in July 1997 a triple murder terrified residents in the nation's capital investigators could find no immediate suspects and no clear motive for the attack Metro D.C police turned to the FBI for help they hope the bureau's technical expertise could bring Justice for the victims of a triple homicide [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] foreign [Music] Georgetown coffee shop in Washington D.C three employees were shot to death evidence that the crime scene pointed in many different directions was this a hate crime a robbery gone wrong or an act of cold-blooded Vengeance against one of the victims I'm Jim calstrom former head of the FBI's New York office what seemed at first to be a senseless act of violence soon grew into a crime of federal proportions [Music] in 1997 Washington DC and its monuments played host to thousands over the three-day Fourth of July weekend visitors attended Independence Day celebrations throughout the capital by Monday morning July 7th the holiday was officially over inhabitants of the Georgetown section of DC were just waking up to face the work week at 5 15 am the day shift supervisor at a popular coffee shop arrived to prepare for the onslaught of Rush Hour she was surprised to see the night manager's car in the parking lot the shop should have been closed at 8 pm the previous night [Music] you found the light still on the music playing and fresh pastries behind the counter [Music] yet no one seemed to be there and the shop hadn't been thoroughly cleaned to check the shift schedule to see who was working the night before [Music] Katie Katie she headed toward the back room searching for her colleagues or some sort of explanation there she found the slaughtered bodies of the night crew let the shot right down the first vehicle she saw on city bus the driver called the police by Dawn the D.C metropolitan police had sealed the shop and began to process the scene down by the front door did not match the soles of any of the victims nor the day managers three employees were killed by multiple gunshots night manager Katie Mahoney age 24. 18 year old Aaron David Goodrich and Emery Allen Evans age 25. the victims had apparently been caught in the middle of their cleanup routine sometime after closing at 8 pm Katie Mahoney who sustained most of the gunfire was apparently still holding her keys when she fell to metropolitan police detective James trainham the wanton violence seemed like an act of personal vengeance when I first learned of how the bodies were positioned in the number of shots that had been inflicted on Katie uh one of the one of the initial theories was was it was a domestic that she had had a fight with a boyfriend an ex-boyfriend the other two were in the back room giving them some privacy she had gone to the back followed by the boyfriend and there and he exploded shot her multiple times and then shot them as they tried to come to her assistance I think that's an interesting thing this one piece will make 52 layers watch on mobile devices or the big screen all for free no subscription required download vele now six spent casings and four slugs from a 380 semi-automatic were collected from the floor in the ceiling over the safe they discovered one of three slugs from a 38 revolver multiple shots from two different guns suggested at least two gunmen detective train have now theorized that it might have been a robbery gone horribly wrong when we found out that there were two guns and that there was a shot to the ceiling above the safe which is typically a warning type shot then that's when we started looking at commercial robbery now was it totally conclusive that that made it a robbery no absolutely not if it was a robbery attempt the gunman had likely panicked since they left empty-handed the cash drawers were untouched and there were no signs to the safe had been tampered with a receipt showed that one of the employees purchased a pound of coffee at 8 40. which meant they were likely still alive 40 minutes after the shop had closed detectives spoke to one witness who stopped by the shop at about 9 15 the previous evening he saw the two male employees inside cleaning but the door was locked so he left assuming it was closed several other would-be customers told detectives that they had visited the store moments later at around 9 30. then at 9 30 we had actually two groups of people independently walk up to the front door the door was unlocked they walked right on in they looked around they could see that the store was in the process of being cleaned up but there was nobody there so they figured that people were in the back and they left at that time so we figured based on that sort of information that the murders have burned between 9 to 10 and 9 30. the day shift manager told the detective that when she arrived in the morning the front door was locked the back door had been locked as well there was no way to lock them without a key if it was an inside job she had a good idea of who it might be one of the first things she told us about was an ex-employ who had been fired just a few weeks before that he had a drug habit he had and he was a shift manager so he had access to the safe to the alarms the night after the theft Katie noticed a discrepancy in the cash drawers on her shift she tracked the loss to a single employee and fired him why [Music] the company did not press charges against the man and he agreed to pay back what it took over time [Music] police interviewed the ex-employee at his Georgetown home he explained that he and Katie had worked out a payback agreement for the money yield he claimed to Harbor no bad feelings towards her investigators photographed the soles of his shoes to compare against the print recovered of the crime scene they provided no match he said he was out of town at the time of the murders his Alibi checked out thank you the viciousness of the slayings became clearer at the autopsy Katie Mahoney had been shot five times Emery Allen Evans had been shot three times Aaron David Goodrich had been shot once the bullet piercing both lungs and his heart slugs removed from the victims confirmed that two weapons had been used the unsolved murders riveted The public's attention we are deeply saddened by the loss of three Partners the owners of the coffee shop chain offered a fifty thousand dollar reward for information leading to The Killers [Music] some believed it was a hate crime against the minority victims others claimed it may have something to do with Katie's former internship at the White House what seemed more likely was that one of the victims may have been an accomplice who was double-crossed after giving access to the killers the fact that no money was taken did increase the number of possible theories as to why and actually what happened inside the store uh but I think that once we did look into the background of the employees once we found out what type of people they were that began to to eliminate a lot of the theories to help Focus the investigation the detective called on his friend from the FBI Washington field office special agent Brad Garrett over the years detective traynom had come to rely on agent Garrett's expertise I've had a lot of experience in analyzing crime scenes doing victimology studying offender characteristics and so it's it's sort of like another set of eyes looking at uh at a scene you know it doesn't seem magical about it but um I think Jim respects my opinion and asked me initially to come take a look the next day investigators returned to the coffee shop to search for more clues they noted the store had no security cameras and its alarm had not been breached the night of the crime the front lock functioned properly and showed no signs of tempering perhaps The Killers had ended with a key since the door was locked after the murders the investigators tried to piece together events with what little they knew they figured the crew was still cleaning the store just after 9 15. that's when The Killers must have burst in the world the gunman probably hustled the crew into the back room closer to the safe oh this is where they had apparently lost control of the situation the bullet hole in the ceiling looked like a warning shot designed to get attention ceiling definitely closed space probably only increased everyone's Panic resulting in this triple tragedy a couple rounds now investigators concluded that robbery not murder was likely the gunman's initial intention they also believe that perpetrators had robbed before and would do so again it's fairly rare in robbery situations where they kill either the patrons or the employees of the store so I wasn't really looking at groups that had killed other people I was looking at groups that came in guns drawn were ready to commit violence if they needed to commit violence so and again that's not uncommon for people in a in robberies obviously to pull guns out but typically people that will rob a commercial facility like this coffee store well typically then Target similar type situations with the scenario presented few Clues to the Killer's identities investigators hoped and overlooked answer remained in the shop behind the counter the detective found Katie Mahoney's to-do list she had almost completed it the night she was killed for death one item she hadn't checked off yet was to apologize to an employee has learned that Katie had reprimanded the employee for his less than professional appearance a few days before she was killed good morning the man said that he bore no grudge against Katie he explained that she was sensitive and might have felt concerned that she'd been too harsh with him but he didn't feel that way okay all right investigators confirmed he was with Friends when the murders took place it was another dead end detective training poured over store procedures and policies and discovered that someone else had been to the store at 2 am we found out that the pastry guy comes with his you know delivery when he arrived there that morning he just assumed that the door was locked used his key pushed the carts in closed and locked it behind and that's how come when the shift manager got there all the doors were locked the pastry delivery explained why the front door had been locked but it did not reveal how The Killers gained entry three days after the triple homicide investigators still had no leads to the Killer's identities the murderers were still on the loose on July 7 1997 three employees had been shot to death in a Georgetown coffee shop a reward offered by corporate headquarters and local businesses for information grew to one hundred thousand dollars the largest for a crime in DC history the heavy publicized reward induced dozens of false claims the special agent Brad Garrett chasing rumors as part of the job one thing you have to do in any of these cases is you have to keep a lot of balls in the air at the same time you can't just do one thing so while we're looking at the backgrounds of the victim disgruntled employees employees that have been fired we're also looking at robbery groups we're also talking to robbery homicide detectives in the metropolitan area about what cases they've had is there anybody that sort of fits this genre of of um what happened despite their efforts they found no leads after two and a half months then on September 27 1997 Metropolitan homicide detectives received an anonymous call [Music] didn't know Carl's last name but described him as thin mid-20s with brown skin according to detective James trainum he said Carl lived on Gallatin Street described the location where he lived and he said he lived there with his mother his wife and his child and that they drove a car that was a different color blue he said if anybody is telling you anything else they're wrong no the man promised to call back when he learned more type of training just got some good information investigators check DMV records and assembled a list of all the cars on Gallatin Street in Washington DC on the 1200 block they found one registered to a man named Carl Cooper the car was listed as blue a criminal background check revealed that 28-year-old Carl Cooper had a record of commercial armed robbery and suspected murder Carl Cooper and an associate robbed two convenience stores at gunpoint in Prince George's County Maryland in January 1989. when Cooper's associate was later found shot to death Cooper was the Prime Suspect but police never found enough evidence to prove he killed his partner thank you his criminal record coupled with the anonymous caller's statement made Carl Cooper the prime suspect in the coffee shop triple homicide investigators needed to find out more about Cooper special agent Brad Garrett secured a warrant to establish a trap and trace on Cooper's home phone the pin register and trap and Trace would give you incoming and outgoing telephone numbers only you cannot hear what goes on the line but it records every time you dial a number out we get it shows up on a screen and every time someone calls into you it shows up and it shows up it shows the duration of the call so what that did obviously it gave us who Mr Cooper was talking to what individuals out there in the community is he interacting with agents discovered that one man worked as a local barber called Cooper's home frequently informants claimed the barber was likely Cooper's accomplice in the coffee shop killings gather more information on Cooper and Cooper and those who visited him undercover agents dressed as telephone repairmen and set up surveillance on Carl Cooper's house we'd put up a very discreet pool camera outside his house where it would shoot 24 hours a day on his front door to see obviously who's coming and going what hours does he keep what is his routine what cars does he get into who comes to visit him agents didn't need a court order since it was public surveillance they monitored Cooper around the clock and created a videotape record of everyone entering and leaving the head right on the house right they identified his child and his wife the surveillance was not limited to his home [Music] teams were also assigned to tail Cooper throughout the city Carl Cooper visited the barber shop where his alleged accomplice worked investigators needed to somehow confirm if the barber had been involved in the coffee shop killings they hope to trap and trace on his phone would tell them more at this point we're just trying to figure out who this guy is in the barbershop and what is his relationship with Carl and had he committed robberies with Carl so we did a background on him he had served time for armed robbery and based on what sources were telling us that the two of them along with other individuals had committed our properties agents discovered a stronger connection through the Trap and trace on the barber's phone they recognize the name of a woman who called The Barber frequently she was the former girlfriend of the robbery partner allegedly killed by Cooper several years earlier she said that Cooper The Barber and her boyfriend at the time were all friends before her boyfriend was killed now she only kept in touch with the bar since she believed Cooper was responsible for her boyfriend's death she also knew Cooper's wife and explained how she helped him with his crimes okay Carl Cooper's wife purchased weapons illegally for him one was a nine millimeter handgun his wife used a driver's license with her maiden name and an old address so the nine millimeter couldn't be traced back to her husband that's 200 Carl's accomplices used their girlfriends in the same way his wife [Music] the girlfriend was extremely Cooperative she was still interested in bringing closure to his case and she gave us even more background on Carl Cooper and his associates she told us about a third person who who was working with them during the summer of 1997 committing robberies investigators placed Carl Cooper's alleged third man under surveillance he was a small-time crack dealer he in fact knew anything about the murders his blatant criminal activity made him a liability to Cooper continue authorities plan to arrest the dealer after a series of undercover drug pies and force him to come clean about the murder suspect but it would take weeks perhaps months to establish trust and purchase enough crack to charging with felony drug trafficking if they arrested him before that the charges would not be stiff enough to leverage his cooperation until then investigators had no evidence to arrest Carl Cooper for the coffee shop triple homicide and as time passed Cooper would be more difficult to get to since he had insulated himself with so many by the end of July 1998 over a year had passed since three employees at a Georgetown coffee shop had been shot to death the FBI and D.C metro police believe that 29 year old Carl Cooper and at least one accomplice were responsible but investigators still had no direct proof to find it they pursued Cooper from all directions tracing his calls watching his house and surveilling his associates [Music] despite their relentlessness Cooper remained just Out Of Reach but investigators did learn that Cooper knew he was a suspect according to FBI special agent Brad Garrett As you move into these cases further and further and you talk to more and more people particularly people on the street that we're trying to get back to whoever you're looking at if they're out on the street and it did I mean he knew in Fairly short order that the police and the FBI were taking a look at him the FBI and Metro DC police were not the only agencies investigating Cooper in nearby Prince George's County Maryland Sergeant Joseph McCann was investigating Cooper for the attempted murder of a police officer Jim Joe McCann how are you the sergeant was working with a female informant who also wanted to tell the FBI what she knew about Cooper the informant and Mr Cooper had committed several armed robberies together which is the reason why the informant was in jail for armed robbery at the time so she knew him very well place I was the getaway driver there's two others involved investigators interviewed her at a prison in Pennsylvania though she had no direct knowledge of the coffee shop murders she knew firsthand how Cooper operated the woman told about a pizzeria robbery that they'd committed in September 1996. Cooper was the leader she was the driver of the stolen getaway car Cooper's friend The Barber and the woman's boyfriend at the time were also in on the job she said that Cooper carried two guns into the restaurant that night as he usually did his job was to shoot anyone who didn't obey orders no gunfire was needed that night [Music] they collected the cash drawer and wallets and made a fast getaway tell me just as best you can recall what Cooper told me the informant wasn't finished [Music] she told investigators about another robbery shortly after the pizzeria Heist when Cooper had fired his weapon that evening Cooper carried a nine millimeter in a stolen 38 revolver the barber drove the getaway car their plan was to Rob couples parked in Avondale Park in Hyattsville Maryland [Music] foreign [Music] Cooper was unaware that the man he attacked was an off-duty Maryland officer Cooper fired twice hitting him once the informant said that Cooper had told her about it the next day when the news revealed that the man he shot was an off-duty police officer how long have you been fortunately the officer survived the attack the check of police reports confirmed everything the informant had said special agent Brad Garrett had every reason to believe her level of detail was just phenomenal which she was able to to lay out when it happened where it happened what time it happened who participated even the interaction between the robbers and the victims that we knew about obviously through what the victims had told us during the robbery so she was really a pot of gold in this case the information demonstrated that Cooper wasn't just a violent Criminal he was the leader of a band of robbers [Music] the informative provided facts that the FBI could build a case around she was basically the first bit of information that in in my mind and in the prosecutor's mind that really started fitting Eureka case or a racketeering case where you've got a group that's committing violent acts Interstate robbing commercial facilities and that we saw through her the real possibility of putting together a federal Ricoh indictment that would include the coffee store triple murder building a racketeering case that proved Carl Cooper was the leader of a criminal organization meant outlining those activities in detail the FBI secured a warrant to wiretap Cooper's phone now they could capture conversations not just phone numbers we're going to record any incoming conversations as part of the warrant they also cloned Cooper's pager number anytime someone paged Cooper the agent's pager would also beep with everything in place detective training hope to stimulate conversation between Cooper and his associates they began by inquiring on the whereabouts of the nine millimeter handgun purchased illegally by Cooper's wife well we knew that his wife had made that purchase of handgun for him in 1996. so what we did was we went out to the address that she had given the gun shop when she had purchased the gun and it turned out to be her mother's address as a ruse to get information investigators asked the mother if her daughter still had the nine millimeter handgun they told her they needed to complete a routine check of its serial number to verify whether it had been used in a crime I have not disowned I just have not heard the woman claimed that she had not spoken to her daughter since they had had a disagreement some time ago foreign ERS felt sure that she was lying as we were walking back to the car unless a distance of less than 50 feet Carl's pager starts going off 911 911 behind it and we knew that uh we had probably struck some kind of nerve there at that point already she doesn't know where she is the number I don't believe it agents monitoring Cooper's home phone heard the mother call to warn that authorities were looking for her daughter's gun okay all right it comes again Cooper's wife tried paging Carl but he didn't respond next she called her father panicking because she couldn't find the weapon and feared that she'd be implicated in her husband's crime Carl's wife was on a cordless phone sitting outside on the front porch and she's on the phone to one of her relatives hysterically sobbing about how the police are going to lock her up with this gun that Carl's done something with this gun and that she looked in the hiding place in the house and the gun wasn't there so Carl must have it and she was just going on and on and on so then she calls Carl and he's on his way home he's on a cell phone on his way home and she says Carl I'm going to call this police officer right now and he's screaming at her no no don't don't call I'm just screaming at her on the phone foreign wife hung up investigators went to her residence to speak with her directly [Music] they knew she and Carl were home but no one came to the door [Music] after almost 14 months of pursuit investigators were confident they were closing in on the suspected murderer but Cooper was not the sort of man to sit idly by and allow himself to be cornered [Music] in September 1998 Metropolitan Washington D.C police and the FBI continued to pursue Carl Cooper the alleged ringleader of an armed gang wanted in the triple homicide of three Georgetown coffee shop employees surveillance of Cooper's house phone family and friends began to pay off for investigators detective James tranum overheard an incriminating conversation between Cooper's wife and the girlfriend of one of Cooper's alleged accomplices so she's trying to figure out why the police are looking at Carl and she starts what we call this guessing game and she goes was it for the shooting in the park Missy goes no was it for the robbery the pizza place she goes no and then she said what is it and Missy goes something along the lines of you know the thing I told you about the thing in Georgetown and the other woman brings up you mean the coffee shop yeah yeah at that point we knew that his wife and this other woman had intimate knowledge of all these other crimes that Carl had committed this is 200. using her maiden name and mother's address investigators were already aware that Cooper's wife had purchased a nine millimeter illegally for her husband now they would turn up the pressure on Carl's wife to reveal the whereabouts of the handgun investigators showed up at Cooper's wife's workplace unannounced to again ask her where the nine millimeter was according to detective James trainam they caught her completely off guard which was their intention we're here to talk to you about the gun because she saw us it was like she hit a brick wall I mean just her face dropped she became she began to shake she became very nervous and we're you know just very very calm Mrs Cooper we don't know why you're so upset this is just a routine investigation you okay at home Cooper's wife told them that she still had the nine millimeter handgun but it was in storage in Maryland good she agreed to turn it over to them later that evening at her grandfather's home close to the appointed time FBI agents watched suspected murderer Carl Cooper removing what appeared to be a gun case from his house agents were not sure what to expect at the meeting with his family Garrett maybe it was a trip I just left in the car he had the gun with him the agent wore a wire to alert other agents parked close by if they should need assistance grandfather's Maryland home Cooper confronted them he accused the Agents of harassing his wife but he didn't prevent them from going inside [Music] her grandfather and child sat at the table with a gun I don't do not touch the god since the nine millimeter handgun was already in plain view investigators were legally permitted to seize it that type of weapon was not used in the coffee shop killings but it was the same type used to shoot an off-duty officer in a Maryland Park [Music] agents sent the gun to the ballistics lab where it was test-fired and compared to the Slugs removed from the wounded officer shallow grooves imprinted by the inside of the barrel on each of the Slugs did not match but the marks made by the weapons ejector pin on the shell casings match those on the shell casings collected from the crime scene experts determined that the barrel might have been switched or altered but they agreed that this was definitely the gun used to shoot the officer in Maryland according to Sergeant Joseph McCann once we received that ballistic report and we confirmed that this weapon that was registered to Carl Cooper's wife was used to shoot an off-duty Prince George's County police officer at that point we had entered into a completely different realm in the investigation it stepped it up considerably at that point though investigators had evidence against Cooper for that crime they had little to charge him for the Georgetown triple homicide or for federal racketeering [Music] special agent Brad Garrett and his team turned back to one of Cooper's alleged accomplices crack dealer who had been under surveillance for months we set up multiple crack buys from this guy until eventually we got up to a quantity that he faced a mandatory minimum sentence in federal court and then we arrested him the key is was to get him to help us investigators would pressure him to inform on Cooper in exchange for a reduction in his trafficking charges [Music] to avoid years in prison the dealer agreed to wear a wire he wasn't as close to Cooper as agents had hoped but the dealer was close to another one of Cooper's alleged accomplices a friend from The Barbershop good good he called The Barber to set up a money if I can meet with you guys [Music] the entire conversation will be caught on tape informant told the barber that police had stopped him on the street asking questions about their involvement with Carl Cooper in the triple homicide the barber was already aware of the investigation and assured him that he had nothing to do with it Barbershop guy kind of Whispers to the drug dealer look I Know Carl did it he called me the night before and he wanted me to go along with him but he never called me back I said I would but he never called me back and then the next morning bam they were dead [Music] other than the anonymous caller that put them on the trail shortly after the crime this was the FBI's first real connection between Cooper his gang and the coffee shop homicides now it was the Barbara's turn to be taken in agents hoped he would be the key to taking a triple murderer off the streets a year and a half after a botched robbery and triple homicide in a Georgetown coffee shop the FBI and Washington Metro Police were closing in on a gang of suspected thieves and murderers a barber believed to be one of them told an FBI informant that he had agreed to rob the coffee shop with ringleader Carl Cooper but Cooper never called him back so the barber figured Cooper had committed the crime by himself FBI special agent Brad Garrett decided it was time to question the barber directly and find out how much he knew about Cooper so we thought at that point well the barbershop guy obviously knows something about this but he's basically saying he would have participated but wasn't called so didn't participate so we weren't we weren't sure at that point now then Cooper do it alone did he pull somebody else in to help him do the robbery we weren't really sure but we then had enough that we could charge the barbershop guy early in the morning authorities followed the barber from his home and cornered him in an isolated location [Music] agents wanted to be certain that no one especially Carl Cooper knew that Cooper coup expected accomplished was being taken in was arrested without incident and transported to the FBI office for questioning the man once again denied any participation in the coffee shop homicides but he did tell agents what Carl Cooper had said the night before the crime he told us that Carl had come to him and said you know I've been surveillance this coffee shop it doesn't have any surveillance cameras they take in a lot of money and I want to I want to hit it he said okay I'll go with you what do you want to maintain that Cooper never called him back at the beginning and as far as he knew the ringleader had no other accomplices on the job even if the barber hadn't participated in the coffee shop murders authorities had enough to charge him with conspiracy to commit armed robbery hoping for leniency he told them what he knew about Cooper on May 1st 1993 he and Cooper committed their first crime together the barber didn't have a gun but Cooper said he would get one for him they spotted an armed security guard at a DC apartment building Hooper snuck up on him hey when the guard tried to draw his weapon Cooper shot him then took the Dead Man's gun got him Carl Runs Out runs to him and they take off so that's a murder we didn't even know about the Cooper had done so that also was another case that that was rolled into this uh Rico diamond we ran into the pizza store and it was the barber understood that stopping Cooper was the FBI's ultimate goal he agreed to wear a wire and meet with coup agents followed the barber through less populated roads after he picked up Cooper in his car in the course of their recorded conversation Cooper expressed his rage that the authorities were on his back did you hear that Nick yeah sounds like he wants to kill these he vowed to kill agent Garrett and detective trainer he also admitted that at one point he had seen Brad Garrett on the street and he had followed him for a while and he was laughing about how Brad didn't know that he was being followed and so uh it was a bit unnerving but we knew that we had to arrest Carl pretty quickly after that authorities weren't going to take any chances a few days later they decided to arrest it for shooting the officer in Maryland they hoped a search warrant for his house would provide the physical evidence needed to tie him directly to the coffee shop slams inside Cooper's home officers found ski masks law enforcement clothing and a variety of ammunition [Music] but none of it could prove that Carl Cooper had murdered the three employees at the coffee shop foreign Cooper knew that all they had was evidence of conspiracy and hearsay from secondary sources despite two hours of grilling Cooper remained steadfast in his denial thank you we did not have a good case on him but coffee shop murders but if we charged him with the racketeering in DC then we would be under a time constraint to get him indicted and convicted and we just didn't want to place ourselves under that constraint so we decided that PG County had the strongest case that they were the ones that were going to be able to hold him without letting him get out of jail that's placing all of our other people in Jeopardy after his interview in DC officers from Prince George's County Maryland came to transport him to their jurisdiction there he would face charges of shooting the off-duty police officer but Cooper was preoccupied by the FBI's investigation he demanded to take a lie detector test to prove his innocence Cooper took one in Maryland but failed miserably that's when he finally broke [Music] I think that Carl felt that we had him in a box for the coffee shop murders and that he was going to be charged with those that he was going to go down for those so he wanted to put his spin on it to make to put him in the best light possible of course with him being the only person who could he blame it on but the victims and that's what he tried to do Cooper actually made three separate confessions each time taking more of the blame in his final confession he claimed total responsibility for the coffee shop killing she was he said he planned and carried out the robbery after spending time casing the shop he called his accomplice the barber but then decided he could handle it on his own you want to lose the window of opportunity after the shop closed and before the crew went home he admitted to Sergeant Joseph McCann that he brought two weapons to the scene which was his signature Carl Cooper's approach when he committed robberies was very business-like it was a business to him it was not personal and if you did exactly as he said usually you would make it out of there but on that night three of Cooper's victims did not at about 9 20 Katie Mahoney Emory Evans and Aaron Goodrich were towards the end of their cleanup routine for some reason no one will ever know why let's go when Cooper arrived at the shop the door was unlocked he ordered everyone into the back office where the safe was kept go in the back [Music] according to Cooper the female manager tried to escape when he fired his warning shot into the ceiling Cooper began to lose control of the situation and of his temper he shot her first then the others okay Cooper shot Katie four more times and left with nothing I think people were were very surprised that one individual had committed this act that it just I think it's beyond most people's comprehension that that one person could go in where there's three employees and try to commit a robbery [Music] yeah he said he rushed back home laundered his clothes and disposed of the weapons they were never recovered in February 2000 more than two years after the triple homicide Carl Cooper confessed to and was convicted of 48 charges stemming from that crime as well as the murder of a security guard shooting of the off-duty police officer the robbery of the Pizzeria and leading a racketeering Enterprise by pleading guilty Cooper avoided the death penalty serving a life sentence with no possibility of parole and no appeal [Music]