Lam Guilty of Manslaughter : Could Get Six Years in Slaying of Cooperman

A Superior Court judge Thursday found 21-year-old Vietnamese student Minh Van Lam guilty of involuntary manslaughter at his second trial in the shooting death of Cal State Fullerton Prof. Edward Lee Cooperman.

The prosecutor and defense attorneys said Judge Richard J. Beacom gave a fair verdict. But Cooperman’s family and friends, convinced the professor was a victim of a political assassination, were stunned and angry.

Lam will be sentenced May 17. He faces a maximum prison term of six years.

Lam’s first trial ended last month in a hung jury. Those jurors voted 9 to 3 for convicting Lam of involuntary manslaughter, with the three no votes in favor of acquittal. All of the jurors rejected the first-degree murder conviction sought by the prosecution.

Verdict by Judge

A new jury was selected last week for the second trial, but attorneys for both sides agreed Wednesday to let Beacom decide the case himself.

Beacom based his verdict primarily on the evidence presented at the first trial. The second trial amounted to only minor additions from both sides. Testimony this week ended less than two days after the second jury had been dismissed. Both trials were held in Santa Ana.

Cooperman’s supporters said they were dissatisfied with the district attorney’s office for not vigorously pursuing their theory that the professor had been assassinated by right-wing Vietnamese refugees. Cooperman was active in providing scientific and humanitarian aid to Communist-controlled Vietnam and had told friends in the months before the shooting about death threats he had received.

Cooperman’s 15-year-old daughter wept in court when Beacom announced his decision. Klaaske Cooperman, the professor’s widow, said she had not expected a murder conviction after seeing the second jury dismissed.

“This is the American system of justice,” she said. “It’s pretty obvious a deal was made so that no one would have to face up to having a political assassination in their backyard.”

Cal State Fullerton philosophy Prof. Frank Verges, in tears, began screaming at defense attorney Alan May in the hallway later, accusing him of unethical behavior. Verges passed out placards he had prepared criticizing the judge and attorneys for both sides, but most other Cooperman friends said they were too upset to join him.

Dorothy Woolum, chairwoman of the Cal State Fullerton physics department, said, “It’s unbelievable. What an unfortunate message.”

Called ‘a Travesty’

Tony Russo, a close Cooperman friend, called it “a travesty. The judge just provided a license for other assassinations.”

Chief Deputy Dist. Atty. James Enright, who prosecuted the case, said there is nothing he can do about criticism from Cooperman’s friends.

“There’s a big difference between theories of political assassination and evidence you can take into court,” Enright said. “We put Russo on the stand. He didn’t give us anything.”

Enright said his office did investigate fully the political assassination motive. “We beat the bushes on that, but nothing came up that connected it with Lam,” he said.

Enright said he did not expect much more from the judge based on the evidence the prosecution had.

Cooperman, 48, was fatally shot in the left side of the neck with a .25-caliber handgun at his sixth-floor Science Building office on Oct. 13, 1984. Blood was found spread across the back part of the room, on opposite walls, the desk, the telephone, a file cabinet, and two of the chairs.

Campus police arrived at the office and found Cooperman lying in a corner with the gun in his outstretched left hand (he was left-handed).

Lam at first denied he shot Cooperman but later admitted his involvement, claiming the shooting was an accident. Lam said the gun went off when Cooperman grabbed his arm to show him how to aim the weapon.

Lam claimed that Cooperman had been like a father to him. Lam did not testify at his first trial, but in a videotaped reenactment of events, he said Cooperman had insisted that they practice moves with the gun.

Defense attorney May left the courtroom pleased after the judge’s decision.

Although Lam had hoped for acquittal, May said, his client was prepared for the involuntary manslaughter verdict.

Defendant’s Reaction

“Minh is pleased that the judge at least believes his version that the whole thing was an accident,” May said.

May said Lam’s only reaction was to ask him to come to the Orange County Jail later to explain the implications of the judge’s decision.

After the first trial, the prosecution was limited to seeking a conviction no more serious than second-degree murder, which carries a sentence of 15 years to life. That verdict would have meant the judge agreed that Lam acted with malice.

The involuntary manslaughter conviction carries a penalty of two, three or four years, plus a possible addition of another two years for use of a weapon. Involuntary manslaughter is the careless use of a weapon in which the defendant knows there is a high degree of risk that death could result.

Enright argued in court on Thursday that Lam’s actions after the shooting proved malice.

Lam left Cooperman on the office floor not knowing if he was dead or alive and without calling for help, Enright said. Lam then went to the movie “Purple Rain” with a girlfriend. He left the movie shortly after viewing a suicide scene in the film, returned to Cooperman’s office and placed the gun he had been carrying with him in Cooperman’s left hand. Then Lam called the campus police--some four hours after the shooting--and acted as if he had just found the body.

Lam confessed his involvement during interrogation by police later that night. He has been in jail since then.

Although Enright said he was satisfied with the judge’s verdict, he was not satisfied with the case, which he said left his office with “too many questions and not enough answers.”

“We said from the beginning there was just too much that was inconsistent with Lam’s pure accident version,” Enright said. “I think the judge said by his decision that he agreed with us.”

May argued Thursday that Lam fled after the shooting because he panicked. But the defense attorney also argued that Lam’s decision to return and call police showed his concern for the professor.

Family’s Reaction

At the first trial, Deputy Dist. Atty. Mel Jensen made a point to the jury that Lam had told police before his confession that he “had nothing to cry about.” May argued to Beacom on Thursday that Klaaske Cooperman had also shown no tears during interviews with police and reporters after her husband’s death, yet no one claimed she was insensitive about the shooting the way Jensen and Enright described Lam.

Although May was pleased with the verdict, some of Lam’s family and friends weren’t sure if they should be relieved that he was not convicted of murder or sad that he was not acquitted.

Anh Lam, his sister in his adopted family, cried but said she was mostly confused. “I just hope my brother is free soon,” she said.

Vic Opalek, an Orange County man who helped sponsor part of Lam’s family when it first came to the United States in the 1970s, said he was happy with the verdict and praised May for his handling of the case.

May drew criticism, however, not only from Cooperman’s friends, but from Beacom himself after the first trial.

Beacom chided May for bringing into the case theories about Cooperman’s political involvement with the Vietnamese government which later he couldn’t prove. Beacom threatened to take May before the State Bar disciplinary panel if May did the same thing at the second trial.

But May praised Beacom after the verdict Thursday as an “excellent judge who made a fair decision.”

Beacom had reportedly told both sides after the first trial that they should try to come up with some kind of agreement on a plea to save the taxpayers the cost of a second trial. May said that he was convinced after the first trial that Beacom would favor nothing higher than an involuntary manslaughter verdict, one reason the defense favored dismissing the second jury.