The Murders Began by Aime Austin

Author:Aime Austin [Austin, Aime]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781644140949
Publisher: Moore Digital Media

Twenty-Six

Season 2, Episode 6:

Fifteen to Life

Things have gotten complicated. As I say that, I’m thinking it’s the biggest understatement I’ve ever made out loud.

When I started this season, I thought it would be an investigation into garden variety corruption. The kind that Boston, and Detroit, and Chicago, and even Cleveland have mastered, made a fine art. Instead, I think I’ve opened Pandora’s box.

This is The Murders Began with me, your host, Blake Hardin Tatum.

Tia Wetzel was indicted for the murder of her date, Malcolm Pointer. There was little surprise there. From my interview with her, and Vernon Dinwiddie, we know that Wetzel has gotten on the wrong side of a few people in law enforcement and in the prosecutor’s office. She says she’s been framed a second time. Even though it sounds like the plot of one of those police procedurals we all watch in reruns every night at ten, I’m inclined to believe her.

My investigation has turned me into a spider. Whenever I put one leg on one part of the web, another part vibrates.

In the same grand jury session where Wetzel was indicted, another woman was as well. This time it was a woman named Tyisha Cooley. Her charge was also murder. Like Wetzel, Cooley isn’t new to the justice system.

I’m not saying that right. I do not want you to think she’s a career criminal. Far from it. For the majority of her life, she lived like any upstanding citizen, working as a rule-following compliance officer for Society Bank.

Cooley is relatively new to the system. A couple of years ago, she was indicted for involuntary manslaughter. Her supposed crime: giving a fatal dose of heroin to Sarah Pope; yes, she was related to the county prosecutor. She was Lori Pope’s half sister.

I know it sounds bad, Tyisha Cooley helping Pope shoot up, but there’s a lot more to the story. Cooley had been her best friend since they met on a fateful night of the 1966 Hough riots. The younger Pope was a lifelong drug user. Cooley had gotten her friend of forty-plus years a spot in a residential rehab. Sarah begged for one las hit in order to stave off withdrawal. With many collapsed veins, Sarah Pope often needed help injecting. At the direction of a guy named Ja Roach, Cooley did the shot. Sarah Pope did not survive the night.

Who has Tyisha Cooley allegedly murdered this time around? Jabari Roach. He was an addict who had supplied Sarah Pope for years. Roach and Cooley only came in contact with each other because of Pope.

In a plot twist that’s unlikely to be a coincidence, Roach was possibly an informant for Lori Pope, starting when she worked for the city of Lakewood. Roach was a twenty-year resident there. Despite Roach being involved in criminal activity for two long decades, he was never arrested, never charged, nor was he ever convicted of any crime.

One third of Americans are arrested by the age of twenty-three. Fifty percent of black men have been arrested by that age.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.