January 26, 2023 • 55 mins
On October 29, 1996, two gunmen broke into Michael Kershner’s apartment in Elkhart, IN and robbed Kershner, his mother and four friends. After fighting back, Kershner was shot in the abdomen. Months later, Keith Cooper was arrested on a purse snatching charge. Lead Detective, Steve Rezutko, determined that Cooper might be one of the perpetrators in Kerschner’s case based on his resemblance to a computerized sketch of the gunmen. After placing Cooper’s photo in a lineup, witnesses identified him, along with one witness who claimed to recognize his voice without ever seeing him. However, the DNA from the hat left at the scene by the gunman did not match Cooper. Solely based on eyewitness testimony, Cooper was convicted of robbery resulting in serious bodily injury and sentenced to 40 years in prison.
To learn more, visit:
https://lavaforgood.com/podcast/211-jason-flom-with-marcus-wiggins/
https://lavaforgood.com/podcast/289-jason-flom-with-andrew-royer/
Wrongful Conviction is a production of Lava for Good™ Podcasts in association with Signal Co. No1.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
On October twenty nine, Elkhart, Indiana police were called to
the apartment of a Michael Kirshner and his mother known
a Canal. Allegedly, while they and four friends were watching
a movie, two men forced their way in, demanding money
and drugs. After the taller of the pair allegedly shout
at his friends and missed. A struggle between Michael Kirshner
(00:23):
and the shooter resulted in a non fatal gunshot wound
to Michael's abdomen. The gunman's hat fell off during the struggle,
and the two assailants fled. The police collected no evidence
from the scene, but took statement through the witnesses and victims,
who described the shooter as tall and skinny carrying a
long silver gun, and the other men as short and
(00:45):
stocky with no weapon. Two days later, one of the witnesses,
Eddie Love, allegedly identified a short and stocky man named
Chris Parrish. About three months later, a suspected person natcher
named Keith Cooper was identified as the taller shooter from
a photo lineup, Even though the jury was presented with
DNA results from the sweatbed of the shooters hat that
(01:06):
were allegedly inconclusive. The identifications appeared conclusive enough to separately
convict both men. But this is wrongful conviction. We're gonna
take a quick break and we'll be right back. The
Pacers Foundation is a proud supporter of this episode of
(01:28):
rawerful Conviction and of the Last Mile organization, which provides
business and tech training to help incarcerated individuals successfully and
permanently re enter the workforce. The Pacers Foundation is committed
to improving the lives of Hoosiers across Indiana, supporting organizations
that are dedicated primarily to helping young people and students.
For more information on the work of the Pacers Foundation
(01:50):
or the Last Mile Program, visit Pacers Foundation dot org
or the Last Mile dot org. Welcome back to Rafle Conviction. Today.
We're going to tell the story of a man who
was wrongly convicted in a place that, well, with what
(02:11):
has been uncovered there already, in such a small population,
it just might be the per capital rafle conviction capital
of this country and therefore the world, a dubious distinction.
And I'm talking about Elkhart, Indiana. But first let's introduce
the man himself, Keith Cooper, I mean, Keith, I'm sorry
(02:31):
you're here because of the reason why you're here and
what you had to go through, but I'm really happy
and honor that you're here with us today. I'm glad
to be here. And with him is his civil attorney
and our resident Elkhart expert, who you might remember from
our coverage of Andy Royer's case, which we're gonna have
linked in the bio. This man is an adjunct professor
at Notre Dame Law, a staff attorney at the Egeneration
(02:53):
Clinic out of the University of Chicago, and a partner
at the nationally recognized civil rights law firm Lobby and Loby,
where he was an investigator before he even passed the bar.
That's some that's some impressive resume, and we're honored to
have you here with us again. Hellio is Low. Sorry,
thanks and thanks so much for having us on. Now, Keith,
(03:14):
you didn't always live in Hukard, Indiana, and you weren't
born to raised there, right. You started off on the
South side of Chicago, So tell us a little bit
about that. I grew up in a single family home.
My mother was raising three of bro It was kind
of rough as I got older, I started, uh having babies,
and then I got married with my wife, you know,
(03:35):
to validate was on a rise in Chicago doing that
in the nineties, and I didn't want to kind of
atmosphere right for my children. So we decided to move
to a car because she had family there, and I
was like, okay, well cool, but I give it a shot.
I was going on twenty nine, I had three children
(03:56):
at the time, and then when I got there, it
was they started at our smooth and then take me
long fortune days before I got my first job at
banks Lumber and Uh, life was great. Yeah, it sounds
like it. I mean, twenty nine years old, three kids, married,
you know, more or less living. What sounds like that,
(04:16):
you know, personificcasion of the American dream. And what's ironic
is that you left Chicago, which had not only had
a rise in crime at the time, but then the
police were also very dangerous. The police in those days,
and this is not hyperbole, were regularly torturing people. They
were bringing them to a warehouse instead of the police station,
(04:36):
not just suspects but also witnesses. They were subjecting them
to beatings, genital electrocution, suffocation, putting bags over their head
while they were chained to a wall, beating them with
telephone books. And they did that not only the suspects again,
but also to witnesses in order to extract confessions but
also testimonies that they needed to make cases against others.
Sticks check out our coverage of Marcus Wiggins. He was
(05:00):
their youngest victim and he was thirteen years old when
they subjected him to this torture. We're going to have
that linked in the bio as well. So anyway, you
had jumped out of the literal frying pan into what
you didn't know was another one in the form of
the town of Elkhart, Indiana. You're right, Elkhart is a
city of manifests and justice. To date, there's been five
(05:22):
e generations from Elkhart. Our clinic represents another dozen in
terms of the number of wronkly convicted people from there.
You know, who knows what that number is. I'm sure
there's hundreds more. I mean hundreds more. That would be
crazy in a big city, but we're talking about a
town of fifty thousand of that's really disturbing. And as
(05:44):
you can hear in our coverage of Andy Royer's case,
which we're also going to link in the bio. There's
coerced false witness statements, fraudulent fingerprint analysis, a false confession
from a cognatively impaired man, and the kicker. The prosecutor
watched it happen and not only did she not stop it,
but rather she used it to ronically convict not one,
but two people in this case. And then I mentioned
that she used the current elected prosecuting attorney for Elkhart County.
(06:08):
And even more disturbing, with how small of a town
it is, all of these bad actors no one another,
are aware of each other's misdeeds. And one of the
detectives in the case we're going to cover today became
the chief of police and that lasted until two thousand
and eighteen, and that's ed Win Biggler. And by the
end of this episode, you're also going to be acutely
aware of his partner, the lead detective in this case,
(06:30):
Steve Razuko. Elliott, can you give us some background on Razuko.
You know, something that we would later obtain on the
civil side of things was Razuko's application of the Okar
Police Department and so they conduct you know, a background
investigation to Rasuco, and then they go to like three
references that he actually lists. You know, it's like when
(06:51):
you're applying to a job, You're like, hey, let me
list like the three most favorable people to be in
the world. And at each of those three places, they
gave them terrible references. You know. One of the people
was like, I would never hire him again. This guy
was overly aggressive, you know, like every red flag he had,
bad credit, was deep in debt, going through a bankruptcy,
(07:11):
several arrests for reckless driving, fighting, an accident with a
parked car, and a high speed chase with the police.
So nothing in this background investigation was like Steve Zuko,
let's give that guy a badge and a gun and
see what he can do for the citizens of Belkart.
But at least one former supervisor seemed to have found
(07:33):
value in Razuko, saying, quote, he knew all the drunks,
all the bandits, and all the prostitutes. He's a big guy,
and he's been in some bar scrapes and come out
the winner. And quote, this guy was an uber, aggressive
dirt bag with plenty of friends in the underbelly of town.
And what you'll come to know about this guy is
that his emo was not solving crimes, but rather finding
(07:55):
a target of his investigation, just fixing all the facts
and coercing not only says efects, but witnesses as well
to give statements that fit his target. You know, this
guy was willing to violate the constitutional rights of anyone
in the community, especially people of color or people without
financial resources to take him on and got away with
(08:16):
committing criminal offenses for decades. And we'll go a bit
further than what those criminal acts were later on, but
bear in mind he wasn't the only problematic dirt bag
investigating this case. There's also ed Wynn Bagler, who eventually
became the chief of police, and another detective named Steve
Ambrose CEB. Ambrose later was implicated in serious misconduct as well,
(08:40):
including shooting and killing a black man in the yok
Art community by the name of Derrick Connors. And everybody
that I had spoken to an ELK cart as serious
concerns about whether Detective Ambrose murdered Derrick Honnors without justification,
and there was an investigation into that, a lawsuit so
this town that Keith had moved to in search of
(09:01):
a safe place to raise his family. Wasn't actually so
safe with these guys protecting and serving Now, Not only
was it unsafe for Keith and his family, but also
another young man named Chris Parrish, who was also wrongly
targeted by Razuko, Ambrose and wind Burgler util Chris was
almost ten years younger than Keith and had grown up
in Elkhart. I think with Chris Parrish something to keep
(09:23):
in mind, as he was a real young kid whose
family had run ins with the police department. And you know,
as we talked about this case, you'll see that the
police went out of their way to manufacturer of keys
against Chris Pearish when all the evidence credibly showed that
he was innocent all along. So it was these previous
run ins with the law, which were nothing serious by
(09:45):
the way, but they offered a motivation for the police
to try to frame Chris, who already had a mug
shot from when he was fourteen years old, which made
it even easier for them. But with you, Keith, you
were brand new to town, unknown to local law enforcement,
so you see him like a pretty random choice, but
they went ahead and did it anyway, did you know
Chris Parrish before all this happened. No, I never knew
(10:08):
Chris parper Yeah, so Christopher Parrison Keith Cooper never met
each other until a decade after Chris's exoneration, And you know,
a couple of years after Keith was exonerated, they had
separate defense attorneys. You know, Chris was from our car
Keith was from Chicago. They lived different lives. Frankly, there
(10:29):
are different age groups. You know. Keith was a period
with children. Chris was his early twenties. Yeah, Keith was
like nine years older than him and living a totally
different lifestyle. So the idea that two of you committed
an armed robbery together, on its face makes no sense.
So let's get into the climate itself. Now, this incident
may not have even happened in the way that the
victim described it. The police really never did collect any
(10:52):
evidence at the scene, but rather it was collected later
for them by the alleged victims. But it's really all
we have to go on. So on October twenty, allegedly
there were about six people in an apartment at a
public housing project in Elkhart. Seventeen year old Michael Kirshner,
his mother known a canal, and then about four of
(11:13):
Michael's friends, including fifteen year old Eddie Love and another
guy named Jason Ackley and two others, and they said
that they were watching a movie, that ridiculous movie, Don't
be a Menace to South Central while drinking or juice
in the hood when they allegedly got a knock on
the door from two black men, one short, one tall,
with a hat on, and they were looking for someone
named Shell. Whether that was Short from Michelle, we don't know.
(11:36):
In either event, they had the wrong apartment, according to victims,
you know, their account is that when they denied that
Shell was there, these two guys forced their way into
the apartment because the victims had like a bag of
laundry coins on the living room table and there was
an SKS rifle. Ultimately there was a scuffle and in
(11:59):
the midst of the scuffle, one of the victims, Michael Kirshner,
was shot right. He allegedly got in between his mother
and the gunman, which was the taller of the two assailants,
and took a non fatal gunshot to the abdomen, which,
if true, is very heroic. Now this taller gunman was
the role in this crime that Keith later got saddled with.
(12:21):
Also notable by the way, during that tussle, the taller
man's hat fell off. Yeah, and it wasn't just any hat,
you know back in the eighties and nineties, you know,
when they had malls. It was like one of those
hats that you can customize. They were like rhyan stones
on it that formed the letter J. Notably, you know,
Keith Cooper doesn't have the letter J anywhere in his name.
(12:43):
But when the shooter and the second person left the apartment,
they left that hat and on that hat was DNA
evidence that has excluded Keith Cooper since the time of trial.
And we'll get into how that played out at trial
in a bit. And from what I can understand, this
hat and any other physical evidence from the scene, none
(13:03):
of it was even initially collected by the police on
the scene. What the hell is that all about? There
are two different perspectives to this, you know. Later there
was some evidence that came out during Chris Parrish's post
conviction litigation that alleged that the shooting happened in a
parking lot. And if they happened a parking lot. That
might tend to explain why there wouldn't be any physical
(13:25):
evidence in the apartment. There's a second explanation, which is
that it's not just detectives and ELK cards that are
completely incompetent, but also crime scene technicians. And so the
crime scene technician when he went there, he didn't actually
do his job and look for physical evidence from the shooting.
And so two days later, when the victims came home
(13:46):
from the hospital, they were the ones who recovered the hat.
The showcasings called the police back, and that's when the
police department came and seized the physical evidence. So there
are some chain of custody issues from the get go here.
But nonetheless, they had some bullets, shell casings, the hat
with the d n A that excludes Keith. And then
(14:07):
the witness's descriptions, right, two young black men. One was
short and stocky, and then the tall gunman who had
a long silver gun and was described as wiry. But
I'm not sure if Keith ever was wiry. It certainly
doesn't appear that way. Now. Yeah, Keith is tall, but
he's never been a wiry guy. You're totally right about that.
And in this case, there was a composite that was
(14:28):
created early on, and it's like the most generic looking
composite you'll ever see. I mean it like basically was
a human being. There was no like detailed to it
that would like lead you one way or the other
to who actually did the shooting. And we'll link that
in the bio as well. So this generic composite leaves
room for a very loose interpretation as to which direction
(14:49):
to take this investigation. So two days after the crime,
one of the witnesses, a fifteen year old kid named
Eddie Love, who may may not have been at risk
of his own charges, had a highly pressurized sit down
with Edwin Biggler. And it's been theorized that Win Biggler
may have been pushing the idea that Chris Parrish was involved.
So what is the result of this conversation. What's fascinating
(15:12):
is there are like two different versions of this based
on the reports. So, like Detective Win Bigler's reports said
that Eddie Love said that the person looked like a
person he knew named Chris Parrish. He didn't say it
was Chris Parrish. So he was like clearly telling the
cops like, hey, you know, like, I know this guy,
Chris Parris, the guy you're looking for, looks like him.
(15:35):
But Detective Razuko would later write a report saying that
Eddie Love named Chris Parrish as a person who did this. So,
whether they had already planned on doing this or not,
they now have a reason to place Chris Parrish's photo
in the lineup to be viewed by Michael Kirshner, Nona
Canal and the other four robbery victims. Now, remember they
(15:57):
only had a picture of Chris from when he was fourteen,
even though Chris was twenty years old at the time
of the crime, so the lineup was totally suspect. Plus
they knew that he was in Chicago, you know, which
is about two hours from Alcarda, Indiana, and he had
somewhere around fifteen alibi witnesses who testified his criminal trial,
(16:18):
including a minister, and Razuko would testify later on in
Chris's civil case. This is like fifteen years later. I
believed when the trial was over that Chris was going
to be exonerated because I believed his alby witnesses. That's
a quote from Razuko, and it really is a striking
(16:39):
admission because if you believe Chris Parrish's aliby witnesses that
Chris is innocent, then how does a police officer somehow
get a half dozen people to make a positive identification
of Chris Parrish? Right, both can't be true. Sure, maybe
there's some statistical probability that one person could mistakenly pick
(17:01):
Chris out of a photo ray, But how do you
get a half dozen people to mistakenly pick Chris Parris?
I have a photo ray? Well, you do it by
putting a fourteen year old juvenile photo in an array
with five adult men, knowing that they described the person
as younger looking, and you lead your eye witnesses to
misidentify somebody who's innocent. So they made this suggestive array
(17:22):
with Chris's juvenile photo and led the six witnesses to idea.
Chris was charged shortly after the actual incident, to later
be taken to trial. But Keith, you were brand new
in town. They didn't even know you, let alone have
a photo of you. So how did you get pulled
into this? Then all started from the they said, I
(17:42):
wrapped this lated for a purse, So a person matching happened.
But Keith was like literally walking on the street, his
card broken down. He went to go get some like groceries,
and the detective saw a tall black eye and was like, oh,
there was a person match him with a tall black
eyed Let me just bring this guy over. So he
(18:03):
drove Keith over to the victim's house and I saw
the later on the porch with the other officers, and
I'm staying to myself, how's she gonna be at this
identifying me when I'm sitting in the backseat and they
square called these little gates around the window where you
can't even really see inside. Was she white? She was white? Yes,
(18:24):
she were Okay, so we have a cross racial identification
from a distance through a window which is screened. As
you said, you barely could see in at all. And
the suggestive nature of it is extreme right in and
there my life went to ships once she identified me
(18:44):
as the person acttion. That was a line when I
got to the police station. A lot of things they
did at the police station, it went I'm told because
see they had me to take a lot and take
the test approved that I was innocent of DEBD case.
But good because Zukos and other France with me. And
(19:04):
this is like from Detective Razuko's own mouth. You know,
he's testified to this Detective Rozuko sees Keith in there
and he's like, oh, tall black guy, that must be
the tall black guy I'm looking for in the Cursoner shooting.
I mean like it literally could have been like any
tall black eye in America who could again brought into
that station and their life would have been ripped away
because Rozuco just wanted to close the case and stead
(19:27):
us all here. You have two separate incidents involving a
(19:48):
tall black man, and then both the person matching detective
and Razuko just picked out any old, tall black guy
and it just happened to be Keith both times. So
you were in jail for two months awaiting trial on
the persona correct Well, how much was bail on that case? Uh?
(20:08):
It was ten thousand thousand a goal to bound album
and and not having access to that money like so
many other people, You're stuck in his jail. I'm stuck.
I'm sitting waiting trial. Right before I was getting ready
to go to trial for the person not you, I
get a visitor. The visitor was Detective Zooks. He had
(20:32):
to come down to his office and sat down across
from him. Told me, he said, hey, if you take
this person not in case to trial, and if you
do win it, I have another case for I said,
I didn't commit this person. I said that I don't
do anything else. I in their God. He said, I
got six people to say the different. And he gave
(20:53):
me a police report and I read and he tells
me that you're the one who attempted to rob these
people and shot with Michael Kursen. And at that time
I'm like no, I said I didn't do it. He said,
will you take this egg and you lay on because
if you if you get found, I'll give to that battery.
You will be faced with this hire. And as I'm
(21:13):
sitting there waiting for trial, that he was on the
visit I was getting into County jail. At this time.
He was letting me know, hey, this is your baby.
You're sitting on that egg. Yeah, you're gonna get found, gifted.
He was threatening me. After a couple of months May passed,
I went to trial. I was I was a quitter
to that there. Like when they were processing me out,
(21:36):
they came with a best warm and I asked him
for what he said, chim robbed right there, and that
I knew wasn't gonna let me go home. No, he
was not, Like he had already explained to you, he
had six people that are ready to identify you, and
all of those ideas, with the exception of Eddie Luve,
we're going to be cross racial, which I'll say it again,
(21:56):
and study after study has been proven to be less
accurate than guessing. So he had your picture now and
he put it into another suggestive lineup. What's remarkable about
our cart is even though they had the ability do
live lineups back in the nineties, they declined to do it.
All of the identifications in this case we're made on
(22:18):
photo rays, and if you look at the photo rays,
it's like, yeah, canal idd Keith kurshioner ided keys and
you're like, oh wow, these are positive identifications. You know,
there's no reports about you know, confidence levels or whether
they're done sequentially or together. And it took, frankly, about
(22:42):
fifteen years for that story to really unravel and for
us to learn how those identifications were manufactured. So, you know,
once we began the investigation and what was really going on,
the victims told us all this information about the identification process.
(23:02):
They told us that they were telling Razuko the whole
time they didn't know if Keith Cooper was really the person.
They actually were like demanding a live lineup to Detective Razuko,
saying like, we we want to live line up because
we're not sure, you know, we don't want to misidentify somebody,
and he just kept telling them, I got the right guy,
I got the right guy. He also told him that
he didn't have enough tall black people in Elkhart to
(23:24):
do a live lineup, which is also a lie. It
sounds like the basis for probable cause was a lie
as well. These ideas were not positive ideas and the
lead up to trial, but Rozuko was able to shore
them up later in the meantime leading up to trial,
they had the DNA from the sweat band and the
results came back telling the state definitively that Keith was
(23:47):
not and could not have been involved, which should have
put an end to this crazy prosecution totally, but instead
the state enters into this stipulation with this defense attorney
that Keith had, saying that if the state lab analysts
were to testify a trial, she would testify that the
(24:09):
hat neither included nor excluded Keith Cooper from having worn it,
and that is like the opposite of what the actual
DNA results say, which is that like he's excluded from
being a contributor to any of the DNA on the hat.
I'm finding it hard to understand why his attorney would
do something so stupid. I mean, did you know that
(24:30):
your attorney was allowing this ship to go on? No? No, no.
When the DNA, I felt confident that that's going to
be the way I get out. But they used the stipulation,
which I didn't understand at the time where they were met.
My lawyer told me that when he agreed to that,
they were going to be into my favor if I
agreed to the stipulation, I said, okay, cool, what ended
(24:51):
up having a trial? It's like, you know, is in
many of these cases, right, you've got police misconduct, You've
got over zealous prosecutors. You know, they just want to
get a conviction. And he had a defense attorney who
was checked out. Are we going to say his name? Yeah,
Jack's meeting. He did not protect Keith Cooper had trial.
And you know when I say trial, like that is
(25:14):
like charitable. This was a half day bench proceeding that
sent Keith to present wrongfully for a decade of his life.
It's chilling to think that he said to you. He
was actually being honest, but not in a good way,
because he said, I'm gonna take a bench trial so
we could get this over with, right, But he was
he was not. I mean, any lawyer would know that
(25:37):
you're better off with twelve jurors where you only need
one to say, hey, this this doesn't make any sense.
I thought that way too, but he kept on tim.
He said, you you better facing the judge because the
judge is familiar with the laws, and how better for
you to do it with the judge and have to
go through the Twitter people because the judge no more
(25:57):
about your case than they do. And I, like, I said,
I know about the system. So I went with what
do you say? Because you know, hey, he represented me,
but he wasn't. He was just getting He just wanted
me to cop out. It seems like that's what the
court was greased up to do. I don't even understand
how the judge could have allowed that stipulation to come
(26:17):
to pass, honestly, but everyone seemed on board with just
ignoring the clear cut evidence of your innocence leading up
to trial, except for the people who didn't know about
the DNA evidence. The eyewitnesses who it seems to me,
we're probably the only people trying to do the right
thing here, canal Mike Kirshner. They like, we're so insistent
(26:40):
regarding their doubts in this identification that Rozuka was like, fine,
show up to the courthouse at this time and meet
me in this location. And the date was Keiths Cooper's trial,
the location was the hallway, and the time was before
the trial started. And so Rozuko has these witnesses lined
(27:02):
up in the hallway as Keith Cooper is walking up
with his wife and children. And what the witnesses and
the victims say is that Razuko turned to them and
so that's the guy. That's the guy who're going to
go in there and identify as the shooter. And they
did what the cop told him to do. So they
trusted the detective that he had the right guy. Meanwhile,
(27:24):
he knew otherwise all along. In fact, Razuko, win Biggler,
and Ambrose knew that the case was so weak with
the shaky I d S and DNA evidence exonerating Keith,
that they had to come up with even more bullshit.
So at some point prior to trial, Detective Razuko and
Win Biggler get a jail house informant involved named Barry Coleman,
(27:46):
and they promised the Barry Coleman is consideration and fedom
information in order to fabricate a statement alleging that Keith
confessed to him when they were incarcerated together and a trial.
One of the remarkable things here to be Ry Coleman
actually refused to testify there and the judge allowed for
a detective to testify to the statement that he took
(28:07):
from the jailha's informant without any defense having the ability
to cross examine the informant who is refusing to testify.
That is off the rails. Everybody who knows anything about
the law or legal proceedings knows that there can be
no testimony for either side unless the other side has
an opportunity to counter it by cross examining the witness.
(28:31):
I've seen wrongful convictions happen for that reason. But apparently
like Razuka was like not convinced the Keith was going
to get wrongfully convicted, and so like he goes out
into the hall and gets us. Witness Jason Ackley, who
was at the time of the shooting in the shower,
is not in the living room when the shooting is
going on, and he tells Actlee that he needs them
(28:52):
to go in there and identify Cooper's voice as the
voice that he heard through the walls. Well, he showery
as the perfect who you know, fire the shot. I mean,
it's the most absurd thing. And so they bring this
guy out from the hallway and they have Keith, you know,
say some ridiculous thing in court, and actually it's like, oh, yeah,
that's the voice I heard. Not only is voice recognition
(29:15):
totally unreliable, but for anyone who's ever taken a shower,
we all know that identifying a strange voice over the water,
through the wall and maybe the shower curtain or the
glass door and whatever else is between you and whatever
is going on, this guy actually is totally full of it. So, Keith,
you had watched all this go down. The eyewitnesses gave
positive by des in court to judge a lot of
(29:36):
detectives to read in the jailhouse. Nitche statement After this,
Nitche refused to testify, and your defense attorney entered into
that DNA stipulation. Hell, this is a preconvench trial, and
the judge went ahead and allowed that stipulation. I mean,
I don't know how you could have held out any
hope that you'd still be acquitted after that. No, something
(29:56):
my body told me, Man, I was going to prison
when they agreed to youth today and they when this
when they proved that I was innocent, that minutes said
inconclusive and they threw that to the side. I knew
I was going to prison. The judge, man was already
made up and we had recess. We came up to resess.
I was found guilty. I looked at my turn I said,
how you that this happened? When the d and they
(30:17):
was there, and he said, but I did what I could.
It's like a little groomiss grins about itself, you know, like, hey,
I did what I can do. Wow. I mean, this
is really devastating just to hear about it, and you
had to live through it, and then you got taken
(30:37):
off to prison facing forty years to life. During much
my sentences, I had told my wife she had to
get on with her life. Don't worry about being because
I can't help her all my three babies. I have
to now worry about how i'm'm surviving this prison, and
you have to worry about how you and the kids
gonna survive because I don't have no source of happy.
(30:58):
I can better have myself now this time. So you know,
I've lost the words and she lost the words too,
because we both got a journey on our own now
separate ways. Well, that's valley where they sent me to.
(31:27):
It was to ride the long ride down and that
uh it took his toll on me because I had
to think about how I was going to vive in
that prison and uh they thought of me not saying
my babies again, that was taking the toll. Beclose. I
got to that penitential. The more I would, I wasn't
gonna see my kids. Then when I got inside the penitentious,
(31:51):
I knew that was gonna be my home for the
next for the years if I live. And that was
scary because I was in a place where I know nobody, nobody,
and uh then I had to deal with the lensality
of the prison yard. Everybody in there is taking their
frustration out on't one another, and no matter how you
(32:14):
try to aboid it, you couldn't shake it. It came.
It's always presented itself where you had to knuckle up,
you had to throw your hands, you had to fight.
I'm getting tired of people. Man. Every morning, Man, somebody's
manhood is getting tested. It's like, I'm tired of fighting. Man.
I'm gonna end up man actually committing a crime in
(32:35):
this place because I know there was going to eventually
and caill me up in the How did you survive
and how did you maintain hope in a place that,
I mean hope was lost. I got on my niece
and I just prayed. Man, I ask God, I ask
guys that guy had me get through this year. I
wasn't really get a no help until I got the
point in another lawyer really for Alaski, and he came
(32:57):
into my life. That's when the hope and everything began
range for me. After man year, it took me nine
years to see that. They're like you said, Man, I
look to your case, I see what the DNA here.
I'm having to wed your DNA. So you know Keith's
case in the early two thousands, there was more DNA
testing don on the hat and they were able to
(33:18):
run the profile from the sweat band through the code
of database and they got a hit to a person
named Jolanna Servant who was convicted of murder with a
similar type weapon in a town that was less than
thirty miles from Elkhart and to match the description that
the witnesses really gave. So when the system fails and
(33:41):
the wrong person goes in, it fails the victims family,
Keith Cooper and his family. But here's the situation where like,
because the detectives went so far out of their way
to put an innocent guy in prison, the real perpetrator
not only stayed free, but he actually committed another murder.
They had actually done their job originally, maybe they could
(34:02):
have prevented that. So when the hit happened, Keith was
litigating a post conviction petition and the judge gave Keith's attorney,
who is at the Public Defender's Office, and Keith a
choice either he will grant a new trial. And at
that point, the defense attorney who was representing Keith, you
know these victims, you know, they were identifying Keith for
(34:24):
all he knew you know, he didn't talk to them,
and there was some fear by the attorney that Keith
could get re wrongfully convicted or the offer that was
presented is that the state would modify Keith's sentence on
the wrongful conviction to time served so that he could
go home to his family. I want to go home
because I had got a letter from my sister telling
(34:45):
me that my family was living in the shelter, and
that was what made me really won't understand that papermans,
I can come home because I didn't want more people
living in the show, especially the door, because I was
locked up with the perverted. As you hear they tell
their stories how they finally get their victims, and that
made me realize, now I need to get upbout it
(35:07):
here so as fast as possible. That's a Sophie's choice.
You know, Yes, you get to go home to your family,
but you get to live for the rest of your
life as a convicted violent felon, you know. Or of
course you have to go back to jail await trial
in a in a hellish place, which could take years
to get back to another trial, and then you've already
seen the worst of what the system has to offer,
(35:29):
and you know they're capable of faming and they can
just do it again. So who would want to have
to make that choice? I think for someone in Keith's
position in Elkhart, Indiana at that time, it was probably
the only only rational choice to make. When I got
out and two thousand and six, my kids didn't even
know who I were, and I better recognized them because
they had grew up. They were teenagers now. They was
(35:51):
just little babies when i'ming into the you know, being
raised without me and their life that he had some
little resiments that I had to deal will. I had
to let them know it one like, I just walked
out your life. I was kidnapped. They took me out
from y'all, you know, so there was a hard appear
for all of us to swatter when we got to
be reunited. This is something that will have a lasting
(36:13):
impact on them for as long as they live. The
children need their dad, they need their parents, and we
all right now. I mean, I'm so happy I got
my grandkids around me. They keep me motivated. You know,
I might have missed out on raising my own kids,
but at least my kids give me the luxury of
raising their children. So I'm grateful. What do they call you?
(36:33):
They call you Grandpa Grahams Pap Papa, they call you
they called me Paul, Paul. They love they Pap Paul.
That's great, And I understand you got remarried as well,
to your wife, Nicole Slayton Cooper in two thousand ten. Oh.
I love my wife. She's beautiful. She's been very supportive
of me and the person. Now I gotta get a
(36:55):
high honest to us God first. Then my my lawyer,
fly Brothers last friend. Yeah, when he stepped to come
to my life, I was given. Man. I knew I
had a chance man to make things right. So, you know,
I learned about Keith Cooper when I was investigating the
case of his co defendant, Christopher Parish, who had already
(37:17):
been exonerated. You know, he was in the middle of
a civil lawsuit. I was like, not even in law
school yet. When I was working on that as an investigator,
and when I talked to the victims and they told
me what Detective Razuka really did to get these false identifications.
You know, I went back to the firm to my
boss and I was like, Chad Keith Cooper is super
(37:41):
innocent and these people all feel terrible that they ripped
his life away. We've got to We've got to tell him.
So I met Keith that way and ended up, you know,
promising him, you know that we would do everything that
we can to help him get his name back. Since
your investigation of Keith case really began with Chris Parrish's case,
(38:02):
we need to revisit what that investigation and the civil
suit uncovered. Now he filed the wrongful conviction lawsuit in
so take us through that. During Parish's civil lawsuit, Keith
Cooper's wrongful conviction unraveled, the eyewitnesses revealed that they were
manipulated into misidentifying Keith Cooper. Did Joehus informant to Barry Coleman,
(38:24):
You know he refused to testify trial, right, So Coleman,
you revealed like, Hey, yeah, I didn't testify trial because
A it was false and B they didn't satisfy their
promises to me, and I wasn't going through with it.
I wasn't gonna let them give me up there to
put an instant guy in prison. Jason Actley, the guy
in the shower, testified that Detective Razuko was out in
(38:45):
the hallway and just told him what to do, and
he would do anything to help Detective Razuko and you know,
the family get a conviction. So he was just doing
what Razuko said. Parrish presented evidence that a Kirshner was
shot in the parking lot outside the building, and lot
it about it because he said it was in the
apartment because he was on home detention for a gun charge.
So that's a botmobshell right there. Okay, then love testify
(39:10):
the police coerced him to identify Parrish. DNA tests conducted
after the trial, and the hat showed not Keith Cooper,
of course, but as you said, DNA of a man
named Jolana's Irvine who was later convicted of murder. It
would later be proven Detective Razuko, the same guy who
was telling the eyewitnesses who to select in the hallway
with Keith Cooper, was using a child photo of Chris Farrish,
(39:33):
yet that they knew who to identify in his arrays.
And then Razuko would later admit under oath that when
he watched Chris Parris's trial, this frame job that he
had like orchestrated, and he admitted in the deposition, like
they convinced me. I thought they were going to find
him not guilty, right, I mean, the state's case had
been laid to waste. Right, it was just laying there
(39:53):
in tatters. And there's still so much more that was revealed,
and we'll get to that in a minute. But Keith's
best shot at elexna ration was an actual innocence pardon
from the governor. And this was Governor Pence at the time,
and it was filed in like two thousand thirteen. Right,
wasn't he released in two thousand six? In Indiana? They
had this real antiquated rule at the time where if
(40:15):
you had been released from prison, then you had to
wait five years to file a part in or prole application.
So all of this information had already been accumulated. No
one could deny his innocence. They couldn't have back in
two thousand six, even though they would have tried. But
now he's out and ready for the fight. So this
goes in front of the pardoning parole Board and there's
(40:36):
an even better case made for then Governor Pennce to
do the right thing here. What's remarkable is that the
part of parle board did a unanimous recommendation. They recommended
the actual innocence pardon. The victim Michael Kershner testified on
Keith Cooper's behalf, apologized to him, told him what Detective
Razuko did, you know? Begged the pardon Pearle board to
do the right thing, beg the governor to do the
(40:57):
right thing. A number of other people gave statements, and
probably you know, the most critical thing was a letter
from the trial prosecutor who's now a judge and car
Judge Christofino. It was a letter directed from the trial
prosecutor to Governor Pence, and in the letter, Mr Christofino
admitted that the evidence available to the State of Indiana
(41:20):
at this time exonerates Keith Cooper, and justice demands that
Mr Cooper be pardoned. As an attorney, he begged the
governor to undo Keith Cooper's tragic, wrongful conviction. And then
Pence sat on this thing for years and instead, once
he got nominated by Trump, they wrote a public letter
(41:45):
that they submitted to the press saying that the governor
wasn't going to act on the actual and instance pardon
even though his board unanimously recommended that it be granted.
And telling Keith Cooper to go back to court and
file a post fiction petition. And we went back to court,
we filed the post conviction petition. We were going to
call the bluff. What ended up happening is Keith's case
(42:09):
became a political issue and a civil rights issue in Indiana.
During the gubernatorial election, there was even a debate where
the candidates were each asked the question, will you parton
Keith Cooper in your first three days in office? That
is how like Biges Scott answer. The momentum could not
be stopped. I felt like a celebrity. I'll tell you
(42:31):
that God is good. Hey he put me out there
when I heard that part. And I was at work
on the forklift truck loading the FedEx up and one
of my guys ran on the back of the truck.
He said, Keith, you've just been pawned. I didn't know,
he said, man, you didn't part. I thought it was
a game. He was just on the playoffs. The man
(42:51):
got time for them. I'm going this TI let me work,
he said, come and look now look And there were
ever hoping part of Pith Coop and I could do nothing, man,
but as a man, I tried to hold back my feelings,
but the chierd just just flooded, and uh, every better
my job. It was all happened because they had the
word that got out and on I had to leave work.
(43:15):
I was so excited. I was free. I went home
and and just yell know my knees Admitte just let
it all. I just cheers are just overwhelm them. And
they were just flooding the webs of my eyes. Man,
I couldn't stop. And I was thankful because it was
like a dream had just come true for me. The burden,
(43:37):
all that weight there was all my chest and just
a thousand pounds were just lifted off my chest, man,
and I was free. My name was clear, and I
made history in the state of in the The person
who ultimately won that election, Governor Eric Holcomb, who was
the lieutenant governor two pence. Like this is somebody who
was on Pences ticket previously, and within his first thirty
(44:02):
days in office, he granted Keith Cooper the state of
Indiana's only ever actual innocence part. It's incredible. Finally now
comes to good stuff, right now you get to take
these people to task. So of course in November two thousand, nineteen,
Keith filed the federal lawsuit against the City of el
(44:22):
cart and four of its police officers. What did you
learn during the civil proceedings because this is this is deep. Yeah,
we ended up filing the civil lawsuit, you know, as
a federal lawsuit on behalf of Keith Cooper. We sue
Detective Razuko andwin Biggler Ambrose in the City of Elkhart,
and that civil lawsuit unraveled what is going to be
(44:46):
decades of exonerations people who are wrongfully convicted, just like
Keith was. We ended up uncovering these internal affairs files
that were never disclosed to Keith Cooper prior to his
child in a parishes civil lawsuit. So like, not only
was this stuff withheld on the criminal side from both
(45:07):
of them, but like the City of Elkhart literally litigated
an entire lawsuit without turning it over, which is shocking.
But those internal affairs files showed two different internal affairs
investigations into Detective Razuko, one before Keith Cooper was ever
wrongfully convicted and another one in two thousand one. And
(45:28):
the investigation Detective Razuko admitted to paying an informant for
sexual acts and she was used as a witness in
a homicide investigation. Admitted to that, and the only thing
that the department did was take away three of his
(45:48):
vacation days. And in two thousand one, Detective Razuko was
caught in another internal affairs investigation prompted by other law
enforcement agent. He's coming into Elkhart and saying, we have
evidence showing what your detective is doing paying and informants
(46:09):
and prostitutes for sexual interactions dating back to like, we
have affidavits from these women who he was sexually assaulting, right, Like,
there's no actual consent here when it's a law enforcement
officer with a badge and a gun, Like, they don't
really have a choice. But he was not only paying
them for sexual interactions, but he was then fabricating statements
(46:30):
for them to falsely implicate people in crimes including murder.
These people were going on the stand and testifying to
frame innocent people like Keith Cooper. They ultimately sustained an
allegation of malfeasance against him, which by definition is a
criminal act, and he was allowed to resign and then
get this between the time that the malfeasance finding happened
(46:52):
and his resignation, a supervisor of his at the car
Police Department and a supervisor in the ochre Canny Prosecutor
Office literally wrote letters of recommendation on letterhead to a
different law enforcement agency soys that he could get hired.
And then the chief of Police went to the Board
of Public Safety and thanked Razuko for his years of
(47:15):
public service. Like nobody knew about it. They buried it.
All these people that he helped frame for crimes, commit
a lot of clients and ours who are still wrongfully
in prison, and then they buried it. And then Elkhart
allowed Rosuko even after he resigned with this malfeasance funny.
They were allowing him to testify in criminal cases like
even murder trials without ever disclosing it to the defense
(47:39):
for years. And we uncovered that, we uncovered a ton
of other misconduct and exculpatory information that was withheld, and
we ultimately filed emotion for sanctions against Detective Razuko for
committing perjury and withholding evidence, including dating back to the
Paris lawsuit. And we sent him written discovery request that
(47:59):
was like maybe every informant you ever had tell us
any of every informant you ever had sexual interactions with.
Tell Us, any of every informant you have sexual interactions
with that you use as a witness in a criminal investigation.
And the night before his response to the sanctions was due,
and the night before his written discovery responses was due,
(48:19):
he committed suicide. Wow. I mean, I'm sorry for his family,
but the fact is that everyone safer with him not
being in a position to hurt other people and abuse
his power. You know, again, I wish it was the
(48:40):
only time I'd heard a story like that. You know
that the Pippo and Prevac case in Westchester had similar
levels of police criminality. And then there's that horrible cop
in in Kansas City from Lamont McEntire case and so
many others. You know what I'm talking about. Yeah, Globski,
Jesus Christ. There's one more wild thing, Jason, that are
a law student uncovered. You know the detective who assisted
(49:02):
Razuko and Fabricane at Joha's informant statement, bed Win Bickler.
He would later rise to the ranks of chief of police,
like he was chief of police in Elkhart through two eighteen. Like,
this isn't even something that happened decades ago, and what
we uncovered in Keith Cooper's civil lawsuit was that in
the nineteen nineties there was a group of white officers
(49:24):
in the Elkhart Police Department who refer to themselves as
the Wolverines. Like people in the department have testified about this.
Everybody up to the mayor has testified that they knew
about the existence of this group existing within the department,
and people have testified that the Wolverines originated. The name
originated from this movie called Red Don from the nineteen eighties,
(49:49):
which is real timely given what's going on with Russia
and read Don was premised on this theme that a
group of white suburban teenagers would resort to guerrilla war
fair in order to keep invaders out of their community.
And these officers apparently saw people of color as invaders
of their community and resorted to police abuse, police misconduct,
(50:14):
framing innocent people. And Mr Winbigler actually has admitted under
oath to being associated with this group. And so the
existence of the Wolverines is going to further unravel Elkhart's
epidemic with wrongful convictions because those officers, time and time
again have been implicated in framing other innocent people for crimes.
(50:38):
A incomment. I hate to say, but it's almost like
the Catholic church. You know, you go to whichever city
you go to, and you hear stories like this. We
hear it day in and day out here as we
interview people like Keith who have been through this. So,
since you pursued civil litigation Indiana, that means you've forfeited
the right to state compensation. But aren't you glad you
did because after hearing all the things that Elliott has
(51:00):
been able to uncover here, which is nothing short of
incredible by the way, you were able to win your
civil suit. I mean, he really drew out the truth
here and no one could hide from it. The truth
never changed no matter how long it takes. The truth
always remained the same. Favorite my truth and God for Bill.
They could say whatever they want to say, and then
(51:22):
God for Bill. And he's not done without card either,
A whole lot of truth for to come out of
our car. Yes, sir man. So we have a tradition
here wrongful conviction. It's called closing arguments. It's how we
close the show, and it works like this. First of all,
I thank each of you guys for being here and
(51:42):
sharing this truly incredible story. And then I'm gonna turn
my microphone off and kick back in my chair with
my headphones on and just listen to anything else you
want to share with me and our incredible audience. Elliott,
let's let you go first, tell us what's on your mind,
and then Keith can take us out the epidemic and
(52:05):
Elkhart is only beginning to unravel. Yeah, there are so
many other Keith Coopers who continue to be wrong play incarcerated,
whether they were framed by Detective Razuko or other members
of the All Car Police Department. But one thing that
Keith did through his fight over the past six years,
(52:32):
it shine a light on a community that was riddled
with police and prosecutorial misconduct. And Keith, through shining that life,
will be the main reason why so many other wrongfully
convicted people will be set free. Recently, in seven point
(52:59):
five million different ways, the city of Elkhart acknowledge the
egregious wrong and suffering that happened to Keith Cooper. And
it's no coincidence that Keith received the largest wrongful conviction
settlement in the state of Indiana that settlement is a
(53:23):
result of everything that Keith on earth, and that the
city of Elkhart did not want a jury to hear.
So while keith story is heartbreaking and tragic and so preventable,
you'll be hearing about a lot of other Keith Cooper's
(53:47):
being set free from Elkhart in the years to come.
I just want to let people know, man, that the
justice system can be fixed, and there's people are here
that's working every day to see the folks like myself,
the frothy convicting, do have a chance to get out
(54:10):
because there's people out here working and they're looking into
cases and they're digging up the dirt on these wrongful,
unlawful police prosecutors, even states attorneys and even the Georges.
They're coming after them. As long as they keep their
hope and staying their faith. Whenever their faith made to be,
(54:34):
stay with it, because God are gonna send these folks
who keeps out here to help. And I love it.
That's about clothes. Thank you for listening to Wrongful Conviction.
I'd like to thank our production team Connor Hall, Cheff Clyver,
(54:56):
and Kevin Wardis. With research by Lila Robinson music in
this production was supplied by three time OSCAR nominated composer
Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow us on Instagram at
Wrongful Conviction, on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction Podcast, and on
Twitter at wrong Conviction, as well as at Lava for Good.
On all three platforms, you can also follow me on
(55:18):
both TikTok and Instagram at it's Jason flom Raleful Conviction
is the production of Lava for Good podcasts and association
with Signal Company Number one
On October twenty nine, Elkhart, Indiana police were called to
the apartment of a Michael Kirshner and his mother known
a Canal. Allegedly, while they and four friends were watching
a movie, two men forced their way in, demanding money
and drugs. After the taller of the pair allegedly shout
at his friends and missed. A struggle between Michael Kirshner
(00:23):
and the shooter resulted in a non fatal gunshot wound
to Michael's abdomen. The gunman's hat fell off during the struggle,
and the two assailants fled. The police collected no evidence
from the scene, but took statement through the witnesses and victims,
who described the shooter as tall and skinny carrying a
long silver gun, and the other men as short and
(00:45):
stocky with no weapon. Two days later, one of the witnesses,
Eddie Love, allegedly identified a short and stocky man named
Chris Parrish. About three months later, a suspected person natcher
named Keith Cooper was identified as the taller shooter from
a photo lineup, Even though the jury was presented with
DNA results from the sweatbed of the shooters hat that
(01:06):
were allegedly inconclusive. The identifications appeared conclusive enough to separately
convict both men. But this is wrongful conviction. We're gonna
take a quick break and we'll be right back. The
Pacers Foundation is a proud supporter of this episode of
(01:28):
rawerful Conviction and of the Last Mile organization, which provides
business and tech training to help incarcerated individuals successfully and
permanently re enter the workforce. The Pacers Foundation is committed
to improving the lives of Hoosiers across Indiana, supporting organizations
that are dedicated primarily to helping young people and students.
For more information on the work of the Pacers Foundation
(01:50):
or the Last Mile Program, visit Pacers Foundation dot org
or the Last Mile dot org. Welcome back to Rafle Conviction. Today.
We're going to tell the story of a man who
was wrongly convicted in a place that, well, with what
(02:11):
has been uncovered there already, in such a small population,
it just might be the per capital rafle conviction capital
of this country and therefore the world, a dubious distinction.
And I'm talking about Elkhart, Indiana. But first let's introduce
the man himself, Keith Cooper, I mean, Keith, I'm sorry
(02:31):
you're here because of the reason why you're here and
what you had to go through, but I'm really happy
and honor that you're here with us today. I'm glad
to be here. And with him is his civil attorney
and our resident Elkhart expert, who you might remember from
our coverage of Andy Royer's case, which we're gonna have
linked in the bio. This man is an adjunct professor
at Notre Dame Law, a staff attorney at the Egeneration
(02:53):
Clinic out of the University of Chicago, and a partner
at the nationally recognized civil rights law firm Lobby and Loby,
where he was an investigator before he even passed the bar.
That's some that's some impressive resume, and we're honored to
have you here with us again. Hellio is Low. Sorry,
thanks and thanks so much for having us on. Now, Keith,
(03:14):
you didn't always live in Hukard, Indiana, and you weren't
born to raised there, right. You started off on the
South side of Chicago, So tell us a little bit
about that. I grew up in a single family home.
My mother was raising three of bro It was kind
of rough as I got older, I started, uh having babies,
and then I got married with my wife, you know,
(03:35):
to validate was on a rise in Chicago doing that
in the nineties, and I didn't want to kind of
atmosphere right for my children. So we decided to move
to a car because she had family there, and I
was like, okay, well cool, but I give it a shot.
I was going on twenty nine, I had three children
(03:56):
at the time, and then when I got there, it
was they started at our smooth and then take me
long fortune days before I got my first job at
banks Lumber and Uh, life was great. Yeah, it sounds
like it. I mean, twenty nine years old, three kids, married,
you know, more or less living. What sounds like that,
(04:16):
you know, personificcasion of the American dream. And what's ironic
is that you left Chicago, which had not only had
a rise in crime at the time, but then the
police were also very dangerous. The police in those days,
and this is not hyperbole, were regularly torturing people. They
were bringing them to a warehouse instead of the police station,
(04:36):
not just suspects but also witnesses. They were subjecting them
to beatings, genital electrocution, suffocation, putting bags over their head
while they were chained to a wall, beating them with
telephone books. And they did that not only the suspects again,
but also to witnesses in order to extract confessions but
also testimonies that they needed to make cases against others.
Sticks check out our coverage of Marcus Wiggins. He was
(05:00):
their youngest victim and he was thirteen years old when
they subjected him to this torture. We're going to have
that linked in the bio as well. So anyway, you
had jumped out of the literal frying pan into what
you didn't know was another one in the form of
the town of Elkhart, Indiana. You're right, Elkhart is a
city of manifests and justice. To date, there's been five
(05:22):
e generations from Elkhart. Our clinic represents another dozen in
terms of the number of wronkly convicted people from there.
You know, who knows what that number is. I'm sure
there's hundreds more. I mean hundreds more. That would be
crazy in a big city, but we're talking about a
town of fifty thousand of that's really disturbing. And as
(05:44):
you can hear in our coverage of Andy Royer's case,
which we're also going to link in the bio. There's
coerced false witness statements, fraudulent fingerprint analysis, a false confession
from a cognatively impaired man, and the kicker. The prosecutor
watched it happen and not only did she not stop it,
but rather she used it to ronically convict not one,
but two people in this case. And then I mentioned
that she used the current elected prosecuting attorney for Elkhart County.
(06:08):
And even more disturbing, with how small of a town
it is, all of these bad actors no one another,
are aware of each other's misdeeds. And one of the
detectives in the case we're going to cover today became
the chief of police and that lasted until two thousand
and eighteen, and that's ed Win Biggler. And by the
end of this episode, you're also going to be acutely
aware of his partner, the lead detective in this case,
(06:30):
Steve Razuko. Elliott, can you give us some background on Razuko.
You know, something that we would later obtain on the
civil side of things was Razuko's application of the Okar
Police Department and so they conduct you know, a background
investigation to Rasuco, and then they go to like three
references that he actually lists. You know, it's like when
(06:51):
you're applying to a job, You're like, hey, let me
list like the three most favorable people to be in
the world. And at each of those three places, they
gave them terrible references. You know. One of the people
was like, I would never hire him again. This guy
was overly aggressive, you know, like every red flag he had,
bad credit, was deep in debt, going through a bankruptcy,
(07:11):
several arrests for reckless driving, fighting, an accident with a
parked car, and a high speed chase with the police.
So nothing in this background investigation was like Steve Zuko,
let's give that guy a badge and a gun and
see what he can do for the citizens of Belkart.
But at least one former supervisor seemed to have found
(07:33):
value in Razuko, saying, quote, he knew all the drunks,
all the bandits, and all the prostitutes. He's a big guy,
and he's been in some bar scrapes and come out
the winner. And quote, this guy was an uber, aggressive
dirt bag with plenty of friends in the underbelly of town.
And what you'll come to know about this guy is
that his emo was not solving crimes, but rather finding
(07:55):
a target of his investigation, just fixing all the facts
and coercing not only says efects, but witnesses as well
to give statements that fit his target. You know, this
guy was willing to violate the constitutional rights of anyone
in the community, especially people of color or people without
financial resources to take him on and got away with
(08:16):
committing criminal offenses for decades. And we'll go a bit
further than what those criminal acts were later on, but
bear in mind he wasn't the only problematic dirt bag
investigating this case. There's also ed Wynn Bagler, who eventually
became the chief of police, and another detective named Steve
Ambrose CEB. Ambrose later was implicated in serious misconduct as well,
(08:40):
including shooting and killing a black man in the yok
Art community by the name of Derrick Connors. And everybody
that I had spoken to an ELK cart as serious
concerns about whether Detective Ambrose murdered Derrick Honnors without justification,
and there was an investigation into that, a lawsuit so
this town that Keith had moved to in search of
(09:01):
a safe place to raise his family. Wasn't actually so
safe with these guys protecting and serving Now, Not only
was it unsafe for Keith and his family, but also
another young man named Chris Parrish, who was also wrongly
targeted by Razuko, Ambrose and wind Burgler util Chris was
almost ten years younger than Keith and had grown up
in Elkhart. I think with Chris Parrish something to keep
(09:23):
in mind, as he was a real young kid whose
family had run ins with the police department. And you know,
as we talked about this case, you'll see that the
police went out of their way to manufacturer of keys
against Chris Pearish when all the evidence credibly showed that
he was innocent all along. So it was these previous
run ins with the law, which were nothing serious by
(09:45):
the way, but they offered a motivation for the police
to try to frame Chris, who already had a mug
shot from when he was fourteen years old, which made
it even easier for them. But with you, Keith, you
were brand new to town, unknown to local law enforcement,
so you see him like a pretty random choice, but
they went ahead and did it anyway, did you know
Chris Parrish before all this happened. No, I never knew
(10:08):
Chris parper Yeah, so Christopher Parrison Keith Cooper never met
each other until a decade after Chris's exoneration, And you know,
a couple of years after Keith was exonerated, they had
separate defense attorneys. You know, Chris was from our car
Keith was from Chicago. They lived different lives. Frankly, there
(10:29):
are different age groups. You know. Keith was a period
with children. Chris was his early twenties. Yeah, Keith was
like nine years older than him and living a totally
different lifestyle. So the idea that two of you committed
an armed robbery together, on its face makes no sense.
So let's get into the climate itself. Now, this incident
may not have even happened in the way that the
victim described it. The police really never did collect any
(10:52):
evidence at the scene, but rather it was collected later
for them by the alleged victims. But it's really all
we have to go on. So on October twenty, allegedly
there were about six people in an apartment at a
public housing project in Elkhart. Seventeen year old Michael Kirshner,
his mother known a canal, and then about four of
(11:13):
Michael's friends, including fifteen year old Eddie Love and another
guy named Jason Ackley and two others, and they said
that they were watching a movie, that ridiculous movie, Don't
be a Menace to South Central while drinking or juice
in the hood when they allegedly got a knock on
the door from two black men, one short, one tall,
with a hat on, and they were looking for someone
named Shell. Whether that was Short from Michelle, we don't know.
(11:36):
In either event, they had the wrong apartment, according to victims,
you know, their account is that when they denied that
Shell was there, these two guys forced their way into
the apartment because the victims had like a bag of
laundry coins on the living room table and there was
an SKS rifle. Ultimately there was a scuffle and in
(11:59):
the midst of the scuffle, one of the victims, Michael Kirshner,
was shot right. He allegedly got in between his mother
and the gunman, which was the taller of the two assailants,
and took a non fatal gunshot to the abdomen, which,
if true, is very heroic. Now this taller gunman was
the role in this crime that Keith later got saddled with.
(12:21):
Also notable by the way, during that tussle, the taller
man's hat fell off. Yeah, and it wasn't just any hat,
you know back in the eighties and nineties, you know,
when they had malls. It was like one of those
hats that you can customize. They were like rhyan stones
on it that formed the letter J. Notably, you know,
Keith Cooper doesn't have the letter J anywhere in his name.
(12:43):
But when the shooter and the second person left the apartment,
they left that hat and on that hat was DNA
evidence that has excluded Keith Cooper since the time of trial.
And we'll get into how that played out at trial
in a bit. And from what I can understand, this
hat and any other physical evidence from the scene, none
(13:03):
of it was even initially collected by the police on
the scene. What the hell is that all about? There
are two different perspectives to this, you know. Later there
was some evidence that came out during Chris Parrish's post
conviction litigation that alleged that the shooting happened in a
parking lot. And if they happened a parking lot. That
might tend to explain why there wouldn't be any physical
(13:25):
evidence in the apartment. There's a second explanation, which is
that it's not just detectives and ELK cards that are
completely incompetent, but also crime scene technicians. And so the
crime scene technician when he went there, he didn't actually
do his job and look for physical evidence from the shooting.
And so two days later, when the victims came home
(13:46):
from the hospital, they were the ones who recovered the hat.
The showcasings called the police back, and that's when the
police department came and seized the physical evidence. So there
are some chain of custody issues from the get go here.
But nonetheless, they had some bullets, shell casings, the hat
with the d n A that excludes Keith. And then
(14:07):
the witness's descriptions, right, two young black men. One was
short and stocky, and then the tall gunman who had
a long silver gun and was described as wiry. But
I'm not sure if Keith ever was wiry. It certainly
doesn't appear that way. Now. Yeah, Keith is tall, but
he's never been a wiry guy. You're totally right about that.
And in this case, there was a composite that was
(14:28):
created early on, and it's like the most generic looking
composite you'll ever see. I mean it like basically was
a human being. There was no like detailed to it
that would like lead you one way or the other
to who actually did the shooting. And we'll link that
in the bio as well. So this generic composite leaves
room for a very loose interpretation as to which direction
(14:49):
to take this investigation. So two days after the crime,
one of the witnesses, a fifteen year old kid named
Eddie Love, who may may not have been at risk
of his own charges, had a highly pressurized sit down
with Edwin Biggler. And it's been theorized that Win Biggler
may have been pushing the idea that Chris Parrish was involved.
So what is the result of this conversation. What's fascinating
(15:12):
is there are like two different versions of this based
on the reports. So, like Detective Win Bigler's reports said
that Eddie Love said that the person looked like a
person he knew named Chris Parrish. He didn't say it
was Chris Parrish. So he was like clearly telling the
cops like, hey, you know, like, I know this guy,
Chris Parris, the guy you're looking for, looks like him.
(15:35):
But Detective Razuko would later write a report saying that
Eddie Love named Chris Parrish as a person who did this. So,
whether they had already planned on doing this or not,
they now have a reason to place Chris Parrish's photo
in the lineup to be viewed by Michael Kirshner, Nona
Canal and the other four robbery victims. Now, remember they
(15:57):
only had a picture of Chris from when he was fourteen,
even though Chris was twenty years old at the time
of the crime, so the lineup was totally suspect. Plus
they knew that he was in Chicago, you know, which
is about two hours from Alcarda, Indiana, and he had
somewhere around fifteen alibi witnesses who testified his criminal trial,
(16:18):
including a minister, and Razuko would testify later on in
Chris's civil case. This is like fifteen years later. I
believed when the trial was over that Chris was going
to be exonerated because I believed his alby witnesses. That's
a quote from Razuko, and it really is a striking
(16:39):
admission because if you believe Chris Parrish's aliby witnesses that
Chris is innocent, then how does a police officer somehow
get a half dozen people to make a positive identification
of Chris Parrish? Right, both can't be true. Sure, maybe
there's some statistical probability that one person could mistakenly pick
(17:01):
Chris out of a photo ray, But how do you
get a half dozen people to mistakenly pick Chris Parris?
I have a photo ray? Well, you do it by
putting a fourteen year old juvenile photo in an array
with five adult men, knowing that they described the person
as younger looking, and you lead your eye witnesses to
misidentify somebody who's innocent. So they made this suggestive array
(17:22):
with Chris's juvenile photo and led the six witnesses to idea.
Chris was charged shortly after the actual incident, to later
be taken to trial. But Keith, you were brand new
in town. They didn't even know you, let alone have
a photo of you. So how did you get pulled
into this? Then all started from the they said, I
(17:42):
wrapped this lated for a purse, So a person matching happened.
But Keith was like literally walking on the street, his
card broken down. He went to go get some like groceries,
and the detective saw a tall black eye and was like, oh,
there was a person match him with a tall black
eyed Let me just bring this guy over. So he
(18:03):
drove Keith over to the victim's house and I saw
the later on the porch with the other officers, and
I'm staying to myself, how's she gonna be at this
identifying me when I'm sitting in the backseat and they
square called these little gates around the window where you
can't even really see inside. Was she white? She was white? Yes,
(18:24):
she were Okay, so we have a cross racial identification
from a distance through a window which is screened. As
you said, you barely could see in at all. And
the suggestive nature of it is extreme right in and
there my life went to ships once she identified me
(18:44):
as the person acttion. That was a line when I
got to the police station. A lot of things they
did at the police station, it went I'm told because
see they had me to take a lot and take
the test approved that I was innocent of DEBD case.
But good because Zukos and other France with me. And
(19:04):
this is like from Detective Razuko's own mouth. You know,
he's testified to this Detective Rozuko sees Keith in there
and he's like, oh, tall black guy, that must be
the tall black guy I'm looking for in the Cursoner shooting.
I mean like it literally could have been like any
tall black eye in America who could again brought into
that station and their life would have been ripped away
because Rozuco just wanted to close the case and stead
(19:27):
us all here. You have two separate incidents involving a
(19:48):
tall black man, and then both the person matching detective
and Razuko just picked out any old, tall black guy
and it just happened to be Keith both times. So
you were in jail for two months awaiting trial on
the persona correct Well, how much was bail on that case? Uh?
(20:08):
It was ten thousand thousand a goal to bound album
and and not having access to that money like so
many other people, You're stuck in his jail. I'm stuck.
I'm sitting waiting trial. Right before I was getting ready
to go to trial for the person not you, I
get a visitor. The visitor was Detective Zooks. He had
(20:32):
to come down to his office and sat down across
from him. Told me, he said, hey, if you take
this person not in case to trial, and if you
do win it, I have another case for I said,
I didn't commit this person. I said that I don't
do anything else. I in their God. He said, I
got six people to say the different. And he gave
(20:53):
me a police report and I read and he tells
me that you're the one who attempted to rob these
people and shot with Michael Kursen. And at that time
I'm like no, I said I didn't do it. He said,
will you take this egg and you lay on because
if you if you get found, I'll give to that battery.
You will be faced with this hire. And as I'm
(21:13):
sitting there waiting for trial, that he was on the
visit I was getting into County jail. At this time.
He was letting me know, hey, this is your baby.
You're sitting on that egg. Yeah, you're gonna get found, gifted.
He was threatening me. After a couple of months May passed,
I went to trial. I was I was a quitter
to that there. Like when they were processing me out,
(21:36):
they came with a best warm and I asked him
for what he said, chim robbed right there, and that
I knew wasn't gonna let me go home. No, he
was not, Like he had already explained to you, he
had six people that are ready to identify you, and
all of those ideas, with the exception of Eddie Luve,
we're going to be cross racial, which I'll say it again,
(21:56):
and study after study has been proven to be less
accurate than guessing. So he had your picture now and
he put it into another suggestive lineup. What's remarkable about
our cart is even though they had the ability do
live lineups back in the nineties, they declined to do it.
All of the identifications in this case we're made on
(22:18):
photo rays, and if you look at the photo rays,
it's like, yeah, canal idd Keith kurshioner ided keys and
you're like, oh wow, these are positive identifications. You know,
there's no reports about you know, confidence levels or whether
they're done sequentially or together. And it took, frankly, about
(22:42):
fifteen years for that story to really unravel and for
us to learn how those identifications were manufactured. So, you know,
once we began the investigation and what was really going on,
the victims told us all this information about the identification process.
(23:02):
They told us that they were telling Razuko the whole
time they didn't know if Keith Cooper was really the person.
They actually were like demanding a live lineup to Detective Razuko,
saying like, we we want to live line up because
we're not sure, you know, we don't want to misidentify somebody,
and he just kept telling them, I got the right guy,
I got the right guy. He also told him that
he didn't have enough tall black people in Elkhart to
(23:24):
do a live lineup, which is also a lie. It
sounds like the basis for probable cause was a lie
as well. These ideas were not positive ideas and the
lead up to trial, but Rozuko was able to shore
them up later in the meantime leading up to trial,
they had the DNA from the sweat band and the
results came back telling the state definitively that Keith was
(23:47):
not and could not have been involved, which should have
put an end to this crazy prosecution totally, but instead
the state enters into this stipulation with this defense attorney
that Keith had, saying that if the state lab analysts
were to testify a trial, she would testify that the
(24:09):
hat neither included nor excluded Keith Cooper from having worn it,
and that is like the opposite of what the actual
DNA results say, which is that like he's excluded from
being a contributor to any of the DNA on the hat.
I'm finding it hard to understand why his attorney would
do something so stupid. I mean, did you know that
(24:30):
your attorney was allowing this ship to go on? No? No, no.
When the DNA, I felt confident that that's going to
be the way I get out. But they used the stipulation,
which I didn't understand at the time where they were met.
My lawyer told me that when he agreed to that,
they were going to be into my favor if I
agreed to the stipulation, I said, okay, cool, what ended
(24:51):
up having a trial? It's like, you know, is in
many of these cases, right, you've got police misconduct, You've
got over zealous prosecutors. You know, they just want to
get a conviction. And he had a defense attorney who
was checked out. Are we going to say his name? Yeah,
Jack's meeting. He did not protect Keith Cooper had trial.
And you know when I say trial, like that is
(25:14):
like charitable. This was a half day bench proceeding that
sent Keith to present wrongfully for a decade of his life.
It's chilling to think that he said to you. He
was actually being honest, but not in a good way,
because he said, I'm gonna take a bench trial so
we could get this over with, right, But he was
he was not. I mean, any lawyer would know that
(25:37):
you're better off with twelve jurors where you only need
one to say, hey, this this doesn't make any sense.
I thought that way too, but he kept on tim.
He said, you you better facing the judge because the
judge is familiar with the laws, and how better for
you to do it with the judge and have to
go through the Twitter people because the judge no more
(25:57):
about your case than they do. And I, like, I said,
I know about the system. So I went with what
do you say? Because you know, hey, he represented me,
but he wasn't. He was just getting He just wanted
me to cop out. It seems like that's what the
court was greased up to do. I don't even understand
how the judge could have allowed that stipulation to come
(26:17):
to pass, honestly, but everyone seemed on board with just
ignoring the clear cut evidence of your innocence leading up
to trial, except for the people who didn't know about
the DNA evidence. The eyewitnesses who it seems to me,
we're probably the only people trying to do the right
thing here, canal Mike Kirshner. They like, we're so insistent
(26:40):
regarding their doubts in this identification that Rozuka was like, fine,
show up to the courthouse at this time and meet
me in this location. And the date was Keiths Cooper's trial,
the location was the hallway, and the time was before
the trial started. And so Rozuko has these witnesses lined
(27:02):
up in the hallway as Keith Cooper is walking up
with his wife and children. And what the witnesses and
the victims say is that Razuko turned to them and
so that's the guy. That's the guy who're going to
go in there and identify as the shooter. And they
did what the cop told him to do. So they
trusted the detective that he had the right guy. Meanwhile,
(27:24):
he knew otherwise all along. In fact, Razuko, win Biggler,
and Ambrose knew that the case was so weak with
the shaky I d S and DNA evidence exonerating Keith,
that they had to come up with even more bullshit.
So at some point prior to trial, Detective Razuko and
Win Biggler get a jail house informant involved named Barry Coleman,
(27:46):
and they promised the Barry Coleman is consideration and fedom
information in order to fabricate a statement alleging that Keith
confessed to him when they were incarcerated together and a trial.
One of the remarkable things here to be Ry Coleman
actually refused to testify there and the judge allowed for
a detective to testify to the statement that he took
(28:07):
from the jailha's informant without any defense having the ability
to cross examine the informant who is refusing to testify.
That is off the rails. Everybody who knows anything about
the law or legal proceedings knows that there can be
no testimony for either side unless the other side has
an opportunity to counter it by cross examining the witness.
(28:31):
I've seen wrongful convictions happen for that reason. But apparently
like Razuka was like not convinced the Keith was going
to get wrongfully convicted, and so like he goes out
into the hall and gets us. Witness Jason Ackley, who
was at the time of the shooting in the shower,
is not in the living room when the shooting is
going on, and he tells Actlee that he needs them
(28:52):
to go in there and identify Cooper's voice as the
voice that he heard through the walls. Well, he showery
as the perfect who you know, fire the shot. I mean,
it's the most absurd thing. And so they bring this
guy out from the hallway and they have Keith, you know,
say some ridiculous thing in court, and actually it's like, oh, yeah,
that's the voice I heard. Not only is voice recognition
(29:15):
totally unreliable, but for anyone who's ever taken a shower,
we all know that identifying a strange voice over the water,
through the wall and maybe the shower curtain or the
glass door and whatever else is between you and whatever
is going on, this guy actually is totally full of it. So, Keith,
you had watched all this go down. The eyewitnesses gave
positive by des in court to judge a lot of
(29:36):
detectives to read in the jailhouse. Nitche statement After this,
Nitche refused to testify, and your defense attorney entered into
that DNA stipulation. Hell, this is a preconvench trial, and
the judge went ahead and allowed that stipulation. I mean,
I don't know how you could have held out any
hope that you'd still be acquitted after that. No, something
(29:56):
my body told me, Man, I was going to prison
when they agreed to youth today and they when this
when they proved that I was innocent, that minutes said
inconclusive and they threw that to the side. I knew
I was going to prison. The judge, man was already
made up and we had recess. We came up to resess.
I was found guilty. I looked at my turn I said,
how you that this happened? When the d and they
(30:17):
was there, and he said, but I did what I could.
It's like a little groomiss grins about itself, you know, like, hey,
I did what I can do. Wow. I mean, this
is really devastating just to hear about it, and you
had to live through it, and then you got taken
(30:37):
off to prison facing forty years to life. During much
my sentences, I had told my wife she had to
get on with her life. Don't worry about being because
I can't help her all my three babies. I have
to now worry about how i'm'm surviving this prison, and
you have to worry about how you and the kids
gonna survive because I don't have no source of happy.
(30:58):
I can better have myself now this time. So you know,
I've lost the words and she lost the words too,
because we both got a journey on our own now
separate ways. Well, that's valley where they sent me to.
(31:27):
It was to ride the long ride down and that
uh it took his toll on me because I had
to think about how I was going to vive in
that prison and uh they thought of me not saying
my babies again, that was taking the toll. Beclose. I
got to that penitential. The more I would, I wasn't
gonna see my kids. Then when I got inside the penitentious,
(31:51):
I knew that was gonna be my home for the
next for the years if I live. And that was
scary because I was in a place where I know nobody, nobody,
and uh then I had to deal with the lensality
of the prison yard. Everybody in there is taking their
frustration out on't one another, and no matter how you
(32:14):
try to aboid it, you couldn't shake it. It came.
It's always presented itself where you had to knuckle up,
you had to throw your hands, you had to fight.
I'm getting tired of people. Man. Every morning, Man, somebody's
manhood is getting tested. It's like, I'm tired of fighting. Man.
I'm gonna end up man actually committing a crime in
(32:35):
this place because I know there was going to eventually
and caill me up in the How did you survive
and how did you maintain hope in a place that,
I mean hope was lost. I got on my niece
and I just prayed. Man, I ask God, I ask
guys that guy had me get through this year. I
wasn't really get a no help until I got the
point in another lawyer really for Alaski, and he came
(32:57):
into my life. That's when the hope and everything began
range for me. After man year, it took me nine
years to see that. They're like you said, Man, I
look to your case, I see what the DNA here.
I'm having to wed your DNA. So you know Keith's
case in the early two thousands, there was more DNA
testing don on the hat and they were able to
(33:18):
run the profile from the sweat band through the code
of database and they got a hit to a person
named Jolanna Servant who was convicted of murder with a
similar type weapon in a town that was less than
thirty miles from Elkhart and to match the description that
the witnesses really gave. So when the system fails and
(33:41):
the wrong person goes in, it fails the victims family,
Keith Cooper and his family. But here's the situation where like,
because the detectives went so far out of their way
to put an innocent guy in prison, the real perpetrator
not only stayed free, but he actually committed another murder.
They had actually done their job originally, maybe they could
(34:02):
have prevented that. So when the hit happened, Keith was
litigating a post conviction petition and the judge gave Keith's attorney,
who is at the Public Defender's Office, and Keith a
choice either he will grant a new trial. And at
that point, the defense attorney who was representing Keith, you
know these victims, you know, they were identifying Keith for
(34:24):
all he knew you know, he didn't talk to them,
and there was some fear by the attorney that Keith
could get re wrongfully convicted or the offer that was
presented is that the state would modify Keith's sentence on
the wrongful conviction to time served so that he could
go home to his family. I want to go home
because I had got a letter from my sister telling
(34:45):
me that my family was living in the shelter, and
that was what made me really won't understand that papermans,
I can come home because I didn't want more people
living in the show, especially the door, because I was
locked up with the perverted. As you hear they tell
their stories how they finally get their victims, and that
made me realize, now I need to get upbout it
(35:07):
here so as fast as possible. That's a Sophie's choice.
You know, Yes, you get to go home to your family,
but you get to live for the rest of your
life as a convicted violent felon, you know. Or of
course you have to go back to jail await trial
in a in a hellish place, which could take years
to get back to another trial, and then you've already
seen the worst of what the system has to offer,
(35:29):
and you know they're capable of faming and they can
just do it again. So who would want to have
to make that choice? I think for someone in Keith's
position in Elkhart, Indiana at that time, it was probably
the only only rational choice to make. When I got
out and two thousand and six, my kids didn't even
know who I were, and I better recognized them because
they had grew up. They were teenagers now. They was
(35:51):
just little babies when i'ming into the you know, being
raised without me and their life that he had some
little resiments that I had to deal will. I had
to let them know it one like, I just walked
out your life. I was kidnapped. They took me out
from y'all, you know, so there was a hard appear
for all of us to swatter when we got to
be reunited. This is something that will have a lasting
(36:13):
impact on them for as long as they live. The
children need their dad, they need their parents, and we
all right now. I mean, I'm so happy I got
my grandkids around me. They keep me motivated. You know,
I might have missed out on raising my own kids,
but at least my kids give me the luxury of
raising their children. So I'm grateful. What do they call you?
(36:33):
They call you Grandpa Grahams Pap Papa, they call you
they called me Paul, Paul. They love they Pap Paul.
That's great, And I understand you got remarried as well,
to your wife, Nicole Slayton Cooper in two thousand ten. Oh.
I love my wife. She's beautiful. She's been very supportive
of me and the person. Now I gotta get a
(36:55):
high honest to us God first. Then my my lawyer,
fly Brothers last friend. Yeah, when he stepped to come
to my life, I was given. Man. I knew I
had a chance man to make things right. So, you know,
I learned about Keith Cooper when I was investigating the
case of his co defendant, Christopher Parish, who had already
(37:17):
been exonerated. You know, he was in the middle of
a civil lawsuit. I was like, not even in law
school yet. When I was working on that as an investigator,
and when I talked to the victims and they told
me what Detective Razuka really did to get these false identifications.
You know, I went back to the firm to my
boss and I was like, Chad Keith Cooper is super
(37:41):
innocent and these people all feel terrible that they ripped
his life away. We've got to We've got to tell him.
So I met Keith that way and ended up, you know,
promising him, you know that we would do everything that
we can to help him get his name back. Since
your investigation of Keith case really began with Chris Parrish's case,
(38:02):
we need to revisit what that investigation and the civil
suit uncovered. Now he filed the wrongful conviction lawsuit in
so take us through that. During Parish's civil lawsuit, Keith
Cooper's wrongful conviction unraveled, the eyewitnesses revealed that they were
manipulated into misidentifying Keith Cooper. Did Joehus informant to Barry Coleman,
(38:24):
You know he refused to testify trial, right, So Coleman,
you revealed like, Hey, yeah, I didn't testify trial because
A it was false and B they didn't satisfy their
promises to me, and I wasn't going through with it.
I wasn't gonna let them give me up there to
put an instant guy in prison. Jason Actley, the guy
in the shower, testified that Detective Razuko was out in
(38:45):
the hallway and just told him what to do, and
he would do anything to help Detective Razuko and you know,
the family get a conviction. So he was just doing
what Razuko said. Parrish presented evidence that a Kirshner was
shot in the parking lot outside the building, and lot
it about it because he said it was in the
apartment because he was on home detention for a gun charge.
So that's a botmobshell right there. Okay, then love testify
(39:10):
the police coerced him to identify Parrish. DNA tests conducted
after the trial, and the hat showed not Keith Cooper,
of course, but as you said, DNA of a man
named Jolana's Irvine who was later convicted of murder. It
would later be proven Detective Razuko, the same guy who
was telling the eyewitnesses who to select in the hallway
with Keith Cooper, was using a child photo of Chris Farrish,
(39:33):
yet that they knew who to identify in his arrays.
And then Razuko would later admit under oath that when
he watched Chris Parris's trial, this frame job that he
had like orchestrated, and he admitted in the deposition, like
they convinced me. I thought they were going to find
him not guilty, right, I mean, the state's case had
been laid to waste. Right, it was just laying there
(39:53):
in tatters. And there's still so much more that was revealed,
and we'll get to that in a minute. But Keith's
best shot at elexna ration was an actual innocence pardon
from the governor. And this was Governor Pence at the time,
and it was filed in like two thousand thirteen. Right,
wasn't he released in two thousand six? In Indiana? They
had this real antiquated rule at the time where if
(40:15):
you had been released from prison, then you had to
wait five years to file a part in or prole application.
So all of this information had already been accumulated. No
one could deny his innocence. They couldn't have back in
two thousand six, even though they would have tried. But
now he's out and ready for the fight. So this
goes in front of the pardoning parole Board and there's
(40:36):
an even better case made for then Governor Pennce to
do the right thing here. What's remarkable is that the
part of parle board did a unanimous recommendation. They recommended
the actual innocence pardon. The victim Michael Kershner testified on
Keith Cooper's behalf, apologized to him, told him what Detective
Razuko did, you know? Begged the pardon Pearle board to
do the right thing, beg the governor to do the
(40:57):
right thing. A number of other people gave statements, and
probably you know, the most critical thing was a letter
from the trial prosecutor who's now a judge and car
Judge Christofino. It was a letter directed from the trial
prosecutor to Governor Pence, and in the letter, Mr Christofino
admitted that the evidence available to the State of Indiana
(41:20):
at this time exonerates Keith Cooper, and justice demands that
Mr Cooper be pardoned. As an attorney, he begged the
governor to undo Keith Cooper's tragic, wrongful conviction. And then
Pence sat on this thing for years and instead, once
he got nominated by Trump, they wrote a public letter
(41:45):
that they submitted to the press saying that the governor
wasn't going to act on the actual and instance pardon
even though his board unanimously recommended that it be granted.
And telling Keith Cooper to go back to court and
file a post fiction petition. And we went back to court,
we filed the post conviction petition. We were going to
call the bluff. What ended up happening is Keith's case
(42:09):
became a political issue and a civil rights issue in Indiana.
During the gubernatorial election, there was even a debate where
the candidates were each asked the question, will you parton
Keith Cooper in your first three days in office? That
is how like Biges Scott answer. The momentum could not
be stopped. I felt like a celebrity. I'll tell you
(42:31):
that God is good. Hey he put me out there
when I heard that part. And I was at work
on the forklift truck loading the FedEx up and one
of my guys ran on the back of the truck.
He said, Keith, you've just been pawned. I didn't know,
he said, man, you didn't part. I thought it was
a game. He was just on the playoffs. The man
(42:51):
got time for them. I'm going this TI let me work,
he said, come and look now look And there were
ever hoping part of Pith Coop and I could do nothing, man,
but as a man, I tried to hold back my feelings,
but the chierd just just flooded, and uh, every better
my job. It was all happened because they had the
word that got out and on I had to leave work.
(43:15):
I was so excited. I was free. I went home
and and just yell know my knees Admitte just let
it all. I just cheers are just overwhelm them. And
they were just flooding the webs of my eyes. Man,
I couldn't stop. And I was thankful because it was
like a dream had just come true for me. The burden,
(43:37):
all that weight there was all my chest and just
a thousand pounds were just lifted off my chest, man,
and I was free. My name was clear, and I
made history in the state of in the The person
who ultimately won that election, Governor Eric Holcomb, who was
the lieutenant governor two pence. Like this is somebody who
was on Pences ticket previously, and within his first thirty
(44:02):
days in office, he granted Keith Cooper the state of
Indiana's only ever actual innocence part. It's incredible. Finally now
comes to good stuff, right now you get to take
these people to task. So of course in November two thousand, nineteen,
Keith filed the federal lawsuit against the City of el
(44:22):
cart and four of its police officers. What did you
learn during the civil proceedings because this is this is deep. Yeah,
we ended up filing the civil lawsuit, you know, as
a federal lawsuit on behalf of Keith Cooper. We sue
Detective Razuko andwin Biggler Ambrose in the City of Elkhart,
and that civil lawsuit unraveled what is going to be
(44:46):
decades of exonerations people who are wrongfully convicted, just like
Keith was. We ended up uncovering these internal affairs files
that were never disclosed to Keith Cooper prior to his
child in a parishes civil lawsuit. So like, not only
was this stuff withheld on the criminal side from both
(45:07):
of them, but like the City of Elkhart literally litigated
an entire lawsuit without turning it over, which is shocking.
But those internal affairs files showed two different internal affairs
investigations into Detective Razuko, one before Keith Cooper was ever
wrongfully convicted and another one in two thousand one. And
(45:28):
the investigation Detective Razuko admitted to paying an informant for
sexual acts and she was used as a witness in
a homicide investigation. Admitted to that, and the only thing
that the department did was take away three of his
(45:48):
vacation days. And in two thousand one, Detective Razuko was
caught in another internal affairs investigation prompted by other law
enforcement agent. He's coming into Elkhart and saying, we have
evidence showing what your detective is doing paying and informants
(46:09):
and prostitutes for sexual interactions dating back to like, we
have affidavits from these women who he was sexually assaulting, right, Like,
there's no actual consent here when it's a law enforcement
officer with a badge and a gun, Like, they don't
really have a choice. But he was not only paying
them for sexual interactions, but he was then fabricating statements
(46:30):
for them to falsely implicate people in crimes including murder.
These people were going on the stand and testifying to
frame innocent people like Keith Cooper. They ultimately sustained an
allegation of malfeasance against him, which by definition is a
criminal act, and he was allowed to resign and then
get this between the time that the malfeasance finding happened
(46:52):
and his resignation, a supervisor of his at the car
Police Department and a supervisor in the ochre Canny Prosecutor
Office literally wrote letters of recommendation on letterhead to a
different law enforcement agency soys that he could get hired.
And then the chief of Police went to the Board
of Public Safety and thanked Razuko for his years of
(47:15):
public service. Like nobody knew about it. They buried it.
All these people that he helped frame for crimes, commit
a lot of clients and ours who are still wrongfully
in prison, and then they buried it. And then Elkhart
allowed Rosuko even after he resigned with this malfeasance funny.
They were allowing him to testify in criminal cases like
even murder trials without ever disclosing it to the defense
(47:39):
for years. And we uncovered that, we uncovered a ton
of other misconduct and exculpatory information that was withheld, and
we ultimately filed emotion for sanctions against Detective Razuko for
committing perjury and withholding evidence, including dating back to the
Paris lawsuit. And we sent him written discovery request that
(47:59):
was like maybe every informant you ever had tell us
any of every informant you ever had sexual interactions with.
Tell Us, any of every informant you have sexual interactions
with that you use as a witness in a criminal investigation.
And the night before his response to the sanctions was due,
and the night before his written discovery responses was due,
(48:19):
he committed suicide. Wow. I mean, I'm sorry for his family,
but the fact is that everyone safer with him not
being in a position to hurt other people and abuse
his power. You know, again, I wish it was the
(48:40):
only time I'd heard a story like that. You know
that the Pippo and Prevac case in Westchester had similar
levels of police criminality. And then there's that horrible cop
in in Kansas City from Lamont McEntire case and so
many others. You know what I'm talking about. Yeah, Globski,
Jesus Christ. There's one more wild thing, Jason, that are
a law student uncovered. You know the detective who assisted
(49:02):
Razuko and Fabricane at Joha's informant statement, bed Win Bickler.
He would later rise to the ranks of chief of police,
like he was chief of police in Elkhart through two eighteen. Like,
this isn't even something that happened decades ago, and what
we uncovered in Keith Cooper's civil lawsuit was that in
the nineteen nineties there was a group of white officers
(49:24):
in the Elkhart Police Department who refer to themselves as
the Wolverines. Like people in the department have testified about this.
Everybody up to the mayor has testified that they knew
about the existence of this group existing within the department,
and people have testified that the Wolverines originated. The name
originated from this movie called Red Don from the nineteen eighties,
(49:49):
which is real timely given what's going on with Russia
and read Don was premised on this theme that a
group of white suburban teenagers would resort to guerrilla war
fair in order to keep invaders out of their community.
And these officers apparently saw people of color as invaders
of their community and resorted to police abuse, police misconduct,
(50:14):
framing innocent people. And Mr Winbigler actually has admitted under
oath to being associated with this group. And so the
existence of the Wolverines is going to further unravel Elkhart's
epidemic with wrongful convictions because those officers, time and time
again have been implicated in framing other innocent people for crimes.
(50:38):
A incomment. I hate to say, but it's almost like
the Catholic church. You know, you go to whichever city
you go to, and you hear stories like this. We
hear it day in and day out here as we
interview people like Keith who have been through this. So,
since you pursued civil litigation Indiana, that means you've forfeited
the right to state compensation. But aren't you glad you
did because after hearing all the things that Elliott has
(51:00):
been able to uncover here, which is nothing short of
incredible by the way, you were able to win your
civil suit. I mean, he really drew out the truth
here and no one could hide from it. The truth
never changed no matter how long it takes. The truth
always remained the same. Favorite my truth and God for Bill.
They could say whatever they want to say, and then
(51:22):
God for Bill. And he's not done without card either,
A whole lot of truth for to come out of
our car. Yes, sir man. So we have a tradition
here wrongful conviction. It's called closing arguments. It's how we
close the show, and it works like this. First of all,
I thank each of you guys for being here and
(51:42):
sharing this truly incredible story. And then I'm gonna turn
my microphone off and kick back in my chair with
my headphones on and just listen to anything else you
want to share with me and our incredible audience. Elliott,
let's let you go first, tell us what's on your mind,
and then Keith can take us out the epidemic and
(52:05):
Elkhart is only beginning to unravel. Yeah, there are so
many other Keith Coopers who continue to be wrong play incarcerated,
whether they were framed by Detective Razuko or other members
of the All Car Police Department. But one thing that
Keith did through his fight over the past six years,
(52:32):
it shine a light on a community that was riddled
with police and prosecutorial misconduct. And Keith, through shining that life,
will be the main reason why so many other wrongfully
convicted people will be set free. Recently, in seven point
(52:59):
five million different ways, the city of Elkhart acknowledge the
egregious wrong and suffering that happened to Keith Cooper. And
it's no coincidence that Keith received the largest wrongful conviction
settlement in the state of Indiana that settlement is a
(53:23):
result of everything that Keith on earth, and that the
city of Elkhart did not want a jury to hear.
So while keith story is heartbreaking and tragic and so preventable,
you'll be hearing about a lot of other Keith Cooper's
(53:47):
being set free from Elkhart in the years to come.
I just want to let people know, man, that the
justice system can be fixed, and there's people are here
that's working every day to see the folks like myself,
the frothy convicting, do have a chance to get out
(54:10):
because there's people out here working and they're looking into
cases and they're digging up the dirt on these wrongful,
unlawful police prosecutors, even states attorneys and even the Georges.
They're coming after them. As long as they keep their
hope and staying their faith. Whenever their faith made to be,
(54:34):
stay with it, because God are gonna send these folks
who keeps out here to help. And I love it.
That's about clothes. Thank you for listening to Wrongful Conviction.
I'd like to thank our production team Connor Hall, Cheff Clyver,
(54:56):
and Kevin Wardis. With research by Lila Robinson music in
this production was supplied by three time OSCAR nominated composer
Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow us on Instagram at
Wrongful Conviction, on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction Podcast, and on
Twitter at wrong Conviction, as well as at Lava for Good.
On all three platforms, you can also follow me on
(55:18):
both TikTok and Instagram at it's Jason flom Raleful Conviction
is the production of Lava for Good podcasts and association
with Signal Company Number one
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
The Nikki Glaser Podcast
Every week comedian and infamous roaster Nikki Glaser provides a fun, fast-paced, and brutally honest look into current pop-culture and her own personal life.