Friends, On Thursday, Keith Cooper’s lawyer received the official response from the Elkhart County Prosecutor’s Office to the petition for post-conviction relief. No surprise, they are opposed to his petition. Here are some quotations from their response. Just think about what they are saying: • The defendant [Keith Cooper] has failed to state a claim upon which relief can [be] granted in his Petition for Post-Conviction Relief, • The conviction and sentence entered against said Defendant [Cooper] were proper under Indiana law and the defendant’s petition is completely without merit, I could keep going, but essentially the response of the prosecutor is that Cooper is procedurally barred from proceeding with his petition for a new trial. A judge has not yet ruled to settle this dispute between Cooper and the prosecutor’s office. However, the response from the prosecutor’s office is that the deal they offered Cooper in 2006 to release him on time served with his conviction intact prevents him getting a new trial. That is an outrage enough. However, yesterday, Curtis Hill himself has finally publicly commented on Keith Cooper’s case. You can read his entire statement here: http://www.elkhartcountyprosecutor.com/news/press-releases/prosecuting-attorney-s-response-media-inquiries-keith-cooper-case. However, I will emphasize a few passages: • Recent media reports have characterized Cooper's 1997 robbery conviction as a "wrongful conviction" and suggest that Cooper is “innocent” and/or has been “exonerated”. Cooper is certainly free to proclaim his innocence. However, to date, there has been no judicial determination that he is “innocent” or “exonerated” regarding his 1997 conviction. • Many characterizations and representations are being made through the media which, to my knowledge, have not been properly or fully adjudicated in an appropriate forum. While some of the characterizations and representations on the evidence might be proven to be accurate, the fact remains that, to date, there has been no such judicial determination. • As Cooper has now filed an additional Petition for Post-Conviction Relief before the court, it is the responsibility of my office to review the matter, defend the record, and seek Due Process for Cooper as well as the citizens of the State of Indiana in accordance with the Indiana Rules of Procedure. Let’s review a few details. It was Curtis Hill himself who finalized the deal in April 2006. You can go back to the petition update of August 29 to see that document; Hill’s name is on the first line. In December 2005, the Indiana Court of Appeals overturned the conviction of Keith Cooper’s co-defendant Christopher Parish. In March 2006, the results of the DNA test done on the hat recovered at the crime scene came back negative for Keith Cooper and positive for Johlanis Ervin, then and currently in prison in Michigan for murder. Keith Cooper took the deal in 2006 because his family was then living in a homeless shelter and a retrial would have likely taken two years. But Hill had to know that the case against Cooper was falling apart when he offered Cooper the deal. Now Hill is double-talking. On the one hand, he demands that the fact of Cooper’s innocent must be determined in court. On the other hand, his office is intent on preventing this case from ever reaching court. Someone really should ask Governor Mike Pence if this situation is what he wants to continue defending as he refuses to pardon Keith Cooper. But this is a time for calling Curtis Hill to account. He should not get away with having it both ways, as if he has never had anything to do with causing the situation in which Keith Cooper finds himself. We have had close to 112,000 signatures on this petition since it began in early August. If everyone reading this update would post a link to it as a comment to any posting on Curtis Hill’s Facebook, we would certainly let him know that we see what he’s doing, the commitment he has made to maintain an ongoing injustice. If you would also tweet this to his Twitter feed, we will draw even more attention to Hill’s injustice. And the election is Tuesday. Consider contacting the Indiana GOP with your objection to their candidate’s handling of Cooper’s case. Contacts: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/curtishillforindiana/ Twitter: @CurtisHill_IN Indiana GOP phone number: 317-635-7561 and email link: http://indiana.gop/contact I don’t think contacting the Elkhart County Prosecutor’s Office will do much good next week as the election itself will affect its activities. We may return to contacting them in the future. People have occasionally had questions about me. I did an interview with a reporter for Community Newspaper Holdings, Inc., a consortium of newspapers of large towns and small cities around the country. If you saw the article when it first went online, it actually had me as a GOP candidate to be Indiana’s governor! Yikes! But if you’re interested, here you go: http://www.washtimesherald.com/cnhi_network/column-pence-declined-to-pardon-wrongfully-convicted-man/article_a2051724-2d9b-55a7-8172-d5543aa8edfa.html Finally, separate from this petition effort is another effort maintained by Caleb Walden to raise some money for Keith Cooper personally. Walden runs the Pardon Keith Cooper Facebook page. If you are interested, here’s a link: https://www.crowdpac.com/campaigns/111981/tell-governor-pence-that-you-support-the-fight-to-pardon-keith-cooper-if-politicians-wont-help-keith-we-will So, to conclude, let’s give Curtis Hill some grief for his stand for injustice. Thank you for supporting a pardon for Keith Cooper. Jack Heller