--here I opened wide the door;
Darkness there and nothing more.
Edgar Allan Poe
Down in Norman, Oklahoma testimony continued in the manslaughter trial of Cole Hopper. Hopper is in the dock accused of being complicit in the shooting of 19 year old Kelsey Bransby in late October of 2011.
The Norman Transcript's Arianna Pickard wrote on Friday that a tape played for the jury was that of a phone call, Danielle Cooley made to a jailer who she had begun confiding in. In November Cooley pleaded guilty to second degree murder in Bransby's death and received a 25 year suspended sentence. Pickard quoted Cooley as saying on the tape that, "His mom (Hopper's) and family keep trying to make me feel bad. I can't help that he did it. So I'm not going to help him get out of it--I'm not going to help him lie in court."
On the stand, Cooley then repeated what she'd said previously by telling the court she didn't actually see Hopper shoot Ms. Bransby. However on Thursday she did say that Hopper never told her that Kelsey Bransby shot herself.
According to Pickard three other witnesses testified they'd seen Hopper with guns before the shooting. One testified that Hopper had accidentally fired a weapon while cleaning it about a month and a half before Ms. Bransby was shot. However, the most damaging testimony might have come from a neighbor named, Kenneth Wall. Wall reportedly said that Hopper would often point a hand gun at both Cooley and Bransby and say, "boom." Wall claimed, "It was his sense of humor."
On Friday, Pickard reports that OKCPD officer Randy Kirby testified that he was one of two cops responding to Bransby's apartment the night she was shot. Pickard quotes him as saying he found her on the floor in the living room and her, "body was kind of shaking and she was inhaling rapidly."
EMT, Greg Ford told the jury that Ms. Bransby was alive when he arrived, but unresponsive and her left eye was swollen and protruding out from her head. A live bullet was found on the floor near a closet where Hopper reportedly kept his things.
A witness identified by Pickard only as, "Wesner" testified that he and his girlfriend arrived at Bransby's apartment around 8pm that evening and found her leaning over the couch, breathing strangely. At first he didn't realize she was wounded, but when he went to shake her in order to wake her up he saw the injury. Pickard wrote that Wesner told his girlfriend to call 911 and then, while they waited for help to arrive, they searched the apartment hoping to get rid of any drugs before the police showed up.
They didn't do a very good job. A crime scene investigator testified he found four syringes and two small bags of "white rocks."
Apparently Hopper's name was connected to the shooting from the very moment the investigation began. Officer Kirby said that Wesner told him Hopper had left the apartment earlier in the day while Bransby was getting ready to meet a Mexican male. Why Kirby would have asked that question, or Wesner would have volunteered, or even known such information is unclear.
In November of 2011 police detective Tyler Larson interviewed Hopper. During the questioning, Larson said Hopper told him that Kelsey Bransby owed money to a guy named Manny and that this Manny was part of a Mexican drug cartel. Hopper also told him he thought members of the cartel could be responsible for the shooting.
Larson then testified he tracked down, Manny and questioned him. The detective maintains the individual didn't appear to have anything at all to do with Kelsey Bransby's death.
One would assume it was at that point, Cole Dean Hopper and Danielle Cooley became the primary focus of the investigation, if they weren't already.
No matter what the case, this tragic and cautionary tale is scheduled to resume Monday morning.
As with all such stories, there will not be a happy ending.
sic vita est
6-15-13
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