Death row inmate’s lawyer says his client was framed

More than 20 years after Kevin Cooper was sentenced to death for brutally murdering four people in Chino Hills, his attorney told a federal appeals panel Tuesday that questions about the case remained unresolved and that Cooper was entitled to further hearings and testing to clear up the mysteries.

During oral arguments before the panel, defense lawyer Norman Hile suggested that Cooper had been framed, that prosecutors at trial withheld material evidence that could have cleared him, and that his client had not received a full and fair hearing from U.S. District Judge Marilyn Huff in San Diego, the last jurist to consider the case.

But a veteran appellate lawyer for the California attorney general’s office countered that Cooper was “guilty as sin” and that it was time to bring the case -- which has been the subject of numerous appeals -- to a close. “Enough is enough,” said Deputy Atty. Gen. Holly D. Wilkens.

Cooper was sentenced to death in Riverside County Superior Court for a 1983 rampage in which a married couple and two children were hacked to death in Chino Hills.

Prosecutors alleged at trial that Cooper, then serving time for burglary, had faked a medical condition to escape from the state prison in Chino in 1983, then took refuge in a small house with a view of the hilltop home of Douglas and Peggy Ryen.

Two nights later, prosecutors stated, he broke into the Ryens’ home and used a hatchet, knife and ice pick to kill the couple; their daughter, Jessica, 11; and houseguest Christopher Hughes, 11.

Prosecutors said Cooper also slashed the throat of the Ryens’ 8-year-old son, Joshua, who lay next to his mother’s body for 11 hours before he was found. He survived and later testified against Cooper.

Cooper, now 49, admits that he hid in the house near the Ryen residence. But he has steadfastly maintained that he hitchhiked out of the area and that he was not involved in the murders.

In February 2004, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, by a vote of 9 to 2, granted a last-minute stay of execution and ordered new testing of blood and hair evidence in the case. At the time, Barry Silverman, one of the judges in the majority, said: “Cooper is either guilty as sin or he was framed by the police. There is no middle ground.”

More than a year later, after hearing testimony from 42 witnesses and reviewing test results, Huff in San Diego concluded in a 150-page ruling that Cooper should not receive any legal relief from the courts.

Noting post-conviction DNA testing that linked Cooper to a drop of blood in the hallway outside the Ryens’ bedroom, saliva from cigarette butts found in the hallway and blood smears on a T-shirt abandoned outside a bar near the murder scene, Huff wrote that she was convinced that Cooper “is the one responsible for these brutal murders.” She added that Cooper “is simply making unsubstantiated allegations of tampering as to evidence that was used against him at trial, or that subsequently confirmed his guilt from post-conviction DNA testing.”

But Cooper’s lawyers contend that Huff abused her discretion by denying some discovery and additional forensic testing. Hile, the defense lawyer, urged the appeals court to send the case back to Huff and order further testing, as well as admission of evidence about “three suspicious men,” one wearing bloody clothes, who reportedly were seen shortly after the murders in a bar not far from the crime scene.

The three judges hearing the appeal are Pamela Ann Rymer of Pasadena, an appointee of former President George H.W. Bush; Margaret McKeown of San Diego, an appointee of Bill Clinton; and Ronald Gould of Seattle, also a Clinton appointee. Whatever they decide, the ruling is likely to be appealed to a larger 9th Circuit panel and eventually to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Rymer and Gould, both of whom rejected Cooper’s bid for a stay in 2003, appeared skeptical Tuesday of defense claims of evidence-tampering.

McKeown asked several questions related to footprints of Keds shoes found inside the home and on a spa cover outside the master bedroom. Prosecutors stated at trial that the shoes were prison-issue and could not have been bought from a store.

Hile said Tuesday that when the former warden of the prison at Chino heard the prosecutors’ contention, she called the San Bernardino County sheriff’s office to tell them that the shoes could have been bought at a store. The defense was not informed of the call, a violation of the prosecution’s obligation to turn over any potentially exculpatory evidence, Hile said.

Deputy Atty. Gen. Wilkens countered that there was no doubt Cooper was wearing that type of shoe at the time of the murders. Even if the shoe was commercially available, it proves nothing, she said.

After the hearing, a group of death penalty foes, some holding placards proclaiming “Free Kevin Now,” held a rally outside the courthouse. Attorney Natasha Minsker, the death penalty coordinator for the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California, said it was very troubling that there were so many unresolved questions about the case so long after the murders.

She said the case showed that the state had “insufficient standards and safeguards” for the handling of forensic evidence. That issue, and related ones, are to be taken up in Sacramento today at a hearing of the California Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice.

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henry.weinstein@latimes.com