April 5, 2023 • 43 mins
Kelly discusses a third murder. Josh takes a look at the two women at the center of this case, and how their lives were affected and intertwined by it.
This is a Studio BOTH/AND production:
www.pactpodcast.com / www.bothand.fyi
For an ad-free experience or to support the show: www.patreon.com/studiobothand
Written, researched, edited, and produced by Josh Hallmark.
Music by William Hellfire, Whithe, Sergey Cheremisinov, Lee Rosevere, Radical Face.
Sources: The Iron Mountain Daily News, Michigan Live, U.P. Matters, The Iron County Reporter, Dead North.
This is a Studio BOTH/AND production:
www.pactpodcast.com / www.bothand.fyi
For an ad-free experience or to support the show: www.patreon.com/studiobothand
Written, researched, edited, and produced by Josh Hallmark.
Music by William Hellfire, Whithe, Sergey Cheremisinov, Lee Rosevere, Radical Face.
Sources: The Iron Mountain Daily News, Michigan Live, U.P. Matters, The Iron County Reporter, Dead North.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:09):
This is a studio both and production. If she is to be believed,
and this is a woman who liesmore often than she tells the truth,
she is a serial killer and mostof her victims are people she had relationships
with which, to me, ifthose are true, seems like these are
(00:34):
very solvable cases if she did infact have relationships with them the way that
she did with Chris Regan. Sodo you think that that comes down to
overlooking women as serial killers? Doyou think it's that she's lying and exaggerating
her kill count? What do youthink it is about these seemingly very solvable
(00:55):
crimes that have remained unsolved. Well, first of all, we do know
that male serial killers as a groupor more likely to kill people they know,
So that's kind of a backdrop there. Number two, Whether Kelly and
or Kelly and Jason killed more people, again, I think that may or
may not ever be known, AndI would agree with you, you would
(01:15):
think those would be solvable. DoI believe she did this? I think
it's certainly possible that there are morevictims. The ironic thing, though,
is that killing two people with therebeing an amount of time in between them.
As of two thousand and five,she already qualifies as a serial killer
because in two thousand and five theFBI basically said, we used to say
(01:38):
you had to have three victims thatwere over a period of time or over
in two different time periods. Nowwe're saying two. So she technically already
is a serial killer. Now thatdoesn't answer the question of you know,
how many people did she kill?And I think that, you know,
it's difficult for me to believe justbased on what we know so far,
(02:00):
are that if she does have thesevictims, why they can't be solved?
Now, clearly it appears that shelied about some victims. As doctor Johnston
and I discussed previously, women areoften overlooked when it comes to murder.
It's one of the reasons why femaleserial killers tend to get away with their
(02:23):
crimes for much longer than their malecounterparts, or why they just never get
caught at all. And being overlookedis something that Kelly Cochrane exploited with great
inconsistency in her police interviews and eventualtrial. What first led investigators to the
Cochrane's house in October of twenty fourteenwas a suspicion that Jason Cochrane killed Chris
(02:46):
Regan in a fit of jealousy,and if you believe Kelly was the abuser
in that relationship, she had alreadybeen laying out the groundwork for that very
idea when she told hr at Oldenburgthat her usband had threatened to kill her
and done himself. So when OfficerBarrett asked Kelly if her husband was capable
of murdering Chris in that very firstinterview, she reinforced the narrative all the
(03:12):
way to the trial, well someof the time. As has been well
established, Kelly lies a lot.She also has an ego, so she
was only really capable of playing victimto Jason for so long before that ego
got in the way. And muchlike Keys, Kelly liked to think she
(03:37):
was the smartest person in the room, something that often led her to blurt
out information just to show the policethat she knew more than they did.
The problem with Kelly is you neverknew what was truth, what was ego,
or what was just some arbitrary movein a game that she was playing
by herself. Kellyed Chief Frizzo,but seemed to enjoy talking with Detective Ogden
(04:03):
it's something that's almost reminiscent of Keys. He talked much more openly with Agent
Goden and Detective Doll than he didthe men. With Keys, I think
it's a mixture of having been raisedin a household full of women and feeling
like he could charm them. Butwith Kelly, it appeared that she thought
she could manipulate Ogden more than Frizzo. With Frizzo, she was defensive,
(04:27):
aloof angry, but with Ogden shewas emotional, warm, contrite. Almost
Kelly comes off as almost two entirelydifferent people in her interviews with Frizzo and
Ogden, and it's something Frizzo pickedup on fairly early into the investigation and
would exploit throughout it. In hersecond interview with Ogden, following her arrest
(04:53):
in Kentucky, Kelly shifted from timidvictim to egocentric no it all. She
gave Ogden a list of twenty onepeople she claimed to have murdered, a
list that was dubious at best.There were no last names, very few
details, only several estimated locations ofthese murders, and six of them had
(05:15):
no information whatsoever. On top ofall that, Kelly told Ogden that she
was only willing to discuss one ofthose murders, a trucker she murdered in
Illinois. After fleeing Iron River,Kelly confessed that while traveling through Illinois,
she murdered a truck driver. Shestabbed the man in each eye, then
(05:40):
left him on the side of theroad to die. These were the only
details Kelly was willing to share,not his name, the exact location,
or even how she met the trucker. The grim details she did share,
though, were enough enough to provethat such a murder never occurred. I
know that at one point she claimedthat she had killed a trucker and gouged
(06:04):
his eyes out and done these kindof things, And you would think that
would be the kind of murder thatpeople would remember, particularly law enforcement,
And there seems to be no evidenceto date that that kind of a murder
took place. So I think thatit's very likely that, whether there are
more victims or not, that Kellylied about the number of victims in a
way to get attention, and youknow, for all kinds of reasons,
(06:29):
and Janie's right. Illinois State Policelooked into Kelly's claim, and no one
ever reported witnessed nor recovered a manwith his eyes entirely gouged out on the
side of the road, something thatwould, you know, generally garner a
bit of attention. Kelly's entire listof twenty one victims was then deemed not
(06:53):
productive. Ogden and his partner,Stephen Hooke were sure the list was concocted
merely to divert the investigation away fromChris Regan, but Chief Frizzo was certain
that, whether this list was realor not, Kelly had killed people prior
to Chris Regan and Jason Cochrane.There was the cast off blood spatter in
(07:13):
the Cochrane home that couldn't be linkedto Chris. Kelly and Jason dismembered Chris
in their basement without leaving a singledrop of blood behind, and as she
looked deeper into Kelly and Jason,she found that the pair had a habit
of randomly disappearing from places and thenpopping up in different jurisdictions with no explainable
(07:35):
reasons for their sudden departures. Afterseveral weeks in Graves County Jail in Kentucky,
Kelly was extradited back to Iron Countyand assigned a local public defender,
and Frizzo was ready and waiting forher. On May eighteenth of twenty sixteen,
(07:58):
Chief Frizzo met with Kelly's defender atthe Iron County Jail. It would
be the first time that Kelly andFrizzo would be face to face since her
surprise DNA test in Hobert, Indiana, a year earlier. But Kelly had
a demand before she would meet withChief Frizzo. She wanted to talk to
(08:20):
Detective Ogden. By all accounts,Kelly seemed to think she was pitting the
two cops against each other, whichagain was just Kelly's ego and need to
be the smartest person in the room, because in all reality, it was
just the oldest cop cliche. Inthe book, Laura Frizzo was playing bad
(08:41):
cop and Jeremy Ogden was playing goodcop, so Frizzo was more than happy
to comply with Kelly's demand. Kellyasked Ogden if he was a good writer.
She said she needed a good writerbecause she had a good story to
tell, and Ogden said that hergood story needed to be backed up with
(09:03):
actual evidence. Kelly thought about itfor a minute and then once again shifted
from strong and proud to weak andcontrite in a matter of seconds. Her
entire demeanor changed, her tone,her body language, her facial expressions,
her shoulders bent in, and herhead tilted down as she told Ogden that
(09:26):
she was tired, she needed sleep, she needed to be done with the
Regan case, that she was readyto take Chief Frizzo to Chris's remains.
She told him that she and Jasonhad discarded Regan's dismembered body along the Pintoga
Trail, and then she said,quite curiously, all his parts should be
(09:48):
there unless animals carried them away.She went on to tell Ogden that it
was really Jason that she wanted tokill. She'd been thinking about killing Jason
for a long time, and thaton the night of Chris's murder she thought
about killing Jason instead of Chris.That same day, Kelly led Chief Frizzo
(10:11):
and an evidence recovery team and cadaverdogs to the area of Pintoga Trail,
where she claimed that she and Jasondiscarded multiple garbage bags full of Chris Regan's
remains, and as the dogs aninvestigator searched the woods, Kelly and Laura
talked and what I believe is themost candid conversation Kelly ever had with investigators.
(10:35):
She told Frizzo that seeing all ofChris's blood and watching him die gave
her a high. It excited her. She said it conversationally, almost monotone,
but with a smile on her face, like she was describing some inconsequential
moment in her life. The firstrecovery of the day was an empty garbage
(10:58):
bag that had been buried under severalseasons of fallen leaves, and then in
a nearby open field, one ofthe cadaver dogs alerted on something else,
Chris's skull, and then a singlebullet, and finally Chris's glasses. After
(11:20):
hours on the trail with multiple investigatorsand cadaver dogs, this is what was
left of Chris Regan. After thePintoka Trail recovery, Kelly took Frizzo to
the Caspin Pit, a five hundredforty foot deep flooded mine just five hundred
(11:41):
feet from the Cochrane's backyard on LawrenceStreet. The Caspin Pit has been searched
many times. In many cases,it has its own local mythology in Iron
County as the place people go toget rid of weapons, bodies, and
any other unsavories, and not asingle piece of evidence from any search for
(12:05):
any case has ever been recovered fromit until that afternoon. A dive team
recovered parts of the twenty two caliberlong barrel rifle that was used to kill
Chris Regan and a burn barrel thatneighbors said disappeared from the Cochrane's yard following
their October twenty fourteen barbecue, andfrom the Caspin pit. Kelly took investigators
(12:31):
back to her home on Laurence Streetto recover a pair of forceps that had
been sitting on her kitchen counter sincethe night the Cochranes murdered Chris. Kelly
told Frizzo that she used the forcepsto pull the bullet from Chris's skull.
She recalled telling Jason to wash theforceps, but wasn't sure if he ever
did. Of all the evidence recoveredfrom the Cochrane's home, their car,
(12:56):
and the Caspian pit, those forcepswere the only item with Chris Regan's DNA
on them, and after almost twoyears of investigation across multiple state lines,
with only contradictory confessions and circumstantial evidence. In a single day, Laura Frizzo
now had Chris's remains, a murderweapon, and DNA evidence. Four days
(13:22):
later, Kelly called Detective Ogden againfrom jail in what sounded like a canned
and well rehearsed confession. She toldhim that she had no feelings or emotions,
that she didn't understand love, andthat she'd spent much of her life
watching and studying people to attempt tounderstand how and why they react to one
(13:43):
another and how they exhibit love.She was fascinated by human emotion and curious
about people like her who didn't haveit. She made a point to differentiate
herself from other serial killers by stressingthat she liked animals, that she'd never
hurt an animal, And then,as she was wont to do, she
(14:07):
shifted and immediately began contradicting herself.She told him that Jason killed Chris and
that in doing so, he robbedher of the only good thing in her
life, and so she killed Jasonas revenge for killing the man that she
loved. And you may recall sheliterally just minutes ago said that she didn't
(14:28):
experience love or human emotions, butanyway, she said she killed Jason to
even the score. When discussing thiscall, Ogden noted that when Kelly was
arrested, they recovered from her carletters to her family discussing her lack of
emotion and empathy, along with acopy of the DSM four, a manual
(14:50):
of mental disorders. You also,however, talk about how she went to
school for psychology. She studied forensicso it almost seems like, whether intentional
or not, she was using thisdegree to kind of understand herself, but
also use it to manipulate other people, understand how other people operated responded,
(15:15):
and kind of study that and portrayherself as quote unquote normal, understanding,
caring. I don't think anybody wouldargue that Kelly was stupid. I mean,
she clearly is smart, and itwould not surprise me to think that
she would be drawn to psychology fora couple of different reasons, in addition
to the fact that a lot ofpeople are interested in psychology. But I
(15:35):
do think that there probably was aninterest in trying to understand maybe not only
herself and other people, but givenhow smart Kelly was, I also wonder
if she was trying to figure outwhy she felt different from a lot of
other people, because individuals that I'vetalked to who truly meet the definition of
(15:56):
psychopathy will oftentimes talk about feeling orbeing aware at a certain point that they
just didn't operate the same way thattheir family did, or their friends did,
or other people that they knew,and they weren't initially kind of clear
about what that was a lot oftimes, a lot of times, what
they'll say is, I thought everybodywas this way. Everybody was kind of
playing this game, or everybody waswearing this mask, or you know how
(16:19):
I felt, or my lack ofremorse or my lack of empathy or whatever
is really how everybody was. Butthen I realized at some point that that
really wasn't true. And then Itry to figure out why reading about all
of them? But when did youstart reading about them? When did you
realize? I mean, did youstart reading about them because you were curious
(16:40):
about you? Or did you wasit a study guy to sort of speak,
I mean that'd be a weird questiontoo. Did you learn things from
to do not do? Or wasit just curiosity of do you have anything
in common with them? Is thatyou were looking for a good thing?
Well, the first book I readwas it was called mind Hunter, and
(17:00):
it was written by an FBI profiler. Yeah, I read that years and
years ago, probably when I wasfifteen or sixteen. You I was,
yes, somewhat disturbed by it,just because, um, I don't know,
(17:21):
it's always been that way. It'salways felt like I was kind of
reading about myself in a lot ofthose books. Not that not that myself
that everybody knew. But you know, what did that? I mean,
did that? Where are you concernyou make? You think it was?
Well, at first it was.I had a thought everybody was everybody else
(17:45):
was faking it and everybody was like, I mean, they just didn't act
like it and don't or I figuredthat I was a demon child or whatever.
I don't know, but I'm andall that one away when I was
in my twenty that didn't feel badabout it anymore. I just he feel
bad that you were, that you'vehad those thoughts. I knew that most
(18:08):
people didn't think the way I didby then. I just didn't feel bad
about thinking differently at the time.Right now, Yeah, it's interesting because
you know keys who you know hadhigh classified, high average intelligence, and
I think it's fair to say thatKelly just has high intelligence. He was
reading job Douglass, he was readingabout serial killers. He was doing that
(18:30):
to understand himself. And I dobelieve it's fair to say that, you
know, Kelly went a little bitdeeper, and she took psychology courses and
really embedded herself in trying to understandwhy she was the way she was.
I agree, and I think thatwhen you look at the murders that Kelly
was involved in, this is notsomebody who is killing for the pleasure of
(18:53):
killing somebody. She is, Ithink, killing for very primatic reasons in
her mind, and of course thereare emotional reasons. So Chris Regan,
we don't know exactly why she killedhim, but she says it's because of
this big pact that she has hadwith Jason, which I personally don't believe
at all. I think that maybethere was some discussion or some joke about
(19:15):
that on the night that they weremarried. I think Kelly probably could not
tolerate the thought of Chris Regan leavingher and not wanting to have more of
a relationship with her, and thenof course Jason, Jason has really become
a burden to her. And it'snobody's fault, of course, but he's
got this bad back, and she'shaving a good time sleeping around, and
(19:37):
he's just becoming a burden for her. And so I think, in her
kind of predatory, pragmatic way,this is what's going to happen. Chief
Laura Frizzo was Iron Rivers first femalepolice officer. She was hired in April
of nineteen ninety five, several monthsafter graduating from the police Academy in Kalamazoo,
(19:57):
Michigan, and in December of twentythirteen, Frizzo became the first female
chief of police in Michigan's Upper Peninsula, and less than a year after that
promotion, she would be overseeing oneof the most notorious murder cases out of
the up and While Chief Frizzo wasparamount in solving the Chris Regan case through
(20:21):
both innovativeness and working flexibly across multiplejurisdictions, things at Iron River Pede were
tumultuous throughout the investigation into the cochranes. On September twenty second, twenty fifteen,
just two months after Frizzo helped HobertPD recover the cochranes and retrieve their
DNA In Indiana, the Iron RiverCity Council unanimously hired a new city manager,
(20:47):
David Thayer, and David Thayer hada well documented and sordid past.
While Laura Frizzo was hired straight outof the police academy, David Thayer was
hired several years after he was arrestedand subsequently fired as city manager of Grayling,
(21:10):
Michigan. While serving as city managerof Grayling, Thayer was arrested and
charged with twenty four misdemeanor counts ofviolating the Social Security Number Privacy Act,
and shortly after his firing, hewas convicted of using public resources to help
fund a political campaign. According toa report by up matters, a letter
(21:33):
from Grayling City manager Doug Baum toIron River Mayor Terry Tarci detailed concerns he
and other officials had regarding Thayer basedon his time in Grayling prior to his
arrest. The former police chief ofGrayling, Carl Schriner, who is now
the mayor of Grayling, described Thayeras intrusive, dismissive, demanding, and
(21:56):
vengeful. He said it was widelybelieved that Thayer had something against police departments.
As a whole. He spoke specificallyof Thayer accusing an officer of abusing
sick time when the officer was infact using paid medical leave to care for
his wife who had cancer. Theyare repeatedly threatened to deny the officer's time
(22:18):
off requests, and was so aggressivethat the union eventually had to get involved.
The grailing fire chief Russ Stropaul saidthey are micromanaged and cut off town
officials from committees and counselors they'd previouslyworked with and been accountable to. They
are told Stropaul he was not tospeak to any committees or city councilors directly,
(22:41):
and that all communication should now gothrough Thair. Stropaul went on to
describe Thayer's inconsistencies in the handling offire inspections for local businesses, citing that
Thayer was incredibly lenient with businesses ownedby his friends and family. Escalated when
a complaint was filed against Thayer forviolating the Law Enforcement Information Network Law when
(23:06):
he forced a department secretary to fasttrack a liquor license for one of his
friends, a demand that Thayer hadno authority to make. Most notably,
the letter documented Thayer's violation of theSocial Security Number Privacy Act, which had
been politically motivated, according to Baum, Baum wrote. In November of two
(23:29):
thousand and nine, there were electionsfor city council. A woman by the
name of d Mayberry was elected tothe city Council. It was rumored that
Miss Mayberry's campaign was supported by someof the members of the police department,
and it was thought that David lookedat her as being against him. Prior
to Miss Mayberry taking office, Davidfound that she had not paid her city
(23:49):
income tax yet. On November ninth, two thousand and nine, the city
council meeting that Miss Mayberry was totake her seat on the council at David
theyre took Miss Mayberry into his officeand advised her that she was delinquent on
her city income tax and could nottake her rightful seat on the city council.
(24:10):
To support his claim, David showedand gave Miss Mayberry a copy of
paperwork from the State of Michigan taxrecords showing her information employers information, address,
income, and Social Security number.David would not allow her to sit
at the council table, so shehad to sit in the audience. The
council then announced that there was aglitch that prohibited Mayberry from being on the
(24:32):
council. It was later found thatThayer had no basis or right to prohibit
a duly elected official from taking theirseat. Mayberry contacted an attorney who discovered
that the document David gave her notonly had her social Security number, but
dozens of other people social security numbersand other private information. It was later
discovered, according to both Baum andw j m N Local three news,
(24:57):
that Thayer was using public resources tohelp fund a political campaign, which he
was eventually convicted of, in additionto under reporting budget issues, distributing questionable
financial records to the city council,and engaging in a sexual relationship with a
subordinate. WJMN also reached out tothe village of Lexington, where Thayer was
(25:21):
city manager prior to Grayling. Thevillage president described Thayer as out of control
and difficult to work with, andby Chief Frizzo's account, Thayer began targeting
her almost immediately upon being hired.Within his first month on the job,
Thayer started auditing her credit card receipts, reviewing her personnel file, and dismissing
(25:48):
the twenty year Iron River PD veteranand chief of Police almost entirely in an
open letter. Frizzo went on tosay that within his first three months as
city manager, both the city treasurerand city clerk resigned because of fair The
city clerk had told multiple city employeesthat she was leaving because Thayer had been
sexist toward her and other women.However, the clerk eventually withdrew her resignation,
(26:15):
Frizzo claims in part because of asix thousand dollar raise offered by Thayer.
Six weeks into his new role ascity manager, they are stripped Frizzo
of her police department credit cards,and again, according to Frizzo, gave
no explanation for the seizures. Healso ordered her to stop communicating directly with
(26:36):
both the mayor and the city council, while he somewhat ironically began excluding Frizzo
from police department discussions with her subordinates. By all accounts, the relationship between
Frizzo and they are only intensified overtime. They are called her a bitch
in front of colleagues. He allegedlytold Frizzo that women don't belong in men's
(27:00):
occupations and reportedly attempted to push Frizzodown into a chair while screaming, sit
in that fucking chair. Over time, the political issues in Iron River became
public knowledge, and citizens began protestingin support of Chief Frizzo. They even
started raising money to support her investigationinto the cochranes. And, perhaps not
(27:26):
coincidentally, the intensification of both Kelly'sand Laura's time with the Iron River Peede
came to a head at almost exactlythe same time. Three months after the
recovery of the murder weapon forceps burnedbarrel bullet and Chris Regan's glasses and skull,
(27:47):
Chief Frizzo began preparing for trial,and Kelly was talking less and less
about her lack of emotion and moreand more about Jason's alleged abuse. So
I guess it would be fair tosay they were both preparing for trial.
After several weeks of prep and preliminaryexam testimony, on September twentieth of twenty
(28:10):
sixteen, Frizzo requested a temporary medicalleave. They are tentatively denied the request,
pending a doctor's note, which Frizzosubmitted on September twenty third, Frizzo
told theyer that she would be ableto return to work on September twenty eighth,
and this time they are demanded anotherdoctor's note stating she was ready to
(28:33):
return to work, and then hescheduled a meeting with her for October fourth.
Despite her second doctor's note, Thayerdidn't allow Frizzo to return to work,
and in that October fourth meeting,he demanded that she get a second
opinion and scheduled an exam for herwith another doctor. While Frizzo attempted to
(28:56):
navigate Thayer's return to work demands.On October eleventh, Kelly Cochrane was arraigned,
with trial scheduled to begin in Februaryof twenty seventeen. And while outwardly
Kelly presented herself as a victim ofabuse who killed her husband does retribution,
on recorded jail house phone calls withfamily, she was telling an entirely different
(29:19):
story. Kelly coldly told her motherthat she had never been capable of emotion,
that she'd had murderous thoughts her wholelife. She told her brother that
she killed nine people across multiple states. In another call, she mentioned each
of her ten butterfly tattoos represented adifferent victim, and for all her private
(29:44):
talk of lack of emotion and murderousimpulses, she never once spoke of or
blamed Jason, and she didn't mentionChris Regan at all. At a November
ninth, Iron River City Council meeting, Frizzo, who they are still had
not allowed to return to work,alleged that it was revealed that Thayer had
(30:06):
entered a secure evidence room that onlyChief Frizzo had access to, something that
could have greatly impacted the trial becauseit violated procedures for chain of evidence.
In the days following that council meeting, they are required Frizzo undertake a fitness
for duty exam. The examiner describedFrizzo as defensive and having perceptions of being
(30:30):
persecuted, but still deemed her fitfor duty. On December ninth, just
two months before the Cochrane trial wasset to begin, they are fired Chief
Frizzo, citing irreconcilable differences. Inhis termination letter, Thayer wrote, your
(30:51):
management style and professional standards and practicesare so deeply entrenched in you and are
so foreign to me that I amleft to believe they will remain irreconcilable differences.
Chief Laura Frizzo filed for unemployment followingher firing, which they are fought,
(31:12):
citing that she'd been fired for disciplinaryactions, even though her termination letter
never mentioned such actions and solely statedthat her firing was due to irreconcilable differences.
During an unemployment hearing, which tookplace just weeks before the Cochrane trial,
(31:32):
they are told the judge that Frizzohad been fired for her use of
the F word and based on herfitness for duty exam, which again found
her fit for duty. The judgeruled in Frizzo's favor. Unfortunately, Frizzo
struggled in getting back on her feetafter that. She applied for over twenty
(31:53):
law enforcement jobs, but rarely heardback from any and when she did,
it is usually to inquire why aformer chief of police was applying for a
demotion. The first female police officerin Iron River, the first female police
chief in the Upper Peninsula, anda twenty year law enforcement veteran ended up
(32:15):
working for three dollars an hour plustips at a local olive garden, and
as the trial of Kelly Cochrane loomed. Frizzo found herself on the sidelines of
the murder she solved of the serialkiller she apprehended, as David Thayer became
(32:36):
the face of the trial, thatis, until things got even messier.
While the mayor and city council defendedThayer's decision to fire Laura, the public
did not, nor did essentially everyonewho'd ever worked with or had a close
(32:59):
relationship with Thayer. City officials fromall across Michigan were publishing open letters in
support of Frizzo, and Frizzo washearing from lots of other women who Thayer
had bullied or harassed in the past, including this letter from a female police
officer who worked for Thayer in thevillage of Lexington, January seventeenth, twenty
(33:22):
seventeen. My name is Officer PatriciaDawson. I retired from the Village of
Lexington as a police officer approximately threeyears ago. I was a police officer
for thirty years, with twenty sevenof those in the village of Lexington,
two of which were part time andthen the rest were full time employment.
(33:43):
I am sorry to see Chief LauraFrizzo of Iron River, another victim of
the unacceptable prejudice that Iron River managerDavid Thayer has toward females and more importantly
one in a position of authority,he was and is relentless in destroying career
or a life for his own narcissisticego. I felt that he took an
(34:05):
unprovoked dislike to me immediately in hisposition he took authority to take over the
police department and as chief administrator.I can say my life was a living
hell over the years he actively wasdetermined to destroy me. For now,
I will recite incidences there. Wouldchange the schedule to disrupt my Thanksgiving Day
(34:27):
to an eleven am to seven pmshift, knowing that it would ruin dinner
with the family, intentionally by changingshifts to follow me while patrolling the village
and his vehicle to observe me working, or open the door in the police
office to watch me. Three demandthat I returned to the office every hour
while working and check in with him. Four He wrote me up for attending
(34:52):
a counting life saving award on dutyfor an hour. Another female deputy was
covering my air. When I waspresented with a written slip. He leaned
over the desk and screamed at me. I believed he was going to hit
me, but he did not becauseI took the write up slip and thanked
him. He walked around to theside and stood inches from my face.
(35:15):
He grabbed the note, went backinto his office and rewrote it for week
days rather than the following three weekenddays. Five medical leave. I was
off for surgery and recovery, whichwas unpaid after sick time was used.
I had regular doctor notes and turnedthem into the village. When I tried
to return, he said the schedulewas done and would not disrupt it.
(35:38):
He then requested that I go toa doctor of his choosing. The appointment
was a month away. When Iwas cleared to return, he insisted I
go to a psychiatrist, which wasanother month out. The psychiatrist said I
hope you have a good lawyer andcleared me. The next contact was to
have a reentry interview, which wasscheduled for several weeks out. He needed
(36:00):
to be sure I really wanted tobe here. He suggested several times,
maybe it was time to move on. Six. They are alienated other co
workers and council members, saying Iwas to always go through him. Most
co workers were afraid to talk orcontact me in fear of his repercussions of
(36:21):
being also written up. He wasable to sway the counsel to the picture
of me he chose to present.My co workers would tell me if they
were approached by counsel, they wouldtalk, but only that way, or
we were going to have problems forinsubordination. There was very good at intimidation.
He enjoyed the good old boys statuswith his regulars and favorites at the
(36:44):
expense of me, as he securedhis authority as needed. In closing,
I would like to say that Iliked my job and love the people who
I served. I had a goodpublic support and strong ties to my job
and impeccable ethics and loyalty. Iam sorry this evil, dishonest and conniving
man was given another chance to destroymore lives after Lexington Grayling and then Iron
(37:10):
River, Sincerely, Patricia Dawson.In fact, there was so much local
support for Frizzo that the prosecuting attorneysin the Cochrane case invited her to sit
with them at trial, and despiteher firing, Frizzo was still subpoena to
(37:30):
testify at trial. Along with JeremyOgden, who, despite Kelly's attempts to
pit them against each other, wasnow dating Laura Frizzo and Laura Well.
She wasn't going to go down withouta fight with Iron River or Kelly Cochrane.
(37:58):
Frizzo filed her own loss against DavidThayer and the City of Iron River
for wrongful termination based on gender discrimination, and in between her shift sat the
Olive Garden, she began her ownindependent investigation into the crimes of Kelly Cochrane
(40:04):
M M.
This is a studio both and production. If she is to be believed,
and this is a woman who liesmore often than she tells the truth,
she is a serial killer and mostof her victims are people she had relationships
with which, to me, ifthose are true, seems like these are
(00:34):
very solvable cases if she did infact have relationships with them the way that
she did with Chris Regan. Sodo you think that that comes down to
overlooking women as serial killers? Doyou think it's that she's lying and exaggerating
her kill count? What do youthink it is about these seemingly very solvable
(00:55):
crimes that have remained unsolved. Well, first of all, we do know
that male serial killers as a groupor more likely to kill people they know,
So that's kind of a backdrop there. Number two, Whether Kelly and
or Kelly and Jason killed more people, again, I think that may or
may not ever be known, AndI would agree with you, you would
(01:15):
think those would be solvable. DoI believe she did this? I think
it's certainly possible that there are morevictims. The ironic thing, though,
is that killing two people with therebeing an amount of time in between them.
As of two thousand and five,she already qualifies as a serial killer
because in two thousand and five theFBI basically said, we used to say
(01:38):
you had to have three victims thatwere over a period of time or over
in two different time periods. Nowwe're saying two. So she technically already
is a serial killer. Now thatdoesn't answer the question of you know,
how many people did she kill?And I think that, you know,
it's difficult for me to believe justbased on what we know so far,
(02:00):
are that if she does have thesevictims, why they can't be solved?
Now, clearly it appears that shelied about some victims. As doctor Johnston
and I discussed previously, women areoften overlooked when it comes to murder.
It's one of the reasons why femaleserial killers tend to get away with their
(02:23):
crimes for much longer than their malecounterparts, or why they just never get
caught at all. And being overlookedis something that Kelly Cochrane exploited with great
inconsistency in her police interviews and eventualtrial. What first led investigators to the
Cochrane's house in October of twenty fourteenwas a suspicion that Jason Cochrane killed Chris
(02:46):
Regan in a fit of jealousy,and if you believe Kelly was the abuser
in that relationship, she had alreadybeen laying out the groundwork for that very
idea when she told hr at Oldenburgthat her usband had threatened to kill her
and done himself. So when OfficerBarrett asked Kelly if her husband was capable
of murdering Chris in that very firstinterview, she reinforced the narrative all the
(03:12):
way to the trial, well someof the time. As has been well
established, Kelly lies a lot.She also has an ego, so she
was only really capable of playing victimto Jason for so long before that ego
got in the way. And muchlike Keys, Kelly liked to think she
(03:37):
was the smartest person in the room, something that often led her to blurt
out information just to show the policethat she knew more than they did.
The problem with Kelly is you neverknew what was truth, what was ego,
or what was just some arbitrary movein a game that she was playing
by herself. Kellyed Chief Frizzo,but seemed to enjoy talking with Detective Ogden
(04:03):
it's something that's almost reminiscent of Keys. He talked much more openly with Agent
Goden and Detective Doll than he didthe men. With Keys, I think
it's a mixture of having been raisedin a household full of women and feeling
like he could charm them. Butwith Kelly, it appeared that she thought
she could manipulate Ogden more than Frizzo. With Frizzo, she was defensive,
(04:27):
aloof angry, but with Ogden shewas emotional, warm, contrite. Almost
Kelly comes off as almost two entirelydifferent people in her interviews with Frizzo and
Ogden, and it's something Frizzo pickedup on fairly early into the investigation and
would exploit throughout it. In hersecond interview with Ogden, following her arrest
(04:53):
in Kentucky, Kelly shifted from timidvictim to egocentric no it all. She
gave Ogden a list of twenty onepeople she claimed to have murdered, a
list that was dubious at best.There were no last names, very few
details, only several estimated locations ofthese murders, and six of them had
(05:15):
no information whatsoever. On top ofall that, Kelly told Ogden that she
was only willing to discuss one ofthose murders, a trucker she murdered in
Illinois. After fleeing Iron River,Kelly confessed that while traveling through Illinois,
she murdered a truck driver. Shestabbed the man in each eye, then
(05:40):
left him on the side of theroad to die. These were the only
details Kelly was willing to share,not his name, the exact location,
or even how she met the trucker. The grim details she did share,
though, were enough enough to provethat such a murder never occurred. I
know that at one point she claimedthat she had killed a trucker and gouged
(06:04):
his eyes out and done these kindof things, And you would think that
would be the kind of murder thatpeople would remember, particularly law enforcement,
And there seems to be no evidenceto date that that kind of a murder
took place. So I think thatit's very likely that, whether there are
more victims or not, that Kellylied about the number of victims in a
way to get attention, and youknow, for all kinds of reasons,
(06:29):
and Janie's right. Illinois State Policelooked into Kelly's claim, and no one
ever reported witnessed nor recovered a manwith his eyes entirely gouged out on the
side of the road, something thatwould, you know, generally garner a
bit of attention. Kelly's entire listof twenty one victims was then deemed not
(06:53):
productive. Ogden and his partner,Stephen Hooke were sure the list was concocted
merely to divert the investigation away fromChris Regan, but Chief Frizzo was certain
that, whether this list was realor not, Kelly had killed people prior
to Chris Regan and Jason Cochrane.There was the cast off blood spatter in
(07:13):
the Cochrane home that couldn't be linkedto Chris. Kelly and Jason dismembered Chris
in their basement without leaving a singledrop of blood behind, and as she
looked deeper into Kelly and Jason,she found that the pair had a habit
of randomly disappearing from places and thenpopping up in different jurisdictions with no explainable
(07:35):
reasons for their sudden departures. Afterseveral weeks in Graves County Jail in Kentucky,
Kelly was extradited back to Iron Countyand assigned a local public defender,
and Frizzo was ready and waiting forher. On May eighteenth of twenty sixteen,
(07:58):
Chief Frizzo met with Kelly's defender atthe Iron County Jail. It would
be the first time that Kelly andFrizzo would be face to face since her
surprise DNA test in Hobert, Indiana, a year earlier. But Kelly had
a demand before she would meet withChief Frizzo. She wanted to talk to
(08:20):
Detective Ogden. By all accounts,Kelly seemed to think she was pitting the
two cops against each other, whichagain was just Kelly's ego and need to
be the smartest person in the room, because in all reality, it was
just the oldest cop cliche. Inthe book, Laura Frizzo was playing bad
(08:41):
cop and Jeremy Ogden was playing goodcop, so Frizzo was more than happy
to comply with Kelly's demand. Kellyasked Ogden if he was a good writer.
She said she needed a good writerbecause she had a good story to
tell, and Ogden said that hergood story needed to be backed up with
(09:03):
actual evidence. Kelly thought about itfor a minute and then once again shifted
from strong and proud to weak andcontrite in a matter of seconds. Her
entire demeanor changed, her tone,her body language, her facial expressions,
her shoulders bent in, and herhead tilted down as she told Ogden that
(09:26):
she was tired, she needed sleep, she needed to be done with the
Regan case, that she was readyto take Chief Frizzo to Chris's remains.
She told him that she and Jasonhad discarded Regan's dismembered body along the Pintoga
Trail, and then she said,quite curiously, all his parts should be
(09:48):
there unless animals carried them away.She went on to tell Ogden that it
was really Jason that she wanted tokill. She'd been thinking about killing Jason
for a long time, and thaton the night of Chris's murder she thought
about killing Jason instead of Chris.That same day, Kelly led Chief Frizzo
(10:11):
and an evidence recovery team and cadaverdogs to the area of Pintoga Trail,
where she claimed that she and Jasondiscarded multiple garbage bags full of Chris Regan's
remains, and as the dogs aninvestigator searched the woods, Kelly and Laura
talked and what I believe is themost candid conversation Kelly ever had with investigators.
(10:35):
She told Frizzo that seeing all ofChris's blood and watching him die gave
her a high. It excited her. She said it conversationally, almost monotone,
but with a smile on her face, like she was describing some inconsequential
moment in her life. The firstrecovery of the day was an empty garbage
(10:58):
bag that had been buried under severalseasons of fallen leaves, and then in
a nearby open field, one ofthe cadaver dogs alerted on something else,
Chris's skull, and then a singlebullet, and finally Chris's glasses. After
(11:20):
hours on the trail with multiple investigatorsand cadaver dogs, this is what was
left of Chris Regan. After thePintoka Trail recovery, Kelly took Frizzo to
the Caspin Pit, a five hundredforty foot deep flooded mine just five hundred
(11:41):
feet from the Cochrane's backyard on LawrenceStreet. The Caspin Pit has been searched
many times. In many cases,it has its own local mythology in Iron
County as the place people go toget rid of weapons, bodies, and
any other unsavories, and not asingle piece of evidence from any search for
(12:05):
any case has ever been recovered fromit until that afternoon. A dive team
recovered parts of the twenty two caliberlong barrel rifle that was used to kill
Chris Regan and a burn barrel thatneighbors said disappeared from the Cochrane's yard following
their October twenty fourteen barbecue, andfrom the Caspin pit. Kelly took investigators
(12:31):
back to her home on Laurence Streetto recover a pair of forceps that had
been sitting on her kitchen counter sincethe night the Cochranes murdered Chris. Kelly
told Frizzo that she used the forcepsto pull the bullet from Chris's skull.
She recalled telling Jason to wash theforceps, but wasn't sure if he ever
did. Of all the evidence recoveredfrom the Cochrane's home, their car,
(12:56):
and the Caspian pit, those forcepswere the only item with Chris Regan's DNA
on them, and after almost twoyears of investigation across multiple state lines,
with only contradictory confessions and circumstantial evidence. In a single day, Laura Frizzo
now had Chris's remains, a murderweapon, and DNA evidence. Four days
(13:22):
later, Kelly called Detective Ogden againfrom jail in what sounded like a canned
and well rehearsed confession. She toldhim that she had no feelings or emotions,
that she didn't understand love, andthat she'd spent much of her life
watching and studying people to attempt tounderstand how and why they react to one
(13:43):
another and how they exhibit love.She was fascinated by human emotion and curious
about people like her who didn't haveit. She made a point to differentiate
herself from other serial killers by stressingthat she liked animals, that she'd never
hurt an animal, And then,as she was wont to do, she
(14:07):
shifted and immediately began contradicting herself.She told him that Jason killed Chris and
that in doing so, he robbedher of the only good thing in her
life, and so she killed Jasonas revenge for killing the man that she
loved. And you may recall sheliterally just minutes ago said that she didn't
(14:28):
experience love or human emotions, butanyway, she said she killed Jason to
even the score. When discussing thiscall, Ogden noted that when Kelly was
arrested, they recovered from her carletters to her family discussing her lack of
emotion and empathy, along with acopy of the DSM four, a manual
(14:50):
of mental disorders. You also,however, talk about how she went to
school for psychology. She studied forensicso it almost seems like, whether intentional
or not, she was using thisdegree to kind of understand herself, but
also use it to manipulate other people, understand how other people operated responded,
(15:15):
and kind of study that and portrayherself as quote unquote normal, understanding,
caring. I don't think anybody wouldargue that Kelly was stupid. I mean,
she clearly is smart, and itwould not surprise me to think that
she would be drawn to psychology fora couple of different reasons, in addition
to the fact that a lot ofpeople are interested in psychology. But I
(15:35):
do think that there probably was aninterest in trying to understand maybe not only
herself and other people, but givenhow smart Kelly was, I also wonder
if she was trying to figure outwhy she felt different from a lot of
other people, because individuals that I'vetalked to who truly meet the definition of
(15:56):
psychopathy will oftentimes talk about feeling orbeing aware at a certain point that they
just didn't operate the same way thattheir family did, or their friends did,
or other people that they knew,and they weren't initially kind of clear
about what that was a lot oftimes, a lot of times, what
they'll say is, I thought everybodywas this way. Everybody was kind of
playing this game, or everybody waswearing this mask, or you know how
(16:19):
I felt, or my lack ofremorse or my lack of empathy or whatever
is really how everybody was. Butthen I realized at some point that that
really wasn't true. And then Itry to figure out why reading about all
of them? But when did youstart reading about them? When did you
realize? I mean, did youstart reading about them because you were curious
(16:40):
about you? Or did you wasit a study guy to sort of speak,
I mean that'd be a weird questiontoo. Did you learn things from
to do not do? Or wasit just curiosity of do you have anything
in common with them? Is thatyou were looking for a good thing?
Well, the first book I readwas it was called mind Hunter, and
(17:00):
it was written by an FBI profiler. Yeah, I read that years and
years ago, probably when I wasfifteen or sixteen. You I was,
yes, somewhat disturbed by it,just because, um, I don't know,
(17:21):
it's always been that way. It'salways felt like I was kind of
reading about myself in a lot ofthose books. Not that not that myself
that everybody knew. But you know, what did that? I mean,
did that? Where are you concernyou make? You think it was?
Well, at first it was.I had a thought everybody was everybody else
(17:45):
was faking it and everybody was like, I mean, they just didn't act
like it and don't or I figuredthat I was a demon child or whatever.
I don't know, but I'm andall that one away when I was
in my twenty that didn't feel badabout it anymore. I just he feel
bad that you were, that you'vehad those thoughts. I knew that most
(18:08):
people didn't think the way I didby then. I just didn't feel bad
about thinking differently at the time.Right now, Yeah, it's interesting because
you know keys who you know hadhigh classified, high average intelligence, and
I think it's fair to say thatKelly just has high intelligence. He was
reading job Douglass, he was readingabout serial killers. He was doing that
(18:30):
to understand himself. And I dobelieve it's fair to say that, you
know, Kelly went a little bitdeeper, and she took psychology courses and
really embedded herself in trying to understandwhy she was the way she was.
I agree, and I think thatwhen you look at the murders that Kelly
was involved in, this is notsomebody who is killing for the pleasure of
(18:53):
killing somebody. She is, Ithink, killing for very primatic reasons in
her mind, and of course thereare emotional reasons. So Chris Regan,
we don't know exactly why she killedhim, but she says it's because of
this big pact that she has hadwith Jason, which I personally don't believe
at all. I think that maybethere was some discussion or some joke about
(19:15):
that on the night that they weremarried. I think Kelly probably could not
tolerate the thought of Chris Regan leavingher and not wanting to have more of
a relationship with her, and thenof course Jason, Jason has really become
a burden to her. And it'snobody's fault, of course, but he's
got this bad back, and she'shaving a good time sleeping around, and
(19:37):
he's just becoming a burden for her. And so I think, in her
kind of predatory, pragmatic way,this is what's going to happen. Chief
Laura Frizzo was Iron Rivers first femalepolice officer. She was hired in April
of nineteen ninety five, several monthsafter graduating from the police Academy in Kalamazoo,
(19:57):
Michigan, and in December of twentythirteen, Frizzo became the first female
chief of police in Michigan's Upper Peninsula, and less than a year after that
promotion, she would be overseeing oneof the most notorious murder cases out of
the up and While Chief Frizzo wasparamount in solving the Chris Regan case through
(20:21):
both innovativeness and working flexibly across multiplejurisdictions, things at Iron River Pede were
tumultuous throughout the investigation into the cochranes. On September twenty second, twenty fifteen,
just two months after Frizzo helped HobertPD recover the cochranes and retrieve their
DNA In Indiana, the Iron RiverCity Council unanimously hired a new city manager,
(20:47):
David Thayer, and David Thayer hada well documented and sordid past.
While Laura Frizzo was hired straight outof the police academy, David Thayer was
hired several years after he was arrestedand subsequently fired as city manager of Grayling,
(21:10):
Michigan. While serving as city managerof Grayling, Thayer was arrested and
charged with twenty four misdemeanor counts ofviolating the Social Security Number Privacy Act,
and shortly after his firing, hewas convicted of using public resources to help
fund a political campaign. According toa report by up matters, a letter
(21:33):
from Grayling City manager Doug Baum toIron River Mayor Terry Tarci detailed concerns he
and other officials had regarding Thayer basedon his time in Grayling prior to his
arrest. The former police chief ofGrayling, Carl Schriner, who is now
the mayor of Grayling, described Thayeras intrusive, dismissive, demanding, and
(21:56):
vengeful. He said it was widelybelieved that Thayer had something against police departments.
As a whole. He spoke specificallyof Thayer accusing an officer of abusing
sick time when the officer was infact using paid medical leave to care for
his wife who had cancer. Theyare repeatedly threatened to deny the officer's time
(22:18):
off requests, and was so aggressivethat the union eventually had to get involved.
The grailing fire chief Russ Stropaul saidthey are micromanaged and cut off town
officials from committees and counselors they'd previouslyworked with and been accountable to. They
are told Stropaul he was not tospeak to any committees or city councilors directly,
(22:41):
and that all communication should now gothrough Thair. Stropaul went on to
describe Thayer's inconsistencies in the handling offire inspections for local businesses, citing that
Thayer was incredibly lenient with businesses ownedby his friends and family. Escalated when
a complaint was filed against Thayer forviolating the Law Enforcement Information Network Law when
(23:06):
he forced a department secretary to fasttrack a liquor license for one of his
friends, a demand that Thayer hadno authority to make. Most notably,
the letter documented Thayer's violation of theSocial Security Number Privacy Act, which had
been politically motivated, according to Baum, Baum wrote. In November of two
(23:29):
thousand and nine, there were electionsfor city council. A woman by the
name of d Mayberry was elected tothe city Council. It was rumored that
Miss Mayberry's campaign was supported by someof the members of the police department,
and it was thought that David lookedat her as being against him. Prior
to Miss Mayberry taking office, Davidfound that she had not paid her city
(23:49):
income tax yet. On November ninth, two thousand and nine, the city
council meeting that Miss Mayberry was totake her seat on the council at David
theyre took Miss Mayberry into his officeand advised her that she was delinquent on
her city income tax and could nottake her rightful seat on the city council.
(24:10):
To support his claim, David showedand gave Miss Mayberry a copy of
paperwork from the State of Michigan taxrecords showing her information employers information, address,
income, and Social Security number.David would not allow her to sit
at the council table, so shehad to sit in the audience. The
council then announced that there was aglitch that prohibited Mayberry from being on the
(24:32):
council. It was later found thatThayer had no basis or right to prohibit
a duly elected official from taking theirseat. Mayberry contacted an attorney who discovered
that the document David gave her notonly had her social Security number, but
dozens of other people social security numbersand other private information. It was later
discovered, according to both Baum andw j m N Local three news,
(24:57):
that Thayer was using public resources tohelp fund a political campaign, which he
was eventually convicted of, in additionto under reporting budget issues, distributing questionable
financial records to the city council,and engaging in a sexual relationship with a
subordinate. WJMN also reached out tothe village of Lexington, where Thayer was
(25:21):
city manager prior to Grayling. Thevillage president described Thayer as out of control
and difficult to work with, andby Chief Frizzo's account, Thayer began targeting
her almost immediately upon being hired.Within his first month on the job,
Thayer started auditing her credit card receipts, reviewing her personnel file, and dismissing
(25:48):
the twenty year Iron River PD veteranand chief of Police almost entirely in an
open letter. Frizzo went on tosay that within his first three months as
city manager, both the city treasurerand city clerk resigned because of fair The
city clerk had told multiple city employeesthat she was leaving because Thayer had been
sexist toward her and other women.However, the clerk eventually withdrew her resignation,
(26:15):
Frizzo claims in part because of asix thousand dollar raise offered by Thayer.
Six weeks into his new role ascity manager, they are stripped Frizzo
of her police department credit cards,and again, according to Frizzo, gave
no explanation for the seizures. Healso ordered her to stop communicating directly with
(26:36):
both the mayor and the city council, while he somewhat ironically began excluding Frizzo
from police department discussions with her subordinates. By all accounts, the relationship between
Frizzo and they are only intensified overtime. They are called her a bitch
in front of colleagues. He allegedlytold Frizzo that women don't belong in men's
(27:00):
occupations and reportedly attempted to push Frizzodown into a chair while screaming, sit
in that fucking chair. Over time, the political issues in Iron River became
public knowledge, and citizens began protestingin support of Chief Frizzo. They even
started raising money to support her investigationinto the cochranes. And, perhaps not
(27:26):
coincidentally, the intensification of both Kelly'sand Laura's time with the Iron River Peede
came to a head at almost exactlythe same time. Three months after the
recovery of the murder weapon forceps burnedbarrel bullet and Chris Regan's glasses and skull,
(27:47):
Chief Frizzo began preparing for trial,and Kelly was talking less and less
about her lack of emotion and moreand more about Jason's alleged abuse. So
I guess it would be fair tosay they were both preparing for trial.
After several weeks of prep and preliminaryexam testimony, on September twentieth of twenty
(28:10):
sixteen, Frizzo requested a temporary medicalleave. They are tentatively denied the request,
pending a doctor's note, which Frizzosubmitted on September twenty third, Frizzo
told theyer that she would be ableto return to work on September twenty eighth,
and this time they are demanded anotherdoctor's note stating she was ready to
(28:33):
return to work, and then hescheduled a meeting with her for October fourth.
Despite her second doctor's note, Thayerdidn't allow Frizzo to return to work,
and in that October fourth meeting,he demanded that she get a second
opinion and scheduled an exam for herwith another doctor. While Frizzo attempted to
(28:56):
navigate Thayer's return to work demands.On October eleventh, Kelly Cochrane was arraigned,
with trial scheduled to begin in Februaryof twenty seventeen. And while outwardly
Kelly presented herself as a victim ofabuse who killed her husband does retribution,
on recorded jail house phone calls withfamily, she was telling an entirely different
(29:19):
story. Kelly coldly told her motherthat she had never been capable of emotion,
that she'd had murderous thoughts her wholelife. She told her brother that
she killed nine people across multiple states. In another call, she mentioned each
of her ten butterfly tattoos represented adifferent victim, and for all her private
(29:44):
talk of lack of emotion and murderousimpulses, she never once spoke of or
blamed Jason, and she didn't mentionChris Regan at all. At a November
ninth, Iron River City Council meeting, Frizzo, who they are still had
not allowed to return to work,alleged that it was revealed that Thayer had
(30:06):
entered a secure evidence room that onlyChief Frizzo had access to, something that
could have greatly impacted the trial becauseit violated procedures for chain of evidence.
In the days following that council meeting, they are required Frizzo undertake a fitness
for duty exam. The examiner describedFrizzo as defensive and having perceptions of being
(30:30):
persecuted, but still deemed her fitfor duty. On December ninth, just
two months before the Cochrane trial wasset to begin, they are fired Chief
Frizzo, citing irreconcilable differences. Inhis termination letter, Thayer wrote, your
(30:51):
management style and professional standards and practicesare so deeply entrenched in you and are
so foreign to me that I amleft to believe they will remain irreconcilable differences.
Chief Laura Frizzo filed for unemployment followingher firing, which they are fought,
(31:12):
citing that she'd been fired for disciplinaryactions, even though her termination letter
never mentioned such actions and solely statedthat her firing was due to irreconcilable differences.
During an unemployment hearing, which tookplace just weeks before the Cochrane trial,
(31:32):
they are told the judge that Frizzohad been fired for her use of
the F word and based on herfitness for duty exam, which again found
her fit for duty. The judgeruled in Frizzo's favor. Unfortunately, Frizzo
struggled in getting back on her feetafter that. She applied for over twenty
(31:53):
law enforcement jobs, but rarely heardback from any and when she did,
it is usually to inquire why aformer chief of police was applying for a
demotion. The first female police officerin Iron River, the first female police
chief in the Upper Peninsula, anda twenty year law enforcement veteran ended up
(32:15):
working for three dollars an hour plustips at a local olive garden, and
as the trial of Kelly Cochrane loomed. Frizzo found herself on the sidelines of
the murder she solved of the serialkiller she apprehended, as David Thayer became
(32:36):
the face of the trial, thatis, until things got even messier.
While the mayor and city council defendedThayer's decision to fire Laura, the public
did not, nor did essentially everyonewho'd ever worked with or had a close
(32:59):
relationship with Thayer. City officials fromall across Michigan were publishing open letters in
support of Frizzo, and Frizzo washearing from lots of other women who Thayer
had bullied or harassed in the past, including this letter from a female police
officer who worked for Thayer in thevillage of Lexington, January seventeenth, twenty
(33:22):
seventeen. My name is Officer PatriciaDawson. I retired from the Village of
Lexington as a police officer approximately threeyears ago. I was a police officer
for thirty years, with twenty sevenof those in the village of Lexington,
two of which were part time andthen the rest were full time employment.
(33:43):
I am sorry to see Chief LauraFrizzo of Iron River, another victim of
the unacceptable prejudice that Iron River managerDavid Thayer has toward females and more importantly
one in a position of authority,he was and is relentless in destroying career
or a life for his own narcissisticego. I felt that he took an
(34:05):
unprovoked dislike to me immediately in hisposition he took authority to take over the
police department and as chief administrator.I can say my life was a living
hell over the years he actively wasdetermined to destroy me. For now,
I will recite incidences there. Wouldchange the schedule to disrupt my Thanksgiving Day
(34:27):
to an eleven am to seven pmshift, knowing that it would ruin dinner
with the family, intentionally by changingshifts to follow me while patrolling the village
and his vehicle to observe me working, or open the door in the police
office to watch me. Three demandthat I returned to the office every hour
while working and check in with him. Four He wrote me up for attending
(34:52):
a counting life saving award on dutyfor an hour. Another female deputy was
covering my air. When I waspresented with a written slip. He leaned
over the desk and screamed at me. I believed he was going to hit
me, but he did not becauseI took the write up slip and thanked
him. He walked around to theside and stood inches from my face.
(35:15):
He grabbed the note, went backinto his office and rewrote it for week
days rather than the following three weekenddays. Five medical leave. I was
off for surgery and recovery, whichwas unpaid after sick time was used.
I had regular doctor notes and turnedthem into the village. When I tried
to return, he said the schedulewas done and would not disrupt it.
(35:38):
He then requested that I go toa doctor of his choosing. The appointment
was a month away. When Iwas cleared to return, he insisted I
go to a psychiatrist, which wasanother month out. The psychiatrist said I
hope you have a good lawyer andcleared me. The next contact was to
have a reentry interview, which wasscheduled for several weeks out. He needed
(36:00):
to be sure I really wanted tobe here. He suggested several times,
maybe it was time to move on. Six. They are alienated other co
workers and council members, saying Iwas to always go through him. Most
co workers were afraid to talk orcontact me in fear of his repercussions of
(36:21):
being also written up. He wasable to sway the counsel to the picture
of me he chose to present.My co workers would tell me if they
were approached by counsel, they wouldtalk, but only that way, or
we were going to have problems forinsubordination. There was very good at intimidation.
He enjoyed the good old boys statuswith his regulars and favorites at the
(36:44):
expense of me, as he securedhis authority as needed. In closing,
I would like to say that Iliked my job and love the people who
I served. I had a goodpublic support and strong ties to my job
and impeccable ethics and loyalty. Iam sorry this evil, dishonest and conniving
man was given another chance to destroymore lives after Lexington Grayling and then Iron
(37:10):
River, Sincerely, Patricia Dawson.In fact, there was so much local
support for Frizzo that the prosecuting attorneysin the Cochrane case invited her to sit
with them at trial, and despiteher firing, Frizzo was still subpoena to
(37:30):
testify at trial. Along with JeremyOgden, who, despite Kelly's attempts to
pit them against each other, wasnow dating Laura Frizzo and Laura Well.
She wasn't going to go down withouta fight with Iron River or Kelly Cochrane.
(37:58):
Frizzo filed her own loss against DavidThayer and the City of Iron River
for wrongful termination based on gender discrimination, and in between her shift sat the
Olive Garden, she began her ownindependent investigation into the crimes of Kelly Cochrane
(40:04):
M M.
Popular Podcasts
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.
Law & Order: Criminal Justice System - Season 1 & Season 2
Season Two Out Now! Law & Order: Criminal Justice System tells the real stories behind the landmark cases that have shaped how the most dangerous and influential criminals in America are prosecuted. In its second season, the series tackles the threat of terrorism in the United States. From the rise of extremist political groups in the 60s to domestic lone wolves in the modern day, we explore how organizations like the FBI and Joint Terrorism Take Force have evolved to fight back against a multitude of terrorist threats.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com