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From death row to freedom, Paula Cooper dead of apparent suicide (Pope John Paul II Interceded)
Northwest Indiana Times ^ | 5-26-2015 | Dan Carden

Posted on 05/26/2015 5:03:59 PM PDT by tcrlaf

Paula Cooper, a Gary native who at age 16 was the youngest death row inmate in the United States before an international outcry helped reduce her sentence, killed herself Tuesday near an Indianapolis office building.

The Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department said officers were called to the 9500 block of Angola Court, near the northwest Indianapolis-Carmel border, Tuesday morning in response to a report of a body lying near a tree.

The Marion County coroner's office confirmed that Cooper, 45, was pronounced dead at the scene at 7:38 a.m. Indianapolis time from a suspected self-inflicted gunshot to the head.

Cooper's death comes 30 years and 12 days after she and three friends murdered Ruth Pelke, a 78-year-old Gary Bible school teacher, in Pelke's Glen Park home.

According to records, the teenagers pretended to be interested in taking part in Pelke's Bible classes to get into the house where Cooper, then 15, ultimately stabbed Pelke 33 times with a butcher knife.

She and the other girls, all students at Gary's Lew Wallace High School, then ransacked the house and got away with $10 and Pelke's car

(Excerpt) Read more at nwitimes.com ...


TOPICS:
KEYWORDS: cooper; karma; murder; suicide
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To: tcrlaf
The now-deceased:


21 posted on 05/26/2015 5:24:39 PM PDT by PLMerite ("The issue is never the issue. The issue is the Revolution.")
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To: tcrlaf

She carried out what the liberals would not allow our justice system to do.


22 posted on 05/26/2015 5:27:50 PM PDT by jazusamo (0bama to go 'full-Mussolini' after elections: Mark Levin....and the turkey has.)
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To: tcrlaf

“From death row to freedom, ... “


I guess she never found freedom .... at least not in her mind.


23 posted on 05/26/2015 5:28:56 PM PDT by boycott
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To: tcrlaf

So the sentence was carried out then,


24 posted on 05/26/2015 5:33:36 PM PDT by MileHi (Liberalism is an ideology of parasites, hypocrites, grievance mongers, victims, and control freaks.)
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To: GeronL
30 years late

'Bout how long it would take to carry out a death sentence.

Only we were spared the editorials and protests and riots and the rolling over of yet another cowardly judge.

25 posted on 05/26/2015 5:34:29 PM PDT by Fightin Whitey
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To: Farmer Dean
Just how did a convicted felon like her obtain a gun?

lol!

26 posted on 05/26/2015 5:35:29 PM PDT by sargon
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To: yarddog

Doubt it. Sounds more like guilt was eating at her constantly, but she would not go to the One who could clean the guilt. Took matters into her own hands ala Judas.


27 posted on 05/26/2015 5:36:06 PM PDT by wbarmy (I chose to be a sheepdog once I saw what happens to the sheep.)
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To: yarddog
Maybe she made peace with herself before committing suicide.

Obviously not.

28 posted on 05/26/2015 5:36:10 PM PDT by sportutegrl
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To: Farmer Dean
Just how did a convicted felon like her obtain a gun?

Well, you've heard of Obama phones, maybe this was an Obama gun. 😎

29 posted on 05/26/2015 5:36:33 PM PDT by Mark17 (The love of God, how rich and pure, how measureless and strong. It shall forever more endure.)
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To: Mark17

Please,don’t give that SOB any new ideas.


30 posted on 05/26/2015 5:38:25 PM PDT by Farmer Dean (stop worrying about what they want to do to you,start thinking about what you want to do to them)
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To: tcrlaf

Some would consider the outcome almost poetic justice.
Even still, if such a brutal murderer just had to be released after a shortened sentence, it probably didn’t help her to be put back into the same Indiana neighborhood where it all started. There are likely many residents still there who vividly remember the 33 stabbings tragedy.

Maybe Cooper realized her reputation was lower than whale sh*t, already due to history. Now, walking around looking for a job was not going to be easy either. Luckily, not all black criminals get the exalted “Gentle Giant” treatment, where any dumb thing you did against the law is instantly forgiven by the hood.


31 posted on 05/26/2015 5:39:22 PM PDT by lee martell (The sa)
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To: tcrlaf

The video in this article made before her release offers some insight.

Seems her life was in prison ... where she should have stayed.

http://www.nwitimes.com/news/local/lake/from-death-row-to-freedom-paula-cooper-dead-of-apparent/article_c3cb13a7-ae3b-5971-b1ac-d259a457a28c.html


32 posted on 05/26/2015 5:41:37 PM PDT by boycott
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To: tcrlaf

If she had faced the death penalty 30 years ago, she could have gone to the chair (or whatever) repentant and at peace. Apparently she never found peace in all those years in prison.

I have always thought that JPII’s focus on the death penalty has accomplished little but providing cover for pro-abortion Catholics, giving them a stick to beat pro-lifers with.

What JPII actually said in Evangelium Vitae didn’t change the Church’s moral teaching that capital punishment can be morally licit.


33 posted on 05/26/2015 5:41:43 PM PDT by Arthur McGowan
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To: tcrlaf

Justice has been served.


34 posted on 05/26/2015 5:42:55 PM PDT by sport
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To: Arthur McGowan

Do you remember Karla Faye Tucker?


35 posted on 05/26/2015 5:47:08 PM PDT by MHGinTN (Is it really all relative, Mister Einstein?)
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To: tcrlaf

One last murder


36 posted on 05/26/2015 5:56:06 PM PDT by American Guesser
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To: tcrlaf

The investigative channel did a deadly women program on this muder...these girls were sociopaths.


37 posted on 05/26/2015 6:01:38 PM PDT by RginTN
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To: Farmer Dean
Please,don’t give that SOB any new ideas.

LOL, well, how do you expect these poor, respectable downtrodden people to get their guns? What better way to pass a background check, then to not go through one in the first place? 😆 I have been on death row at San Quentin. The vast majority of them either die of old age, or suicide.

38 posted on 05/26/2015 6:05:21 PM PDT by Mark17 (The love of God, how rich and pure, how measureless and strong. It shall forever more endure.)
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To: tcrlaf

May God have mercy on her soul.


39 posted on 05/26/2015 6:06:07 PM PDT by Freedom_Is_Not_Free (Lord God help us.)
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To: tcrlaf
Pope John Paul finally interceded with the Governor, who commuted her sentence.

He should have been more concerned with her soul than her life. What does the church say about suicide?

40 posted on 05/26/2015 6:09:17 PM PDT by Hugin ("Do yourself a favor--first thing, get a firearm!",)
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