GA - Suspicion over heat death of Cooper, 22 mo., Cobb County, June 2014, #10

[jennapuppy]

Couple things

I now have a callous/blister on my finger from holding my phone scrolling through posts on this case.

I'm a huge thanks button pusher, but not too frequent of a poster, but this case has struck me very hard. My own baby boy was killed by his dad, so I tried to give mom a lot of leeway, but that's gone now. I can't imagine not wanting to see your baby immediately after finding out they'd died! Even if one was able to consider what.. state they'd be in physically...appearance-wise, I'd want to see and hold my baby anyway no matter. I held and rocked and kissed my baby after he died and never wanted to let go...this is all so heart-wrenching!

Sigh

What kind of sick £#(% not only does this to their sweet baby, and not only does the research to know exactly how tortuous the death is, but then gets sexually aroused while it's happening? Rhetorical. So disgusted!

I'm so so sorry for your loss.

 

[jennapuppy]

It doesn't prove anything about this case, but I did know someone who did this. Someone I went to school with got married and had a baby. A few months later, I heard that they had taken the baby with them to a drive-in movie, sprayed a can of bug spray in the car, and shut the door with the baby still inside. I never heard how long it took, but they did leave him in there until he was dead.

I ran into her several years later and she was about 8 months pregnant. Being the tactful person I am, I asked her how she could have another one after what she'd done to her first, and her response was that she had to do it because her husband didn't want kids and said he'd leave her if she didn't. I looked at her obviously pregnant body and asked if she was sure that her husband had changed his mind, and she just said no, she had changed husbands.

Back in school, I knew she wasn't the brightest light on the tree, but why didn't she think of "changing husbands" before agreeing to murder her own child? As far as I know, she turned out to be a good mother, but I never talked to her again. I'd like to think it was guilt that did it, but she died of a heart attack right around the time she turned 40.

Oh. My. Gosh.
These stories are breaking my heart.
I need to go find a baby to hug.

 

[Confusion]

She didn't get charged for killing her first baby?

I never asked her directly, or knew her married name, and it was before the internet so I can't say for sure what I heard is true. I was told that she was found not guilty but he wasn't. Rumor has it that her defense was that she was forced to do it by an abusive husband. None of it ever made sense to me, but killing a child (especially your own) never does,

 

[KALI]

I am wondering, how the video Ross Harris watched "how to survive in prison is working out for him tonight"?
Maybe he should have googled a video, that was about..." How to survive in prison, when inmates and guards think you are a pasty, whimpy child torturer"?

I don't think that Mr. Brilliant thought about that.

I'm pretty sure, that there's some sort of punishment being doled out.
I know this sounds mean.
But I REALLY hope that Justin Ross Harris is suffering BIG time.

I believe, that "Ross Harris" plotted, and planned to kill his toddler Cooper, in a horrible way, for months.

I hope his research, on "how to survive in prison" is woefully inadequate.
And, yes. I hope his incarceration, is intolerable.
Just like Cooper's death, strapped into a too small car seat, left, to die in agony in a hot car, while his Daddy, went out to lunch, and spent most of his working hours looking for sex.

Personally, I hope that inmates, guards, and everyone else who interacts with inmate Harris, treats him like he is scum.

Well, I'm off my soap box.
I am so sorry Cooper. Your horrible death should never have happened.

 

[CHERIE.T]

FLOURISH--
im so sorry
:tears::therethere::grouphug:

 

[gngr~snap]

I am wondering, how the video Ross Harris watched "how to survive in prison is working out for him tonight"?
Maybe he should have googled a video, that was about..." How to survive in prison, when inmates and guards think you are a pasty, whimpy child torturer"?

I don't think that Mr. Brilliant thought about that.

I'm pretty sure, that there's some sort of punishment being doled out.
I know this sounds mean.
But I REALLY hope that Justin Ross Harris is suffering BIG time.

I believe, that "Ross Harris" plotted, and planned to kill his toddler Cooper, in a horrible way, for months.

I hope his research, on "how to survive in prison" is woefully inadequate.
And, yes. I hope his incarceration, is intolerable.
Just like Cooper's death, strapped into a too small car seat, left, to die in agony in a hot car, while his Daddy, went out to lunch, and spent most of his working hours looking for sex.

Personally, I hope that inmates, guards, and everyone else who interacts with inmate Harris, treats him like he is scum.

Well, I'm off my soap box.
I am so sorry Cooper. Your horrible death should never have happened.

Ross Harris is safely tucked in the infirmary for now, yeah Tell me about it!
http://www.cobbsheriff.org/Inmate/InmDetails.asp?soid=001020427 &BOOKING_ID=309026503561217

 

[legalmania]

There is kind of a smoking gun for me. And that was when I saw how extremely close that car seat was to the driver and saw that Coop's head was visible over the top of the car seat. There is no way that a parent could miss the fact that there was a baby in the car seat. imo :moo:

That coupled with the extremely short distance from CFA to the daycare, and :jail:

I think the surveillance cameras are going to play a very important role in this case. Also the times he was on the computer. I wonder if the Day Care center had a policy that they would call the parents to see if the child would be in that day? If they called him I wonder what he said? He had to know at that point the child was not there. That would be red flag #1. This case is in the beginning stages. There are many motions, discovery and witnesses that have to be investigated. I wonder if someone was walking through the parking lot and heard little Cooper screaming and saw dad in the car, that would be a definite smoking gun.

 

[jojo87]

Did we already go over the choking comment RH was said to have made when he pulled the car over? I remember a witness mentioned he said something about the baby choking.
I don't understand why he'd have said that.

 

[legalmania]

Here are some statistics on children dying in cars due to heat. I think one death is to many. http://www.ggweather.com/heat/

 

[legalmania]

I am wondering, how the video Ross Harris watched "how to survive in prison is working out for him tonight"?
Maybe he should have googled a video, that was about..." How to survive in prison, when inmates and guards think you are a pasty, whimpy child torturer"?

I don't think that Mr. Brilliant thought about that.

I'm pretty sure, that there's some sort of punishment being doled out.
I know this sounds mean.
But I REALLY hope that Justin Ross Harris is suffering BIG time.

I believe, that "Ross Harris" plotted, and planned to kill his toddler Cooper, in a horrible way, for months.

I hope his research, on "how to survive in prison" is woefully inadequate.
And, yes. I hope his incarceration, is intolerable.
Just like Cooper's death, strapped into a too small car seat, left, to die in agony in a hot car, while his Daddy, went out to lunch, and spent most of his working hours looking for sex.

Personally, I hope that inmates, guards, and everyone else who interacts with inmate Harris, treats him like he is scum.

Well, I'm off my soap box.
I am so sorry Cooper. Your horrible death should never have happened.

He should have watched the show Scared Straight. That only shows the tame and controlled prisoners. There are prisoners in there that already have life sentences so they have nothing to lose, and some of them absolutely hate people who hurt or abuse children.

 

[lawstudent]

And justice wouldn't be served by prosecuting her? How about making parents aware that it's criminally negligent to be so distracted by your phone that you leave your baby to roast in a car? Too many of these cases seem to involve parents who are on the phone while driving. This breaks my heart for that beautiful girl.

I'd support education campaigns, and maybe even prosecution with a sentence of community service that involves speaking to new parents, but honestly, where it is an actual accident, I don't think justice is served at all by imprisoning the person. Their suffering does not remove one bit of the suffering of the poor child who roasted in a car, nor does it bring he or she back. That is the awful reality of of it. There is no justice, there is no fixing it. If the mother seems to have been a good mother who truly just somehow lost track and seems legitimately devastated already, I see no point in imprisoning her. She would be in her own private hell, and if she has other children, they all suffer on top of it. I would hope that she would never make such a mistake again. These things are so rare and so unpredictable that I just don't think a) the parents who do it once would ever do it again and b) that awareness of cases like this save that many lives. It is a weird brain processing issue that happens to all of us but that happens to occur at exactly the wrong time to someone who is vulnerable due to being overwhelmed or over compartmentalized or something - sure, they probably are not the 100% most attentive and responsible parents in the world - my guess would be that hypervigilant parents are much less vulnerable to this sort of thing. But they may be 90% better than most and still just have that bizarre moment - it's so rare that I can't just chock it up to people obsessing over cell phones or not caring. Lots of really idiotic, cell-obsessed parents never make this mistake, and as I said before, there's not even a high rate of substance abusers - I just don't think there is much of a connection between these deaths and misplaced priorities. People already know it is criminal to neglect your child to be on the phone - they just never think it will happen to them, and in the right mental state your brain does weird things to keep you going. If that brain 'issue' happens to occur at the same time you are driving to work, it could happen, cell phone or not. It is not logical. Not saying they can't be prosecuted, but I don't think it accomplishes any justice. Public education campaigns would be best. It's just so rare though that it seems very impossible to get real target group or link it to any particular negligent behavior. It isn't an issue that people are going to keep in their minds because it just doesn't seem real.

 

[Sonya610]

But speaking of, this week I had to take 2 dogs to the vet. It was bout 10 a.m. when we left to come home , a 30 minute ride. They were in the back seat. When we got home, they were both so hot and panting and came in straight to the water .

If you were with them and you were fine i would guess the trip to the vet stressed them and that is why they got overly worked up (two of mine pant a lot when thunder is coming and it has nothing to do with heat, they are just getting very stressed). Healthy fit dogs should be as heat tolerant as you are when they are resting.

Ice water helps a lot, either take a small cooler partially filled with ice/water or keep a dish in the car and if you forget to bring some stop at a gas station for a big cup of ice water. Since they pant to release heat giving them a refreshing drink to cool off their mouth/throat makes them much more comfortable especially if they take a few laps occasionally.

 

[Lyra500]

Have there been any females witnesses when Cooper was pulled from the car interviewed with any media? I might have missed them, seems like all I have seen are the males. Not that males can not be a good judge but I want a female perspective.

I saw a youngish woman being interviewed not long after this event made the news. She was not impressed with RH at all. She was the one that said she found the sight if Cooper pretty distressing because the rigor mortis meant that his posture just was not 'normal' as he was lying on the ground. She also said that she found RH's behaviour bizarre - at this time he was in the back of the police car I believe. She said he kept switching between seeming hysterically upset but then turning round to look at what was happening - but not to see what was happening with Connor, it looked as if he was checking to see who the police were speaking to and what they were doing.

 

[cluciano63]

Pretty sure day care said the don't usually call? And many people here said that was not unusual?

Also, I have been thinking about the clapping at the funeral and it really bothers me. At the very best, this was the result of a negligent, thoughtless, self-absorbed man, at worst, murderous and diabolical. Either way, this was one time that supposed to about the victim, Cooper. It really disgusts me how it made about RH and a church-fullful,bought into it. It was very disrespectful

 

[lillybell]

I'm just catching up again here, these threads can move so fast,

Just a couple of points, I am interested in what RH phone records are going to show, I bet there was some interesting calls/ messages on that day! Also if the email sent from nursery was opened will be very telling.

Is like to know more about LH and her reaction to been informed her baby wasn't at daycare that day, my first thought would have been that daycare had made a mistake, then I'd be thinking RH must have dropped him of elsewhere and would be calling him to find out.
If he sent her a message around 3.15 asking when she was collecting his buddy, did she read the message or do we not know that yet?
Also did LH go to the scene? When she got to RH work, the LE were there and told her what had happened, where did they take hr from there? X

 

[lillybell]

Pretty sure day care said the don't usually call? And many people here said that was not unusual?

Also, I have been thinking about the clapping at the funeral and it really bothers me. At the very best, this was the result of a negligent, thoughtless, self-absorbed man, at worst, murderous and diabolical. Either way, this was one time that supposed to about the victim, Cooper. It really disgusts me how it made about RH and a church-fullful,bought into it. It was very disrespectful

I know, the whole thing was awful, the bit that got me was LH walking behind her baby boys tiny coffin, still on her phone to RH!!!
Shocking behaviour and very inappropriate x

 

[Lyra500]

[/B]

I totally agree - forget the heat! He had to notice the smell AND had to know what it was......the detective said the odor was still there after several hours with the door/s being open etc.

As other FMs have said, the smell was probably what precipitated how and where he stopped. He might have been getting close to throwing up so just had to stop.

 

[NancyA]

Well, that'll teach me to go and spend the holiday weekend out of town with family (and I really had to resist the temptation to do more than just peek at what happened at the hearing, it was killing me!!) it's taken me hours to read through all these threads!

Just want to thank everyone who posted transcripts, synopses and links - those have made it so much easier to scale the mountains of info. Like to thank the websleuths powers that be for the nice, shiny upgrade too and of course this forum dedicated to Cooper. Nice job all.

Oh and just to throw in my twopennorth, we're in CA, I do the roll down windows and let hot air out thing too but my husband doesn't. We've had some um warmish exchanges about the relative benefits of doing so versus not doing so in the past and in the interests of marital harmony have agreed to disagree. I'm pretty sure I'm right and he's wrong though. :winkkiss:

 

[NancyA]

I know, the whole thing was awful, the bit that got me was LH walking behind her baby boys tiny coffin, still on her phone to RH!!!
Shocking behaviour and very inappropriate x

LH really interests me - and not in a good way - I want to give her the benefit of the doubt as a grieving mother, trouble is I'm not seeing any real signs of grief. Yeah, I know, there's no blueprint for appropriate grieving behaviour but even so her entire affect is odd and off and too much of what she has been reported as saying is odd and off too. I just dunno about her.

 

[SouthAussie]

I totally agree - forget the heat! He had to notice the smell AND had to know what it was......the detective said the odor was still there after several hours with the door/s being open etc.

As other FMs have said, the smell was probably what precipitated how and where he stopped. He might have been getting close to throwing up so just had to stop.

My apologies for causing a ruckus about cooling the car down faster when you get into it on a hot day (by opening the windows for a little while). The point I was trying to make was that RH may have been trying to keep the smell in the car, so that others outside the car would not smell it.

I don't know about others, but I can smell if a person in the car next to me at a traffic light is smoking a cigarette if we both have our windows down. I think someone else may have noticed the strong odour coming from the car if he had his windows down to cool the car.

And I agree that he may have pulled over where he did because he could no longer tolerate the smell .. even after travelling such a relatively short distance.