a jury. That's one of the big problems when
you have a case with media attention and publicity. One
of the biggest problems is when, as far as you know,
the appellate decisions have held. Is if a prosecutor or
defense attorney comes out and puts out intentionally or maybe
not intentionally, but a statement outside of the courtroom that
turns out not to be correct. If a court finds

(26:31):
that that was done and it was done to influence
the jury and properly, you know, that could affect the
prosecution of the case. So you have you have to
be very careful and we have ethical obligations as well
about what we should or shouldn't say, uh in the
media outside of a courtroom before the trial has had
to a jury. Let's talk about the attempt that you
mentioned at picking a jury in Cobb County. What extraordinary

(26:54):
measures were undertaken to attempt to pick a jury in
Cobb Kill. Well, I think the first thing that was
done that was, you know, everyone agreed on trying to
that would help accomplish it was bringing in an extraordinary
amount of jurors, hundreds of jurors, as opposed to you know,
for one case, you may have a general jury pool
and the judge calls forty two jurors up. You know,

(27:15):
we had hundreds of jurors just called in for this case.
Another thing we had done we thought that may expedite
some of the situations and fairt out people that there
was just absolutely no way that could be on the
jury was to do jury questionnaires regarding pre trial publicity
and a myriad of other subjects related to the case.
So that's another tool that we tried to utilize, should

(27:37):
try to actually see if we could get a fair
and impartial jury in this county. Extensive efforts were made
to find an impartial jury in Cobb County, Georgia. Defendants
have a constitutional right to be tried in the county
where the crime is alleged to have occurred. But in
the end, after much effort and much deliberation by the judge,

(27:57):
it was decided that the venue of the trial needed
to be changed, particularly because of pervasive negative media. What
went through your head when you realize that this show
was about to go on the road. I tried to
make sure that my main thought process was what is
the best thing legally and the best thing for this case?

(28:18):
You know, what is the best thing to do justice
for the victim of this crime? You know, so for
good or ill, whatever happened extraneously, not saying that wasn't
in the back of our minds, I'm sure, but you
have to be cognizant and make sure that your decision
is based upon what is the most legally appropriate thing
to do and what is the best thing for the case.
After we got done injury venue had been changed, that's

(28:41):
when the kind of reality of it washes over you,
and then you start thinking about how are we going
to live? Where are we going to go? You know,
and and as as when you when a case, when
you change venue like that and you move hundreds of
miles away. Just as the months go towards trial, there
are things you haven't thought of before, like, oh, great,
how am I gonna get this? How am I get that?

(29:02):
I've got to find a dry cleaner? Wherever this is
gonna go big and small, it starts to wash over
you once that actually the triggers pulled. How was it
decided upon Glenn County, Georgia and Brunswick. Well, the way
that the suggestions are made to the judge in a
case like this, the parties can defense and stake can
make suggestions about different counties that they may want to

(29:23):
try the case in, and you know, it's up to
the judge ultimately to make a determination. She can pick
one of the counties suggested by the parties, or she
can independently decide on a county. Um, what you have
to do is look at the demographics of the county
involved that you're trying to move venue to. The goal
is to find something that's demographically similar to the county
that you're already you know, the the original county the

(29:45):
venue is in. And so Glen County actually, over the
years has been a county where in cases where venue
has been changed, both from Glenn County to another county
and from Cobb to Glenn. It's it's gone back and
forth a little bit because the demographics of both counties
they kind of mirror each other, and so it was
a natural fit for One other thing that I think
had to be taken into consideration was that when it's

(30:08):
got the venue is being changed. Because of the aspect
of media attention, it probably would be most wise to
switch venue to somewhere that may have a different media
hub and most of the news and things of that
nature down in Brunswick St. Simon's. They're actually in the
Jacksonville media market, not Atlanta, So uh, you have to
move it far enough away to at least numb some

(30:29):
of the pre trial publicity. I want to speak briefly
about the the car that Cooper died in. It was
transported to Brunswick for the trial. Correct, How was it transported?
As far as the vehicle getting it, getting it down there,
I'll say, you know it, it was costly to do it,
to make sure it got down there in a manner

(30:51):
that it preserved it. There were nothing, you know, because
you wanted to make sure nothing was done incorrectly. So
it was it was a task to get the car
transported down there. And how's it? How many times have
you try a case where there was no one in
the courtroom who represented the victim in the case. A
lot of the child homicides that I prosecutor over the years,

(31:13):
not prosecuted a lot. I'd say, in the majority of them,
there's no one there because usually you have, I mean, honestly,
a lot of times one of the parents or one
of the caregivers is the offender, and many of the
times the non offending caregiver is supportive of the offender,
and so a lot of times there's nobody there for
the victim. It's sad. I mean, I still have, you know,

(31:34):
in life photos of several of the victims of you know,
child homicides that prosecutor over the years, going back to
two thousand and five, you know, as a reminder, you
know they they were, you know, they were victims. And
even though they don't have family members to go put
flowers in their graves or you know, they don't have
you know, memorials, and you know they don't have people

(31:54):
calling up to our office to touch base with us,
because they were with us through the trial. You want
to keep some memory of, you know, that that living
being whose life was taken from them criminally, And so
in one regard it it can be sad and another
is something that you know makes me proud to be
able to represent that type of victim. You've got a
jury in the box, you present your case, you cross

(32:18):
examined witnesses, you examine other witnesses, the defense puts up
its case, Motions are argued during the middle of a trial,
and now you're at the end. What does it feel
like to stand in front of that jury in that moment?
I was I was pretty worn down by the time
it got there, but I will say in the eight
second closed it wasn't so much exhaustion, but it was

(32:40):
finally like I finally get the this last opportunity and
complete opportunity to seek justice for the victim in the case.
And so I think that's what it felt like. This
is you know, this moment is finally here. Everything is
out there before the jury, so here. It is. One
thing that I've learned in my role as a legal

(33:01):
analyst in the media, both on radio and television, is
that you can't go by emotions. You've got to put
those aside. You've got to be neutral. You can't be
a cheerleader for one side or the other. You have
to stick to the facts that are being reported. But
particularly you have to be careful not to draw assumptions
from those facts, because in a criminal trial, what is

(33:25):
or is not a fact? It is always a question
for a jury. I reached out to Veronic Waters, a
friend of mine and a radio journalist who covers crime
and who followed this case very closely from the beginning
all the way to the end. People were feeling so

(33:47):
sorry for this family and for this young dad who
seems to have lost his world. But then, very early on,
talking to one or two of the witnesses out there
in that parking lot, we started to hear what or
two rumblings about maybe this dad wasn't quite the grieving

(34:09):
father that we first thought. He seemed a little stiff,
he seemed a little not quite all there. Something about
him seemed a little off. And then, very quickly, as
we heard from police that there were some suspicions enough
to hold him behind bars, the sort of focus of

(34:29):
the story quickly turned from oh, my gosh, how could
this happen? To oh my gosh, did somebody make this
happen on purpose? As a journalist, how do you go
about separating your personal feelings about that question? Uh, could
somebody have made this happen on purpose? From being objective

(34:50):
in the way you report about it. Well, you never
lose sight that somebody lost his life. It's impossible really
to separate your emotions from noing that somebody died a
terrible death. I mean, as an adult, have you we've
all gotten into a hot car in the middle of
the summertime and maybe you drop the keys before you

(35:10):
can put them in the addition really quickly and turn
on the car. But we've all had those few seconds
of being in a car that was baking in the
sun for a couple of hours before we got in,
So you kind of know what that really uncomfortable prickle
is like when you are in your own hot car,
but you know you have the power to turn on
the a C let down the window, and you can

(35:33):
kind of chill a little bit, literally chill out a
little bit. But you know that Cooper never had that option,
and so you don't not know that Cooper died. But
in a different way, but sort of the same as
how you are as an attorney. You have to look
at all sides of everything. Basically just report things straight
down the middle. And just because the police say I've

(35:54):
never seen something so horrific in my life, and we
believe that this was done on purpose, doesn't mean that
you have to believe it too. And I think the
way that you keep that in mind means that you
do your job as a reporter and and not sort
of try to sway the audience. I mean, my job
is to go straight down the middle and um, and
that's what I did. You sort of have to pay

(36:15):
attention to not getting caught up in the spin and
looking at what is actually presented at trial. But I
think for the jury in this case, emotion did really
lead the way because there was a lot of at
the at the end of the day, a lot of
people just couldn't imagine that somebody could forget their kid.
And in either case, and in any case, I think
a lot of people thought, even if you were distracted,

(36:39):
no matter what you were doing, you still have to
pay the price for leaving your kid in the car. Well,
I think what a lot of people really couldn't separate
in their mind was the allegation of sexting from the
question of whether or not he actually purposely left his
child in the car die. People were horrified by that.

(37:02):
How could you be sexty six different ladies on the
day that your son is dying in a hot car
in June, it was just unfathomable. I think a lot
of people were saying, I don't want to believe he
did it, but if he did it, he should fry.
I think at that point it was still hard for people,
a lot of people to believe that he had actually
done it, but people were furious with him at the

(37:24):
at the thought of it. Even though we live in
a country where you're innocent until proven guilty, I think
a lot of people tend to think that if you
are ever put in handcuffs, you probably did it. And
of course, as you know as a defense attorney, this
is why the way that your client is presented in
front of a jury is so important, and that goes
for even pre trial hearings, motions hearings where they might
be coming to court. We don't want them seen in

(37:47):
an orange jumpsuit, say the defense attorneys, because we don't
want to prejudice the jury pool against our client. So
people are already horrified and shocked at the nature of
this alleged crime. Do we really want to make it
work by, you know, parading this guy out in jail blues?
Or whatever, and in handcuffs, shackled at the ankles and
wrists to sort of hammer home the image of a

(38:11):
guy who's, you know, guilty before he's even had a
chance to go trial. I think I may have said
to you earlier that we had people who were saying,
I get it, I've been distracted, I've forgotten stuff, and
and in quiet moments, there are some people who will
actually tell you I have forgotten my kid in the car.
Didn't happen for eight hours on a summer day, But
I've walked away from the car for X number of

(38:32):
seconds or minutes and forgotten that I had a kid
in the car. Veronica was actually in the courtroom when
the prosecution displayed the horrific and graphic images of the
deceased body of little Cooper Harris. I asked her what
was in her mind when she saw those photos. It
was heartbreaking. I mean I really felt something in my chest.

(38:57):
I really hurt when we heard about what Cooper probably
experienced that day was bad. But just looking at the

(39:19):
pictures of his frozen, little precious body, this beautiful little boy,
m hm. You just I think, you know, you wish
you could roll back time. You can't imagine that someone
could have done that on purpose. Who would wish this
kind of death on somebody. I do think that the

(39:47):
verdict against Ross Harris was a condemnation of how he
spent his married life. Listening to the k is laid
out by the state and the defense, I was shocked.

(40:11):
I just think for a lot of people it is
hard to separate someone who lies and cheats that much,
or from someone who could be a killer, and I
certainly think that that was the argument made by the prosecutor. Conversely,
Mados Kilgore said, this is a guy who has moral failings.
He's a terrible husband, but he loved his kid more

(40:33):
than anything. And I think one of the things that
was very surprising to me was that the prosecution rested
its case without ever having called a single witness who
could say that Ross Harris ever even spoke across word
to Cooper. And that was a shock to me because

(40:54):
there was not one person whoever said, yeah, he seemed
like he loved Cooper. But I remember that time he
that that boy's arm in the grocery store, or I
remember the time he spanked him, and I just didn't
think that was right. We never heard one single person
say that Ross Harris had even frowned at his little
boy one day. By all accounts, Ross Harris loved Cooper,

(41:21):
even though the prosecution found what they believed was convincing
evidence that Justin Ross Harris was cheating on his wife
with multiple women, and that he was more concerned with
his extramarital sex life than the safety of his own child.
On the day little Cooper died. Not everyone was convinced
yet that this was a murder. Both sides prepared for

(41:42):
what would be a very drawn out trial several hundred
miles outside of Atlanta, all the way down to Brunswick, Georgia.
The question remained, was this murder or was this just
a horrible accident. Justin Ross Harris was represented by a
defense team led by a friend of mine named Maddox Kilgore.

(42:03):
Maddox's job was to convince the jury that Justin Ross
Harris loved his son Cooper, that he was a good father,
and as a good father he could never have done
something like intentionally murdering his child in this horrible way.
His job was to raise reasonable doubt wherever it may
have existed, and ultimately it was up to Matos to

(42:26):
prove to the jury that this was nothing more than
a tragic accident. From watching Maddox in court and knowing
him like I do, I know that he really, truly,
honestly believes that this was a tragic accident. I sat
down with Maddox Kilgore to talk about the case next
time on Sworn. Sworn is produced by Tenderfoot TV in Atlanta.

(43:16):
Story production and sound design by Payne Lindsay Executive producers
Donald Albright and Payne Lindsay, and if you have it yet,
please check out our sister podcast, Up and Vantage that
follows the investigation into the disappearance of Georgia High school
teacher and beauty queen Tera Brinstein. Up and Vantaged is
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(43:39):
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(44:01):
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