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    Kevin Cooper - California Death Row


    Mary Ann Hughes holds a photo of her late son, Christopher, Friday, Jan. 30, 2004, in her home in Chino Hills, Calif. Kevin Cooper was convicted in the 1983 murders of Douglas and Peggy Ryen, both 41, their 10-year-old daughter, Jessica, and her 11-year-old friend, Christopher Hughes.


    [I]A young Josh Ryen


    Family photos of Doug and Peggy Ryen with their daughter Jessica, 10, and son Joshua, then 8-years-old. Joshua was the only survivor of the 1983 incident.



    Kevin Cooper listens during his preliminary hearing in Ontario in November 1983 and listens with closed eyes as a judge in San Diego sentenced him to death on May 15, 1985.


    Kevin Cooper


    Facts of the Crime:

    In June 1983 in Chino Hills, Douglas and Peggy Ryen and their 10-year-old daughter, Jessica, were killed in the master bedroom of their home. Christopher Hughes, 11, a neighbor, was also killed. Joshua Ryen survived despite serious wounds. Kevin Cooper, who escaped from Chino prison on June 2, was arrested 47 days later and was convicted for the murders in 1985 and faced execution.

    Cooper claimed he was innocent and called for DNA testing of the evidence in 2000. In 2003, an execution date of February 10, 2004, was set for Cooper. In 2005, a federal judge upheld his death penalty.

    Cooper was sentenced to death in San Bernardino County on May 15, 1985.

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    December 5, 2007

    Calling the evidence of his guilt "overwhelming," a federal appeals court in San Francisco on Tuesday upheld the death sentence of Kevin Cooper, who was convicted of a rampage 25 years ago that left a Chino Hills couple and two children dead.

    The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals rejected arguments from Cooper's appellate lawyers that he was framed and that prosecutors withheld evidence that could have cleared him.

    The ruling upheld a decision by U.S. District Judge Marilyn L. Huff in San Diego, who considered new blood and hair evidence tests ordered in the case after the 9th Circuit in 2004 granted a last-minute stay of execution.

    Huff wrote that she was convinced that Cooper "is the one responsible for these brutal murders," noting post-conviction DNA testing that linked Cooper to a drop of blood in the hallway outside the bedroom of two of the murder victims, to saliva from cigarette butts found in the hallway and to blood smears on a T-shirt found outside a bar near the murder scene.

    The 9th Circuit, in a 3-0 ruling written by Judge Pamela A. Rymer, agreed.

    "As the district court, and all state courts, have repeatedly found, evidence of Cooper's guilt was overwhelming," the decision said.

    Judges Ronald M. Gould and M. Margaret McKeown concurred in the decision.

    But McKeown, in a separate, concurring opinion, expressed her dismay that the court, because of limits on habeas petitions imposed by Congress in 1996, could not examine the "integrity of the evidence".

    "Significant evidence bearing on Cooper's culpability has been lost, destroyed or left un-pursued, including, for example, blood-covered overalls belonging to a potential suspect who was a convicted murderer, and a bloody T-shirt, discovered alongside the road near the crime scene," McKeown wrote.

    McKeown noted that the criminalist in charge of the evidence was a heroin addict who was fired for stealing drugs seized by police.

    The judge said she was "troubled that we cannot, in Kevin Cooper's words, resolve the question of his guilt 'once and for all.' "

    According to evidence presented at trial, Cooper had faked a medical condition in 1983 to escape from the Chino state prison, where he was serving a sentence for burglary.

    He broke into the home of Douglas and Peggy Ryen and used a hatchet, knife and ice pick to kill the couple, their daughter Jessica, 11, and houseguest Christopher Hughes, also 11.

    Prosecutors also presented evidence that Cooper slashed the throat of the Ryens' 8-year-old son, Joshua, who lay next to his mother's body for 11 hours before he was found.

    He survived and testified against Cooper.

    Cooper, now 50, admits that after he escaped from prison he hid in a house near the Ryens' residence. But he has maintained that he hitchhiked out of the area and was not involved in the murders.

    He was arrested seven weeks after the killings.

    The Chino Hills killings received so much publicity in San Bernardino County that Cooper's trial was moved to San Diego County.

    In 1985, he was convicted of the murders and sentenced to death.

    Tuesday's ruling was the latest of many appellate decisions in the case.

    Sacramento attorney Norman C. Hile said he was disappointed and would seek another hearing before a larger panel of judges.

    He had argued that Huff erred in not ordering further testing and in declining to consider evidence about "three suspicious men," one wearing bloody clothes, who reportedly were seen shortly after the murders in a bar not far from the crime scene.

    But Ronald S. Mathias, California's senior assistant attorney general in charge of death penalty appeals, said the court made the right decision.

    Mathias said he was particularly pleased with "the court's acknowledgment that" evidence of Cooper's guilt "was 'overwhelming.' I think that addresses any concern that technicalities" of the 1996 law "affected the outcome of this case."

    (Source: The Associated Press)

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    Judge denies Calif death row inmate's DNA test bid

    A California death row inmate convicted for the 1983 Chino Hills hatchet and knife killings of four people has lost his bid for a third round of DNA testing.

    Kevin Cooper claims he was framed and says more sensitive DNA tests on a T-shirt, a speck of blood on a paint chip and a vial of his blood would prove the 53-year-old inmate isn't the killer.

    The Riverside Press-Enterprise says San Diego Judge Kenneth So ruled late Friday that Cooper failed to show why more DNA tests are needed. Two previous DNA tests of the items concluded Cooper was the killer.

    Cooper had escaped from a nearby prison two days before the killings of Doug and Peggy Ryen, their 10-year-old daughter Jessica and 11-year-old neighbor Christopher Hughes.

    http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...#ixzz1BXCfaX3E

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    December 27, 2012

    CHINO HILLS: Kevin Cooper’s latest DNA test appeal turned down

    The convicted family killer tries again to get evidence that was tested twice redone; a judge says no

    BY RICHARD K. De ATLEY
    The Press Enterprise

    Kevin Cooper, convicted and sentenced to death for the 1983 knife-and-hatchet slayings of two adults and two children in a Chino Hills ranch home, was turned down Thursday, Dec. 27, by a federal appellate court in his effort to bring in another DNA evidence test he claims will prove his innocence.

    Cooper contended in his federal court action that “he is the target of a long-running conspiracy, involving members of the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department and others, to manipulate evidence and prevent him from proving he was framed,” the opinion from the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals said.

    A San Diego Superior Court judge in 2011 denied Cooper’s bid for a third series of tests on a T-shirt, a speck of blood on a paint chip, and a vial of blood drawn from Cooper after his arrest.

    San Diego Superior Court Judge Kenneth K. So said Cooper “has not demonstrated there is reasonable probability he would have had a more favorable outcome if the requested DNA results had been available.”

    There had been two previous DNA tests of the items in the course of Cooper's appeals. Cooper requested both. The results concluded Cooper was the killer.

    Instead of appealing to the California Supreme Court, Cooper filed a complaint alleging conspiracy in Los Angeles federal court. It named San Bernardino County District Attorney Mike Ramos, along with the law-enforcement officers and two forensic technicians.

    U.S. District Judge Stephen V. Wilson in Los Angeles dismissed Cooper's action because it constituted a de facto appeal of the state court judgment. The three-judge panel Thursday upheld Wilson's opinion, agreeing that federal courts lacked jurisdiction to hear his case.

    Cooper, 54, was sentenced to death in 1985 for the hatchet-and-knife attack that took the lives of Doug and Peggy Ryen; their 10-year-old daughter, Jessica; and neighbor Christopher Hughes, 11, who was staying overnight at the Ryens' home in Chino Hills.

    The Ryens' 8-year-old son, Joshua, had his throat cut and a head puncture wound, but survived the attack.

    The slayings took place two days after Cooper had escaped from the nearby California Institution for Men in Chino. Cooper admitted hiding in a vacant house near the Ryen home, but he denied killing anyone.

    The appellate judges noted in their opinion that since Cooper was sentenced to death, “his case has traveled up, down and around the federal and state judiciaries.”

    “Cooper has vigorously pursued his postconviction options," the appellate judges wrote. "He has appeared before multiple three-judge panels and an en banc panel of this court, as well as various federal district and state courts. While his efforts have questioned the credibility of the police work and forensic evidence, they have failed to result in a reversal of his conviction.”

    Cooper’s campaign for DNA re-testing goes back to a series of San Diego federal court hearings and scientific tests in 2004-05 on his claims of evidence-tampering and police misconduct.

    San Diego-based U.S. District Judge Marilyn Huff ruled in 2005 that Cooper's claims were unsupported. She upheld his convictions and death sentence.

    Cooper went back to the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, which had ordered the Huff hearings, when Cooper was granted a last-minute reprieve from his death sentence in early 2004.

    A three-judge circuit panel upheld Huff in late 2007, and Cooper asked for a second hearing before a large panel of 9th Circuit judges.

    In 2009, the circuit judges denied Cooper that re-hearing, but several jurists sharply dissented. The U.S. Supreme Court declined to take the case. Cooper went to state court on the DNA issue, resulting in Judge So’s 2011 ruling. It was heard in San Diego County because his original trial was held there, in a change of venue from San Bernardino County.

    In Thursday’s ruling, Cooper can seek a re-hearing before the 9th Circuit or appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

    http://www.pe.com/local-news/san-ber...urned-down.ece

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    January 4, 2008

    Death row inmate Kevin Cooper has asked a federal appeals court to give him another chance to argue his innocence.

    A three-judge panel of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals last month denied Cooper's appeal of his 1985 murder conviction. Cooper now claims the panel's decision was wrong, and he wants a larger panel of judges from the court to rehear his arguments and reconsider the ruling.

    The court has not yet said whether it will grant the rehearing. It has, however, ordered state prosecutors to file a response to the request by the end of next week.

    Cooper remains on death row for the killings of Douglas and Peggy Ryen, their daughter, Jessica, 10, and houseguest, Christopher Hughes, 11.

    The four were attacked as they slept in the Ryens' Chino Hills home in 1983, just days after Cooper escaped from the nearby California Institution for Men.

    The Ryens' 9-year-old son, Joshua, survived a slashed throat.

    A jury convicted Cooper of the murders and recommended he receive the death penalty.

    His appeals, however, have lasted more than two decades, during which he has denied the killings and claimed corrupt police and prosecutors framed him.

    Despite problems with evidence in his case, the courts have repeatedly upheld his conviction, most recently last month when the three-judge panel of the 9th Circuit unanimously rejected his arguments.

    Two of the judges, Pamela Ann Rymer and Ronald M. Gould, said the evidence against him was overwhelming.

    The third judge, Margaret McKeown, ruled against him on procedural grounds, despite citing deep concerns over "evidentiary gaps, mishandling of evidence and suspicious circumstances" surrounding his guilt.

    Cooper's attorneys seized on McKeown's opinion in asking for the rehearing.

    "In light of Judge McKeown's condemnation of the prosecution's repeated mishandling and destruction of evidence, Mr. Cooper submits he cannot be executed without violating the U.S. Constitution," the attorneys wrote in their request for a rehearing.

    On a Web site maintained by his supporters, Cooper calls the three-judge panel's ruling "a disappointment," but said it was "not unexpected."

    He said Rymer and Gould have consistently ruled against him for the past eight years.

    He goes on to express frustration that his conviction is allowed to stand despite McKeown's findings, and he vowed to maintain his appeals for as long as he can.

    "I want for you to know that I will continue this fight as long as I live, and I truly hope that you will continue fighting with me!" he wrote to his supporters.

    (Source: The Associated Press)

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    May 11, 2009

    California death row inmate narrowly loses new hearing


    SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - A California inmate has narrowly missed getting a new hearing to reconsider his death penalty conviction.

    At least 11 judges on the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals wrote Monday that they would reconsider the case of Kevin Cooper, who was convicted of the 1983 hacking deaths of four Chino Hills residents. Cooper needed the votes of 14 of the court's 27 judges to get a new hearing.

    His last avenue of appeal is now the U.S. Supreme Court.

    A three-judge appeals panel earlier ruled that Cooper's guilt was overwhelming despite claims that investigators framed him.

    Before that, a trial court had agreed to consider Cooper's claims to innocence and halted his 2004 execution the day before he was to receive a lethal injection. That court later upheld his death penalty.

    http://www.sandiego6.com/news/state/...g.cspx?rss=801

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    Fate of convicted killer Kevin Cooper unresolved

    It's been 30 years since three members of the Ryen family and a young neighbor were brutally murdered -- hacked to death -- inside their home in an area that is now Chino Hills.

    So much has changed since then. And yet, there are things that have stayed the same.

    Kevin Cooper, the convicted killer sentenced to death two years after the crimes, still sits in a prison cell. After multiple appeals and a moratorium on executions in California, Cooper's fate remains unknown.

    Cooper's lawyers are still fighting for his life -- claiming he is an innocent man who was framed for the crimes.

    And the man who originally prosecuted the case still believes Cooper should have been put to death years ago.

    Mary Ann Hughes, the mother of one of the victims, 11-year-old Christopher Hughes, who was sleeping over at the Ryen house, still lives in the same house and looks up the same hill where the slayings happened.

    As time passes, the good days increase for the Hughes family. But not a day goes by that Mary Ann doesn't think about her son.

    "For the last 30 years, we've been looking for closure," said family spokesman Robert Olin, Mary Ann's brother. "And we haven't been able to do that."

    Olin said the family will not have peace until Cooper is executed.

    On the morning of June 5, 1983, Christopher's father was the first to discover the bodies.

    He came looking for his son, who had spent the night at the Ryen house on English Road, and found the mangled bodies of Franklin Douglas Ryen and Ryen's wife, Peggy, both 41, and their 10-year-old daughter, Jessica, all of whom had been hacked and stabbed to death.

    He found his own son dead and covered in blood near the Ryens' bedroom door.

    He also discovered Joshua Ryen, 8, also drenched in blood, clinging to life. Joshua, the Ryens' youngest child, survived a slashed throat, a hatchet blow to the head and stab wounds to his back.

    Not long after the victims were discovered, officials turned their attention to Kevin Cooper, an inmate who had escaped from the nearby California Institution for Men. A manhunt ensued and Cooper was found two months later on a boat off Santa Barbara.

    Cooper, now 55, was convicted of the crime on Feb. 19, 1985, and sentenced to die Feb. 10, 2004, at San Quentin State Prison.

    He has appealed his case for years.

    In 2001, Cooper became the first death row inmate in the state to get post-conviction DNA tests of evidence. Those tests found his DNA on several key pieces of evidence, supporting his guilt, officials said.

    But Cooper has yet to be executed.

    "We wanted it done in a reasonable time," said Olin, a Fontana resident. "Maybe two, three years (after his conviction). Five years. Ten years, would that be asking too much?"

    When asked if he thinks that will ever happen, Olin said, "I hope so."

    They're still waiting.

    "We'll always care what happens," Olin said. "We will not lose interest in the case no matter how long it goes on."

    Wrong man?

    Cooper is a repeat criminal who escaped from the Chino prison two days before the 1983 killings. From the beginning, Cooper, who is black, has maintained his innocence, saying the brutal crimes were committed by three white men.

    "The murders of the Ryens are absolutely horrible, despicable, terrible events," said Norman C. Hile, whose Sacramento-based law firm Orrick, Herrington and Sutclifse LLP took on the case in 2003. "The way those bodies were left, the way those people were hacked to death."

    But there is a significant amount of evidence that shows his client was not the killer, Cooper's attorney said.

    "It would be even more tragic to execute an innocent person for the murders and to allow the real killers to get away," he said.

    Cooper did not get a fair trial, Hile said.

    He says the Sheriff's Department destroyed or lost evidence, the prosecution presented false information at the trial and that new facts have come up since the conviction.

    More testing should have been done at the time, Hile added, and new tests should be conducted since DNA technology has advanced so much over the years.

    Cooper has been fighting the conviction since 1985, but has exhausted his appeals and cannot file another petition unless he first gets approval from the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Hile said.

    He is currently on a list with more than a dozen people who have no appeals left and would be eligible for immediate execution when and if the state re-instates the death penalty.

    California has had a moratorium on executions since 2006 as a result of legal challenges to its execution procedures in both the state and federal courts.

    Crime like no other

    Dennis Kottmeier, who was both the San Bernardino County district attorney and lead prosecutor on the Cooper case, noticed a difference in the then-unincorporated community of Chino Hills.

    "Everybody bought guns," he said in a recent phone interview. "You have to realize this wasn't just a murder that had some sort of explanation.... This was a family that had been killed in their home while they were trying to sleep. Not just killed but butchered.

    "To this day I don't remember anything like this."

    The trial took about four months, Kottmeier said, and within a year of the conviction, the California Supreme Court had verified Cooper's sentence.

    Expecting the execution to happen, Kottmeier joined the Hughes family in February 2004 at San Quentin.

    But hours before he was to be put to death, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals gave Cooper a stay, allowing the defense to file more motions and eventually conduct new DNA results.

    "It took about two months but everything came back showing that Cooper had done the killings," Kottmeier said. "There was no doubt in the testing that he did it."

    But that wasn't the end of it.

    The defense wanted more, Kottmeier said, referring to the appeals, petitions and requests made over the years that have stalled Cooper's execution.

    "I didn't think we were sending him to die of old age," Kottmeier said. "At the end of this, I thought he would be executed."

    Not forgotten

    The tight-knit community that makes up the Chino Valley still feels the effect of the most notorious mass murder in San Bernardino County history.

    Residents on English Road did not want to talk about the killings.

    Thirty years later, one resident said people on the street are still sensitive to the subject -- even those who moved there after the crimes.

    Strangers still come to the street hoping for a glimpse of the crime scene, city officials said.

    "Those of us that call Chino our home still have a memory of those vicious killings," said longtime Mayor Dennis Yates.

    Yates still recalls the chaotic aftermath.

    "A friend of mine lived one house up from where the slaughter happened," he said. "I remember how everybody was just terror-stricken because (Cooper) got away. Everybody in the state was extremely relieved when they caught him."

    For a time after the deaths, no one would allow their children to run around after dark and every parent knew where their child was at all times, he added. No one in the area breathed a sigh of relief until Cooper was captured on a boat near Santa Barbara.

    Even the prison, the Chino Institution for Men, was affected.

    "CIM had elevated from a 'calm, nothing happening' prison to a 'we've got killers escaping' facility," Yates said.

    Policies for security and communication have changed since Cooper's time at the prison. Residents have moved in and out of the Chino Hills neighborhood where all of this began. But decades later, the community has still not found a way to erase the memory of that one horrific night.

    "It's still fresh in everybody's mind," Yates said.

    http://www.dailybulletin.com/news/ci...#ixzz2VjcWlddl
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    October 30, 2009

    Attorney General's Office blasts Kevin Cooper's innocence claims in petition response

    The state Attorney General's Office responded this week to Death Row inmate Kevin Cooper's petition to the U.S. Supreme Court, and urged the court to deny Cooper's September request for intervention in his decades-old case.

    In their opposition filing, state attorneys detail evidence pointing to Cooper's guilt in the 1983 slaying of four people in Chino Hills, and assail Cooper's claim that he's had in insufficient opportunity to review evidence he claims will prove his innocence.

    "(Cooper's) inability to prove his innocence stems from the fact that he is so plainly guilty," state attorneys write. "Further review of (Cooper's) highly fact-bound case is unwarranted."

    Following numerous unsuccessful appeals, Cooper was scheduled to be executed in 2004. But on the day of the scheduled execution, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals granted a stay to allow Cooper an opportunity to conduct forensic testing on a T-shirt and hair evidence.

    Rather than indicate innocence, the testing revealed further evidence of Cooper's guilt, state attorneys wrote in their opposition filing, which was submitted Tuesday to the Supreme Court.

    "The agreed-upon post-conviction DNA testing conducted to allow (Cooper) to prove his innocence only further inculpated him and confirmed the overwhelming evidence of his guilt presented in his state-court trial," state attorneys write.

    In his September petition, Cooper asked the Supreme Court to order lower courts to allow Cooper to conduct additional testing on evidence in his case.

    Cooper was convicted of murder and sentenced to death in 1985 for the brutal killings of Douglas and Peggy Ryen, their 10-year-old daughter Jessica, and 11-year-old houseguest Christopher Hughes.

    Cooper escaped from the California Institute for Men in Chino in the days before the incident, and admitted that he hid after his escape in a home adjacent to the Ryens' property.

    Investigators uncovered evidence linking Cooper to the crime in the Ryens' home, in the house where Cooper was hiding, and in a car that was stolen from the Ryens' home and later abandoned in Long Beach, state attorneys wrote in their opposition filing.

    "Whatever standard might be applied, there is no credible evidence that anyone other than (Cooper)" committed the killings, wrote state attorneys.

    Attorneys for Cooper will reply to the state's opposition filing next week. The Supreme Court may make a decision by the end of November about whether they will hear the case, said Norman Hile, one of Cooper's attorneys.

    Hile declined to respond to the state's opposition filing during an interview Wednesday, saying he first wanted to spend more time reviewing the document.

    He also declined to discuss what future legal measures Cooper's attorneys may take if the Supreme Court declines to hear Cooper's case.

    But even if Cooper's appeals are exhausted, an execution date cannot be set until California finds an execution method it deems humane.

    Executions of Death Row inmates have been on hold in the state since 2006 because of concerns that lethal injection may constitute cruel and unusual punishment.

    In his September petition, Cooper claimed that three white men were responsible for the killings. Witnesses described three white men leaving the scene, and later saw three white men arrive at a nearby bar, according to Cooper's petition.

    Cooper has alleged that investigators may have planted evidence against him to secure a conviction and thwart attempts to prove his claims of innocence.

    http://www.contracostatimes.com/cali...nclick_check=1

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    INMATE: AWAITING EXECUTION IS ‘A LIVING DEATH’

    My name is Kevin Cooper. I am a 55-year-old African American man on death row in California. I have been here, trying to prove my innocence, for 28 years.

    In 2004, I came within hours of being executed, before the courts affirmed my right to have new evidence of my innocence reviewed. Most people can’t imagine what it is like to literally count the remaining minutes of their lives, but for those of us on death row, this is how our very existence is framed — bracketed by birth and the time we are strapped to a gurney and our veins are filled with poison.

    Between the moment we are sentenced and our death date, we die a profound psychological and spiritual death. It is a living death. In a report released this week, the Center for Constitutional Rights and the International Federation for Human Rights detail abysmal human rights conditions on death row in Louisiana and California that they say amount to torture. What they write about, I have lived.

    I spend most of each day inside of an 11-by-4½-foot box. California has 741 prisoners on death row, far more than any other state, and 65 percent of them are minorities. All but one death row prisoner in California is too poor to afford a private attorney, and we wait three to five years to have an attorney even appointed for our appeal. We spend an average of 20 years, first waiting for lawyers to be assigned to our cases, then waiting for the chance to show our innocence or challenge our sentence, and finally waiting for court decisions. Sixty death-row prisoners in California have died of natural causes while waiting for their case to wind through the courts. Twenty-three have committed suicide. Only 13 have been executed.

    I wish you could understand the horror of living under the constant threat of death, each and every day, year after year, for decades. I have seen other prisoners turn into vegetables, become dependent on psychotropic medication, give up, or kill themselves. I’ve never known a death-row prisoner who has not, at some point, felt it was better just to volunteer for execution, in a desperate attempt to end this hell.

    And yet, even living under a death sentence for years cannot compare to living under the threat of imminent execution on a certain date and time. Fifty-five days before my 2004 execution date, guards began monitoring me day and night, asking with perverse concern whether I was “all right,” and the lights were kept on in my cell 24 hours a day. In the ultimate irony, this was to ensure that I did not commit suicide and cheat the state out of killing me. I was repeatedly strip searched, sometimes several times a day. I was asked what I wanted for my last meal and what size clothes I wear, so that I could receive a brand-new set of clothes to be executed in. I made a will. I had my final photograph taken. I stood and watched the executioners take cotton swabs, alcohol pads, and other items into the execution chamber to use on me. I watched as they searched for my “good veins” to insert the needle.

    I lived with this around the clock for nearly two months until, less than four hours before I was to die, I was abruptly taken from that pre-death chamber and returned to my cell as though nothing had happened. I was offered psychotropic drugs, which I declined. I have never received any other help recovering from that experience.

    Executions in California are currently suspended while the state searches for a method of executing 741 people that won’t be struck down by the courts. But once they are resumed, I expect to be at the top of the list to be killed.

    Not everyone here has come this close to the moment of execution. But all 741 of us live with the essential terror that we will one day learn we have only weeks to live. We will start a daily countdown to our last day. We will begin to go through that ghastly ritual of death. Then, in a month or two, we will be killed by our own government. How a country that claims to be a human rights leader can maintain this practice defies understanding — innocent or guilty, no one deserves this torture.

    Cooper, who is on death row at San Quentin, was recently granted a hearing on his case before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, the legal body of the Organization of American States. It will take place Oct. 28.

    http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2013/...?#article-copy
    An uninformed opponent is a dangerous opponent.

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    October 22, 2009

    Experts: Success unlikely in Kevin Cooper's bid to Supreme Court

    Like all petitioners to the U.S. Supreme Court, Death Row inmate Kevin Cooper has a very slim chance of the court hearing his decades-old murder case, according to legal experts.

    And after reviewing the facts of Cooper's case, two law professors say Cooper's odds for success may be worse than the average petitioner - and the Supreme Court grants fewer than 1 percent of petitions.

    "They're all longshots, and his might be more of a longshot than others," said Laurie Levenson, a professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles. "That's not saying he hasn't got anything going for him, but you have to be the needle in the haystack."

    The Supreme Court is set to decide on Tuesday whether to hear Cooper's case. Their decision is expected to be announced Nov. 30.

    Cooper, now 51, was convicted of murder and sentenced to death in 1985 for the brutal killings in Chino Hills of a married couple, their daughter, and a houseguest.

    In June 1983, Douglas and Peggy Ryen, their daughter Jessica, 10, and Christopher Hughes, 11, were attacked with a hatchet, a knife and a weapon similar to an ice pick. The victims each suffered at least 20 wounds during the attack.

    Cooper has long maintained his innocence, and his attorneys argue in their petition to the Supreme Court that he should have an additional opportunity to review evidence in his case.

    Reviews by lower courts in Cooper's case have been unfair, the attorneys argue, because lower courts have required too high a standard when considering Cooper's innocence claims.

    Cooper is urging the Supreme Court to hear his case to provide guidance to lower courts about what standard of review applies when considering an inmate's innocence.

    In its response to Cooper's petition, the state Attorney General's Office "seems to do a good job in dispelling the notion that there is a reason the court should grant certiorari (review) in this case," said Barry McDonald, a law professor at Pepperdine University in Malibu.

    "It seems to me that the state has a better case, that there's really not a definite circuit split for the court to resolve, so I think it's unlikely that they'll grant it," McDonald said.

    The Supreme Court typically seeks cases that will allow it to clarify unsettled areas of the law that lower courts have failed to interpret consistently, according to legal experts.

    "They don't see their role as just correcting mistakes in lower courts, even in death penalty cases," said Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the UC Irvine School of Law. "They really see their role as providing clarity for the law across the country."

    The court generally avoids cases where it's asked to review evidence and make a ruling based partly on its views about a petitioner's guilt or innocence - and those issues are central in Cooper's petition, McDonald said.

    "The issues are that the state botched or mishandled or in some way tainted the evidence below," said McDonald, who stressed that his review of documents in Cooper's petition was cursory. "Those are all kind of factual issues that the Supreme Court doesn't get involved in."

    Levenson said Cooper's chance for success may also be harmed by the brutal facts of his case.

    "The bottom line is that this guy's alleged to have committed a very horrific crime," she said. "... It's one of those situations where I don't know whether he'll have any natural sympathies."

    Levenson said she believed the court wants to clarify what standard of review applies in cases where inmates claim actual innocence, but she believes Cooper's case might not be the case the court wants to use to clarify that area of the law.

    "It's always a longshot, getting to the Supreme Court," Levenson said. "Death penalty cases get more attention than others, but it certainly doesn't make it any type of guarantee that his petition would be granted.

    "And in fact, given some of the facts of the case, including his access to additional DNA tests and frankly the inconclusive results of the earlier tests, it makes it tough for him to get further review."

    When the Supreme Court meets for a conference Tuesday to consider whether to grant Cooper's petition, they will be reviewing "a batch" of cases and only singling out some of them for discussion, McDonald said.

    It's possible that Cooper's petition could be denied without being discussed, McDonald said.

    Four of the nine Supreme Court justices must vote in favor of a petition for it to be granted. If Cooper's petition is granted, his case will likely be heard by the Supreme Court in March or April, Chemerinsky said.

    And if the Supreme Court denies Cooper's petition, Cooper will likely have further legal avenues to pursue before he is put to death, Levenson said.

    There is currently a moratorium in place for executions in California due to concerns about the state's method of administering legal injections.

    Once the state finds a method of execution it deems constitutional, Cooper or other inmates can sue to challenge the legality of the method, potentially further delaying executions, Levenson said.

    Cooper can also have his legal team continue to investigate his case to seek evidence supporting his innocence claims, Levenson said.

    "I don't think he's going to quit trying just because a lot of legal avenues are now closed," Levenson said.


    A shot in the dark

    Fewer than 1 percent of petitioners have their cases heard by the U.S. Supreme Court.

    Chart: Year / Petitions filed / Petitions granted (percentage)

    2006 / 8,857 / 78 (0.88)

    2007 / 8,241 / 75 (0.91)

    2008 / 10,000* / 88 (0.88)

    * Estimate

    (Source: U.S. Supreme Court)

    http://www.dailybulletin.com/ci_1384...ce=most_viewed

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