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Speaker 1: This story contains adult content and language. Listener discretion is advised.

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Speaker 2: You have a forty year old white man steel worker

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Speaker 2: Vietnam VET who's writing very intimate, personal, emotionally raw letters

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Speaker 2: to the then sixteen year old girl. What connects them

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Speaker 2: is that she brutally murdered his grandmother.

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Speaker 1: I'm Kate Winkler Dawson, a nonfiction author and journalism professor

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Speaker 1: in Austin, Texas. I'm also the host of the historical

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Speaker 1: true crime podcast Tenfold More Wicked and the co host

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Speaker 1: of the podcast Buried Bones on Exactly Right. I've traveled

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Speaker 1: around the world interviewing people for the show, and they

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Speaker 1: are all excellent writers. They've had so many great true

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Speaker 1: crime stories, and now we want to tell you those

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Speaker 1: stories with details that have never been published. Tenfold Where

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Speaker 1: Wicked Presents Wicked Words is about the choices that writers make,

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Speaker 1: good and bad. It's a deep dive into the stories

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Speaker 1: behind the stories. The story of one of America's youngest

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Speaker 1: death Row inmates is tragic and complicated. How did a

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Speaker 1: young woman in nineteen eighties Indiana end up in prison?

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Speaker 1: Alex mar unfolds her incredible book Seventy Times Seven, a

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Speaker 1: true story of murder and mercy. It's a journey about racism, anger,

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Speaker 1: and forgiveness. Let's start with the setting. We're talking about

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Speaker 1: nineteen eighty five, Gary, Indiana. And I'll confess the only

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Speaker 1: thing I know about Gary, Indiana is the Jackson family.

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Speaker 1: So in eighty five, what is this.

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Speaker 2: Area like Gary really is? It's an American city that

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Speaker 2: was hit hard when the steel industry went down, So

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Speaker 2: in nineteen eighty five, the city's already really feeling the

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Speaker 2: effects of that. So back in the nineteen oh six

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Speaker 2: and the years after that, the city was created by

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Speaker 2: US Steel. So it was essentially a company town. They

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Speaker 2: bought up a bunch of acreage on the border of

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Speaker 2: Lake Michigan. There was nothing much there, and they said, look,

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Speaker 2: you know, we're thirty miles to Chicago. We've got the

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Speaker 2: waterfront here for shipping purposes. We're going to build the

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Speaker 2: ultimate steel processing plant right here, and we're going to

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Speaker 2: make a fortune. You know, that was the idea. So

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Speaker 2: Gary was actually named after one of the company executives,

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Speaker 2: and the town that they created was really designed to

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Speaker 2: provide for the native born, local white corporate executives connected

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Speaker 2: to the mill. Anyone else who came along and wanted

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Speaker 2: to get a job there. They were kind of out

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Speaker 2: of luck because they had to scramble for housing. At

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Speaker 2: the edges of town. People were living in overcrowded shack

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Speaker 2: with no plumbing and no paved streets at the edges

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Speaker 2: of town. And I bring all this up because one

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Speaker 2: of the important things to know in the background here

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Speaker 2: is this is a town that from day one was

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Speaker 2: heavily segregated in the way that it was built, the

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Speaker 2: way it was organized. You had a lot of black

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Speaker 2: workers who were migrating up from the South, trying to

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Speaker 2: get away from Jim Crow America and thinking, you know what,

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Speaker 2: this is great. I get you a job at a

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Speaker 2: booming steel town and things are going to be different.

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Speaker 2: But the reality was that the level of segregation and

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Speaker 2: racism was comparable to the worst parts of the Jim

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Speaker 2: Crow South. By the time you get to the eighties,

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Speaker 2: Gary's had its first black mayor. Richard Hatcher became the

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Speaker 2: first black mayor when he was elected in sixty nine.

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Speaker 2: And what happened as a result of that is the

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Speaker 2: white population kind of panicked and you had extreme white

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Speaker 2: flight out of Gary and so the white tax base

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Speaker 2: and the white businesses really abandoned the city and drained

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Speaker 2: the resources from it. They moved further south and there

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Speaker 2: were huge malls and suburbs where all the businesses went,

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Speaker 2: and all of these great, you know, little suburban communities

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Speaker 2: were developed that were totally white, and you ended up

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Speaker 2: with a city that had a robust black community and

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Speaker 2: white community that were separate, but they were both doing well,

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Speaker 2: and it became a city that was destined to fail economically.

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Speaker 2: Crime started rising, the steel jobs were declining, right, so

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Speaker 2: you can you can kind of get a sense of

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Speaker 2: the level of trouble that's in the air in Gary

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Speaker 2: at the time. At the same time, it was, you know,

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Speaker 2: the black community in which Paula Cooper, who's you know,

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Speaker 2: at the center of the story, was growing up, was vibrant.

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Speaker 2: You know, there were black churches and stores and restaurants

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Speaker 2: and record shops, and they had a number of local

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Speaker 2: papers that were black run. There had been a really

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Speaker 2: strong civil rights movement in the area. But at this point,

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Speaker 2: the economic downturn is it's not looking like things are

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Speaker 2: going to turn around. So most of the households that

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Speaker 2: had men working in the mills and there were a

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Speaker 2: lot of households that did, including Paula's. Those were stressed

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Speaker 2: out households. You know, in the early nineteen eighties there

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Speaker 2: were people who worked in the mills that didn't know

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Speaker 2: that within a few years about like two thirds of

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Speaker 2: them were going to lose their jobs. Wow, it was

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Speaker 2: really interesting. You know. You brought up the Jackson family,

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Speaker 2: but I in the course of my research, I ended

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Speaker 2: up driving by the old Jackson family home and the

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Speaker 2: Jacksons still still own it. It's a tiny home. I

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Speaker 2: think it was probably only two or three rooms for

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Speaker 2: all the kids and the two parents. You know, to

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Speaker 2: see where Michael Jackson and Janet Jackson grew up, you

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Speaker 2: really feel a sense of wow, you know how far

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Speaker 2: they traveled from those beginnings because that neighborhood has seen

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Speaker 2: some tough times.

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Speaker 1: Let's talk about crime. We know in the seventies and

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Speaker 1: the eighties the whole country struggled with rising crime rates.

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Speaker 1: What specific was happening in Gary, What really was the

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Speaker 1: thread was that people out of work and you know,

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Speaker 1: reacting with home invasions or what was happening.

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Speaker 2: There was a whole range of problems that won't surprise anyone. Robberies,

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Speaker 2: home invasions, homicides. At the same time, you know, there

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Speaker 2: were a lot of sensational crimes taking place in the

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Speaker 2: white areas further south. I think it's worth just making

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Speaker 2: note of the fact that a little more hay was

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Speaker 2: made in the local papers of crimes committed by black locals.

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Speaker 2: And you know, what I think is important to have

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Speaker 2: a sense of to get the larger context, is that

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Speaker 2: Gary is up against the border the southern border of

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Speaker 2: Lake Michigan, as I mentioned, but it's part of larger

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Speaker 2: Lake County, right, and so Lake County is right up

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Speaker 2: against Illinois, and it connects in a way with the Chicago,

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Speaker 2: the greater Chicago metropolitan area. And Lake County is special

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Speaker 2: in that it's always been blue, you know, Union blue

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Speaker 2: in a red, red red state. Indiana is a red state.

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Speaker 2: You know, as many of your listeners are aware, Lake

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Speaker 2: County's became kind of infamous for its corruption on the

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Speaker 2: political scene, you know, beyond any crime that was coming

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Speaker 2: out of Gary in its immediate vicinity, it was often

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Speaker 2: compared to Cook County, where Chicago is, and they just said,

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Speaker 2: you know, the line that people would use is it's

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Speaker 2: just you know, the crimes just got fewer zeros on it, right,

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Speaker 2: that's it, but proportion it's the population. Lake County really

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Speaker 2: gave Chicago a run for their money. And back when

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Speaker 2: Robert F. Kennedy was Attorney General of the United States,

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Speaker 2: he had supposedly made this comment that Lake County was

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Speaker 2: easily one of the most corrupt counties in the nation.

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Speaker 2: And a lot of people I met in the legal

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Speaker 2: system in Lake County kind of proudly quoted that line

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Speaker 2: from RFK. So that's also important to keep in mind.

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Speaker 2: So there's political ambition, there's political corruption, and then you

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Speaker 2: also have the incredible tension created by segregation, racism, and

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Speaker 2: an economic downturn. And the local media really really loved

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Speaker 2: finding stories that would sell papers. They were also covered

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Speaker 2: by the Chicago press too, you know, so there was

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Speaker 2: a lot of room for local crime to be covered

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Speaker 2: in a sensationalized way at times. At the center of

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Speaker 2: this book is a crime committed by a fifteen year

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Speaker 2: old girl, a truly violent crime that took place in

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Speaker 2: the spring of nineteen eighty five. But actually I chose

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Speaker 2: to start the book with a moment a little further

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Speaker 2: back in time, in nineteen seventy nine to give the

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Speaker 2: readers a better sense of who Paula was and the

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Speaker 2: kind of childhood she had. So in seventy nine, she

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Speaker 2: was actually only nine years old and she lived with

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Speaker 2: her sister Ronda, who was twelve at the time. They

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Speaker 2: lived in a household that was incredibly unstable, and the

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Speaker 2: scene that opens the book is a morning in seventy

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Speaker 2: nine when their mother, Gloria, has kept them up all

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Speaker 2: night in hysterics and has convinced them to go out

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Speaker 2: to the garage with her very early in the morning,

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Speaker 2: and she gets them into the rear passenger seats of

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Speaker 2: the car. It's an old Chevy Vega. She rolls down

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Speaker 2: the garage door, she gets in, she pulls down the windows,

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Speaker 2: and she starts running the engine. And the girls understand

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Speaker 2: that the intention is that they will not be leaving

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Speaker 2: the garage. This is it. They're going to end their

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Speaker 2: lives that morning, and there's something about their mother that

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Speaker 2: has that kind of power over them, and they're such

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Speaker 2: young girls. Right at the last minute, Gloria has a

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Speaker 2: change of heart and carries the girls, who've passed out

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Speaker 2: at that point back into the house and she puts

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Speaker 2: them in their bed in their bedroom, Ronda, the older sister,

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Speaker 2: at some point wakes up and can hard move, and

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Speaker 2: eventually she regains consciousness and she sees their mother has

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Speaker 2: left a note on the door saying that she's going

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Speaker 2: to finish what she started by herself. So Ronda ends

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Speaker 2: up calling one of their aunts hysterically and the ance says, look,

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Speaker 2: you've got to go to the neighbors and get help.

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Speaker 2: And so she's able to get help from the neighbors,

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Speaker 2: who drag Gloria out of the garage and they start

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Speaker 2: performing CPR on her. At a certain point, nine year

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Speaker 2: old Paula has wandered out of the house too and

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Speaker 2: sees this happening, and eventually medics come and the fire

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Speaker 2: department and all of these people are taking turns trying

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Speaker 2: to revive her mother, and she becomes hysterical. Ronda told

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Speaker 2: me that she'd spend a lot of her life wondering

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Speaker 2: how Paula could commit the horrible crime she eventually did

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Speaker 2: when she was fifteen, but that that was the moment

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Speaker 2: that she thought things finally changed for Paula. You know,

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Speaker 2: they've been living with a certain amount of abuse, but

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Speaker 2: it was that morning that she thinks her sister something

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Speaker 2: in her changed that she truly became a young a

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Speaker 2: traumatized young person, and no one took the kids out

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Speaker 2: of the home. You know, it took years before they

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Speaker 2: were even put into emergency foster care or emergency shelter

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Speaker 2: and whatnot, And regularly they were returned to their mother's house.

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Speaker 2: And that is where Paula was living when three weeks later,

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Speaker 2: right after being returned home three weeks later, she committed

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Speaker 2: this terrible crime. So I say that it's just a

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Speaker 2: way to set this up. What happened when she was

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Speaker 2: fifteen is her sister had had already left home. Her

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Speaker 2: sister was a few years older and had learned that

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Speaker 2: her biological father was someone else, and so she had

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Speaker 2: a way out of this terrible household. Wow, her biological

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Speaker 2: father turned out to be a stable, loving guy and

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Speaker 2: they were able to make that work. Paula did not

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Speaker 2: have any legal kind of custody argument for going with

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Speaker 2: her sister. She was stuck and one day at school

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Speaker 2: at Leu Wallace hig Scho School in Gary, during lunch break,

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Speaker 2: she got together with a couple of friends who were

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Speaker 2: also ninth and tenth graders. There was a girl, Karen,

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Speaker 2: who was sixteen, April who was fifteen, and a young

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Speaker 2: girl named Denise who was just fourteen, and they all

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Speaker 2: decided to skip school for the rest of the day.

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Speaker 2: They went over to April's house because she lived just

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Speaker 2: a few blocks away in the Glen Park neighborhood, and

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Speaker 2: they sat on her back porch and they were just bored.

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Speaker 2: They didn't have any money left to spend at the

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Speaker 2: arcade or to do anything, so they thought they would

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Speaker 2: try to rob someone in the neighborhood. April had taken

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Speaker 2: Bible lessons from Ruth Pelke, who was a seventy eight

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Speaker 2: year old woman who lived right across the alleyway from

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Speaker 2: her in Glenn Park, and she said, you know, she's

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Speaker 2: home alone a lot. Her husband died a few years ago,

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Speaker 2: and she has you know, she's always helping people out,

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Speaker 2: which means that she has more than she needs. You know,

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Speaker 2: she's probably got extra money and jewelry lying around the house.

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Speaker 2: I think we should talk our way in there and

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Speaker 2: see what we can get.

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Speaker 1: Let me go back a moment, So between nine, when

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Speaker 1: this terrible thing happens with her mother, in fifteen, she

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Speaker 1: continues to live with her mother. I'm assuming, right yes,

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Speaker 1: is the instability the same? Does it get any better

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Speaker 1: for her?

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Speaker 2: Well, So what ends up happening is after Ronda leaves home,

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Speaker 2: Paula runs away. A number of times she tries to

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Speaker 2: run away, She's regularly picked up by the police and

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Speaker 2: returned home. Her father, Herman Cooper, is physically abusive. One night,

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Speaker 2: she actually runs to the nearest police station and says

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Speaker 2: to them, you know, you've got to help me out.

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Speaker 2: You can see the bruises. You've got to do something

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Speaker 2: for me. And so then she starts getting bounced around

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Speaker 2: foster care. So you have these brief periods in maybe

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Speaker 2: a few weeks, it maybe a few months, and maybe

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Speaker 2: longer than that, but she's always being brought back home,

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Speaker 2: And anytime she acts out in one of these foster

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Speaker 2: care scenarios, she's sent to juvenile detention along with kids

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Speaker 2: who actually have a criminal record and who are in

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Speaker 2: there for more serious stuff. So you can kind of

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Speaker 2: see the cycle of trauma and also exposing her to

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Speaker 2: people who are not going to be a great influence

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Speaker 2: on her and are not going to be a stabilizing

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Speaker 2: force in her life, and blaming her for acting out.

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Speaker 2: I'm not saying that she didn't encounter social workers and

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Speaker 2: individuals who didn't try to help. Yeah, but all in all,

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Speaker 2: this was a pretty disastrous scenario. And actually, at one point,

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Speaker 2: a social worker assigned to her and her sister Ronda,

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Speaker 2: was asked by Ronda's biological father, you know, isn't there

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Speaker 2: some way I could make a case to adopt Paula

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Speaker 2: as well? And he was told, you know what, I'm

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Speaker 2: retiring in six months. Her mother is crazy and I

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Speaker 2: just don't want to deal with this. So I'm sorry.

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Speaker 1: I mean, that's terrible. And can I assume that these

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Speaker 1: other three young women, no one's older than sixteen? Is

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Speaker 1: that in this group who goes on and does this

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Speaker 1: terrible thing? It sounds like everybody is probably in a

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Speaker 1: similar situation. Are they all from unstable households also in

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Speaker 1: the neighborhood.

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Speaker 2: So you had a sixteen year old and two fifteen

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Speaker 2: year olds, including Paula. They were all living in households

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Speaker 2: where they either had only one parent or the parenting

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Speaker 2: situation was incredibly unstable and volatile. Two of the other girls, Karen,

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Speaker 2: the oldest girl, had at that point, already had a baby.

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Speaker 2: She had gotten pregnant at twelve and had the baby

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Speaker 2: at thirteen. Her mother had died of cancer. April's mother

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Speaker 2: had died of cancer, and she was kind of being

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Speaker 2: bounced around between households. So you really have a scenario

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Speaker 2: for three out of these four girls where there's no

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Speaker 2: stability in terms of the adult presences in their lives.

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Speaker 2: The youngest, Denise, she was someone who just hung out

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Speaker 2: with the wrong kids at lunch that day. So you

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Speaker 2: had someone who came from more of a stable family situation,

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Speaker 2: who had been a pretty good student, and it was

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Speaker 2: a case of just the worst circumstance to end up

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Speaker 2: in on that day.

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Speaker 1: It seems so like a big jump from being an

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Speaker 1: unstabled household to then saying let's go rob an old

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Speaker 1: woman who teaches the Bible to young kids. Is there

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Speaker 1: an escalation in do they have any petty crimes before then?

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Speaker 1: Or is this their first big idea with crime.

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Speaker 2: There were a couple other scenarios where they found a

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Speaker 2: way into neighboring homes and grabbed a few things when

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Speaker 2: someone wasn't home, nothing that went beyond petty delinquent crime.

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Speaker 2: I think one of the girls had had a shoplifting

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Speaker 2: incident on her record, but that's a far cry from

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Speaker 2: violent crime. Right, So this was just an enormous, enormous leap,

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Speaker 2: And I think it's really important to keep in mind

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Speaker 2: something that I really rush with in the book because

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Speaker 2: I wanted to make clear how horrific this crime was,

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Speaker 2: to also give a sense of Paula's background. I am

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Speaker 2: not saying that this is an excuse for what she did.

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Speaker 2: And also her older sister, Ronda, who I did eventually

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Speaker 2: get to know quite well through the course of researching

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Speaker 2: this story, she doesn't feel that way either. That no

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Speaker 2: one involved is trying to say that there is a

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Speaker 2: legitimate explanation for what happened that afternoon. I think what

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Speaker 2: readers will hopefully do is they'll put themselves in the

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Speaker 2: mindset of, Okay, if this happened in my community, in

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Speaker 2: my neighborhood, what would my response be, because I think that's

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Speaker 2: the more important question. Right, she's fifteen, she commits murder

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Speaker 2: in this horrific way that's unjustifiable, but she's still a kid,

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Speaker 2: and you cannot change that fact. What is the right

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Speaker 2: response as a community or as the prosecutor in Lake

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Speaker 2: County for instance, who becomes a pretty big character.

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Speaker 1: So We're talking about a spring day in nineteen eighty

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Speaker 1: five in Gary and Deana, and you have these four girls,

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Speaker 1: two fifteen year olds, a sixteen year old and a

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Speaker 1: fourteen year old, and they think that they are going

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Speaker 1: to go and there's a woman who lives at home,

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Speaker 1: Ruth Helki, and she's seventy eight, unarmed, and it will

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Speaker 1: be easy for them to go in and rob her,

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Speaker 1: nobody had money, and walk out. I have to assume

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Speaker 1: the intention was not to murder her, is that right.

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Speaker 2: What's interesting is the prosecutor, Jack Crawford, and his deputy

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Speaker 2: who handled the case, they really pushed a narrative that

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Speaker 2: this was premeditated, This was a pre meditated robbery and murder.

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Speaker 2: I found that to be total nonsense. It seemed obvious

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Speaker 2: to me that these girls walked in there to rob

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Speaker 2: this elderly woman so they could go off and have

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Speaker 2: some fun. I'm fairly convinced that Paula's actions in the

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Speaker 2: way in which those escalated came as a shock to

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Speaker 2: everyone in that house, and the violence ratcheted up from there.

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Speaker 2: There's research that's been done in much more recent years,

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Speaker 2: not the kind of research we had in the eighties.

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Speaker 2: As to how heightened group dynamics can become between juveniles.

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Speaker 2: When you have a group of teenagers together and one

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Speaker 2: of them takes part in high risk behavior, the rest

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Speaker 2: of the group is far more likely to jump on board, right,

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Speaker 2: and you have a kind of runaway train scenario that

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Speaker 2: has the possibility for unfolding. Again, this is not an excuse.

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Speaker 2: It's just trying to understand what might have happened in

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Speaker 2: that house in May of nineteen eighty five. I spent

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Speaker 2: five years researching this book, and no one really knows

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Speaker 2: what happened or why who's still alive.

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Speaker 1: So the four of them head over that day in May,

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Speaker 1: and one of them is.

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Speaker 2: Armed, right, So what happens is when Paula cares and

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Speaker 2: in Denise go over to April's house. April takes a

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Speaker 2: knife out of the kitchen drawer and says, you know,

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Speaker 2: when you go over there, you can scare missus Pelki

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Speaker 2: with this. Paula takes the knife and she hides it

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Speaker 2: under her jean jacket. April, knowing that she already has

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Speaker 2: a relationship with missus Pelk, who taught her Bible studies,

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Speaker 2: who was nice to her after her mother died, who

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Speaker 2: made lunch for her, who took her to church a

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Speaker 2: couple times. April decides it's less complicated if she stays behind,

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Speaker 2: because there's that sort of recognition that they can avoid.

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Speaker 2: The other girls don't actually know about the relationship April

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Speaker 2: has with missus Pelk already, and I found that to

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Speaker 2: be really a disturbing part of the background of this crime.

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Speaker 2: So the three others walk across the alley and they

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Speaker 2: go up the front steps of missus Pelk's house and

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Speaker 2: they knock on the door, and eventually they are allowed in.

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Speaker 2: They say that, you know, we need you to write

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Speaker 2: down some information about Bible study. My aunt wants to

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Speaker 2: know when it is and maybe you could write it

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Speaker 2: down for us, something along those lines. She lets them

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Speaker 2: in and she says, okay, well, I'm going to just

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Speaker 2: get some note paper, and they follow her through the

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Speaker 2: house and into her dining room. She's got a little

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Speaker 2: secretary desk up against the wall, and as she's turned

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Speaker 2: around to start writing a note for them, Paula picks

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Speaker 2: up a paperweight, a glass paperweight, and hits her in

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Speaker 2: the head and missus Pelkie falls to the floor. Paula

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Speaker 2: described this moment later that there was this moment where

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Speaker 2: her hair was so white, and then there was the

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Speaker 2: red suddenly of the woman starting to bleed on her head.

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Speaker 2: From the way in which she later described the incident,

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Speaker 2: it sounds like that was a very deep triggering moment

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Speaker 2: for Paula, and she went to find the knife in

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Speaker 2: her jacket, which was somewhere within reach, and she pushed

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Speaker 2: missus Pelkie down and began stabbing her. And it was

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Speaker 2: clearly an extremely heightened, irrational moment because she ultimately stabbed

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Speaker 2: missus Pelki thirty three times. Wow. There was nothing about

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Speaker 2: this where they were threatening her for her money, and

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Speaker 2: something went a little too far. It went way beyond that,

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Speaker 2: and none of the other girls went for help. They

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Speaker 2: eventually ransacked the house and were only able to find

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Speaker 2: about ten dollars and the keys to missus Pelki's plymouth,

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Speaker 2: so they ended up leaving and leaving missus Pelk on

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Speaker 2: the floor and going for a joy ride in her plymouth.

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Speaker 2: They were not all brought in until a couple days later.

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Speaker 2: Paula had a doctor's note with a prescription for birth

387
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Speaker 2: control in the pocket of her jacket, and she'd left

388
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Speaker 2: that behind at the scene I mean, there were a

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Speaker 2: number of factors at the scene of the crime that

390
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Speaker 2: made clear that these were kids. There were some details

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Speaker 2: that you know, leaving your jacket with identifying information in

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Speaker 2: it behind. There was a real box that had been

393
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Speaker 2: left open on the counter in the kitchen where clearly

394
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Speaker 2: one of them had a snack somewhere in the middle

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Speaker 2: of all of this. And it's just really terrible, and

396
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Speaker 2: they came away with nothing. It was it was a

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Speaker 2: completely chaotic crime committed by kids.

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Speaker 1: How is this discovered? Does one of missus Pelkie's kids

399
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Speaker 1: come over or is there a welfare check?

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Speaker 2: Missus Pelki had a number of grown step kids who

401
00:23:25,760 --> 00:23:29,960
Speaker 2: lived in the area, and she was well beloved by

402
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Speaker 2: all of them and had become really like a deep

403
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Speaker 2: part of her that family's life when she married their father.

404
00:23:36,960 --> 00:23:40,280
Speaker 2: So she had a number of step kids and grandkids

405
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Speaker 2: who live nearby, and so her steps on. Bob Pelki

406
00:23:44,280 --> 00:23:46,760
Speaker 2: was concerned that she hadn't answered the phone, because they

407
00:23:46,760 --> 00:23:50,240
Speaker 2: would regularly talk on the phone, so he stopped over midday.

408
00:23:50,760 --> 00:23:53,680
Speaker 2: It was the next day he stopped in midday and

409
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Speaker 2: he looked through this opening in the mail slot when

410
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Speaker 2: she didn't answer, and he saw sort of like a

411
00:24:00,200 --> 00:24:04,360
Speaker 2: mess where selfa cushions and papers had been thrown everywhere. Right,

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Speaker 2: this was absolutely not you know, she was an extremely

413
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Speaker 2: meticulous woman. And immediately he knew something was wrong, and

414
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Speaker 2: so he found the extra key and let himself in

415
00:24:14,200 --> 00:24:17,240
Speaker 2: and he discovered Ruth. He had to run down the

416
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Speaker 2: street knocking on doors. It was the middle of the day.

417
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Speaker 2: Most people weren't home, they were at work, until he

418
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Speaker 2: could find someone who would be able to call the

419
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Speaker 2: police because the girls had also torn the phone out

420
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Speaker 2: of the phone jack out of the wall. It's a

421
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Speaker 2: terrible crime to have to think about and grapple with.

422
00:24:34,600 --> 00:24:38,080
Speaker 2: And there were various moments where I was immersed in

423
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Speaker 2: understanding paula situation and how young she was and her background,

424
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Speaker 2: and I would make sure to go over occasionally the

425
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Speaker 2: details of the crimea. I've seen the crime scene photos.

426
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Speaker 2: They're just terrible. I thought it was really important not

427
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Speaker 2: to fall under the spell of the prosecutor on the

428
00:24:57,720 --> 00:25:01,240
Speaker 2: one hand, but also not to forg get what actually

429
00:25:01,280 --> 00:25:04,280
Speaker 2: took place that day, and so how do you maneuver that?

430
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Speaker 2: And it makes what happened next even more extraordinary? I

431
00:25:23,240 --> 00:25:27,120
Speaker 2: think what is extraordinary about this story and what is

432
00:25:27,240 --> 00:25:31,439
Speaker 2: so important to grapple with She was a kid, She

433
00:25:31,640 --> 00:25:36,720
Speaker 2: was fifteen years old, which I think makes any assessment

434
00:25:36,920 --> 00:25:42,159
Speaker 2: of her culpability a lot more complex, and that was

435
00:25:42,200 --> 00:25:48,480
Speaker 2: something that I dove headlong into, just grappling with that question.

436
00:25:49,320 --> 00:25:53,399
Speaker 2: What does it mean when a child commits a violent crime?

437
00:25:53,480 --> 00:25:57,880
Speaker 2: And what does our response to that crime say about us?

438
00:25:58,200 --> 00:26:02,280
Speaker 2: If we are willing to apply the ultimate punishment to

439
00:26:02,359 --> 00:26:06,520
Speaker 2: a juvenile, to a teenager, what does that say about

440
00:26:06,640 --> 00:26:09,840
Speaker 2: us as a culture society? What does that say about

441
00:26:09,880 --> 00:26:15,320
Speaker 2: our true goals in our criminal justice system? Because it

442
00:26:15,400 --> 00:26:19,640
Speaker 2: was possible to sentence teenagers to death in nineteen eighty five,

443
00:26:19,680 --> 00:26:22,720
Speaker 2: it was possible all the way up until two thousand

444
00:26:22,720 --> 00:26:24,760
Speaker 2: and five, which was a lot more recent than I

445
00:26:24,760 --> 00:26:27,959
Speaker 2: think a lot of people realize. So within less than

446
00:26:27,960 --> 00:26:31,639
Speaker 2: a year, Paula Cooper had been sentenced to death. The

447
00:26:31,680 --> 00:26:35,560
Speaker 2: reaction in the local media was very much about the

448
00:26:35,600 --> 00:26:38,520
Speaker 2: shock of her crime and sort of the sense that,

449
00:26:38,640 --> 00:26:42,359
Speaker 2: you know, what is society coming to that young people

450
00:26:42,400 --> 00:26:45,840
Speaker 2: can be involved in such a horrific crime, right? That

451
00:26:46,200 --> 00:26:49,840
Speaker 2: was the tenor of the coverage. It was not shock

452
00:26:50,200 --> 00:26:53,480
Speaker 2: at the fact that we had just sentenced a kid

453
00:26:53,680 --> 00:26:56,399
Speaker 2: to the electric chair, right, That was not part of

454
00:26:56,440 --> 00:26:59,840
Speaker 2: the coverage, and it took it took a little while

455
00:27:00,359 --> 00:27:04,240
Speaker 2: for the tables to turn. It actually took the European

456
00:27:04,320 --> 00:27:09,080
Speaker 2: media becoming aware of the fact that a fifteen year

457
00:27:09,080 --> 00:27:11,159
Speaker 2: old girl had just been sentenced to death in the

458
00:27:11,240 --> 00:27:15,359
Speaker 2: United States to change the media conversation around the crime

459
00:27:15,960 --> 00:27:19,480
Speaker 2: in the United States. So I actually tracked down. It

460
00:27:19,520 --> 00:27:24,119
Speaker 2: came down to ultimately two Italian journalists who caught wind

461
00:27:24,880 --> 00:27:28,359
Speaker 2: of this through a tiny line item somewhere in the

462
00:27:28,359 --> 00:27:32,560
Speaker 2: middle of an issue of USA Today. While they were traveling.

463
00:27:33,119 --> 00:27:37,080
Speaker 2: They caught wind of her sentence and convinced their editors

464
00:27:37,160 --> 00:27:42,159
Speaker 2: back in Rome and in Florence to fund their travel

465
00:27:42,480 --> 00:27:45,879
Speaker 2: to Gary to look into what the situation was. So

466
00:27:46,119 --> 00:27:48,840
Speaker 2: they ended up having front page stories in Italy that

467
00:27:48,920 --> 00:27:53,360
Speaker 2: were picked up around Europe. It became a sensation as

468
00:27:53,359 --> 00:27:56,240
Speaker 2: a story in Italy for the exact opposite reason that

469
00:27:56,280 --> 00:27:58,960
Speaker 2: it did in the US and the Midwest. Then the

470
00:27:59,000 --> 00:28:02,960
Speaker 2: media here started covering the fact that we were being shamed.

471
00:28:03,000 --> 00:28:07,439
Speaker 2: Indiana specifically was being shamed by the European press for

472
00:28:07,560 --> 00:28:12,199
Speaker 2: this decision, right, And so it turned the tables on

473
00:28:12,280 --> 00:28:16,960
Speaker 2: this issue and made it a much more complex conversation.

474
00:28:17,920 --> 00:28:20,879
Speaker 2: Something else that took place within a few months of

475
00:28:20,920 --> 00:28:24,439
Speaker 2: Paula's death sentence is I think, possibly the most extraordinary

476
00:28:24,520 --> 00:28:27,840
Speaker 2: part of this story. A man named Bill Pelki, who

477
00:28:27,960 --> 00:28:32,760
Speaker 2: was the adult grandson of the victim Ruth Pelki, decided

478
00:28:33,240 --> 00:28:37,040
Speaker 2: against the wishes of his family, his friends, his congregation,

479
00:28:37,240 --> 00:28:41,560
Speaker 2: his coworkers, really truly against the wishes of everyone he knew.

480
00:28:42,480 --> 00:28:46,240
Speaker 2: He decided to publicly forgive Paula for killing his grandmother.

481
00:28:46,880 --> 00:28:50,200
Speaker 2: He had a revelation that his grandmother would not want

482
00:28:50,360 --> 00:28:56,520
Speaker 2: this girl killed in her name, and once that conviction

483
00:28:56,720 --> 00:28:58,800
Speaker 2: came to him, he wouldn't let it go. And this

484
00:28:58,960 --> 00:29:01,160
Speaker 2: was a guy who didn't have a political bone in

485
00:29:01,200 --> 00:29:04,040
Speaker 2: his body. He was not someone who was used to

486
00:29:04,080 --> 00:29:08,240
Speaker 2: making waves. He was a crane operator in a steel mill,

487
00:29:08,600 --> 00:29:13,080
Speaker 2: Bethlehem Steel in Portage, Indiana, just outside Gary. He'd been

488
00:29:13,200 --> 00:29:17,040
Speaker 2: a crane operator there for a couple decades. He just

489
00:29:17,200 --> 00:29:20,440
Speaker 2: you know, punched the clock, came home, cashed his check.

490
00:29:20,600 --> 00:29:24,320
Speaker 2: He didn't want trouble. And one night up in the crane,

491
00:29:24,400 --> 00:29:27,400
Speaker 2: he was there doing a late shift. He'd been called

492
00:29:27,400 --> 00:29:30,719
Speaker 2: in and for some reason there was no work, so

493
00:29:30,760 --> 00:29:34,240
Speaker 2: he was alone hovering up above this warehouse in the dark,

494
00:29:34,720 --> 00:29:37,560
Speaker 2: and he started thinking about everything that had taken place

495
00:29:37,600 --> 00:29:40,560
Speaker 2: over the last few months, how he'd been grieving the

496
00:29:40,600 --> 00:29:44,280
Speaker 2: death of his grandmother, but also how he felt that

497
00:29:44,360 --> 00:29:47,600
Speaker 2: he'd really messed up his own life. He had just

498
00:29:47,880 --> 00:29:52,600
Speaker 2: filed for bankruptcy, he was on his way to losing

499
00:29:52,760 --> 00:29:55,920
Speaker 2: his living girlfriend, Judy, who he'd fallen so deeply in

500
00:29:55,920 --> 00:29:58,800
Speaker 2: love with. He'd gotten divorced to his first wife, you know,

501
00:29:58,840 --> 00:30:01,680
Speaker 2: and so he was just feeling, you know, on top

502
00:30:01,760 --> 00:30:05,400
Speaker 2: of that, I think I'm about to disappoint my grandmother.

503
00:30:05,720 --> 00:30:08,240
Speaker 2: I'm about to let something else terrible happen.

504
00:30:08,560 --> 00:30:12,240
Speaker 1: Well, and he's making a series of bad decisions. That's

505
00:30:12,320 --> 00:30:14,400
Speaker 1: where he's ending up, is that there's a divorce and

506
00:30:14,440 --> 00:30:18,200
Speaker 1: the girlfriend and the bankruptcy. And I'm sure it occurs

507
00:30:18,200 --> 00:30:21,560
Speaker 1: to him how easy it is to make bad decisions,

508
00:30:21,720 --> 00:30:24,240
Speaker 1: you know. I mean, we're human, That's what happens. Does

509
00:30:24,280 --> 00:30:26,880
Speaker 1: he feel any sort of parallel in any way to

510
00:30:26,960 --> 00:30:28,080
Speaker 1: the girls or at Paula?

511
00:30:28,600 --> 00:30:31,760
Speaker 2: Was there something interesting? I think sometimes you know, the

512
00:30:31,840 --> 00:30:34,920
Speaker 2: human mind, when you're alone, you're in the dark, you're tired,

513
00:30:35,040 --> 00:30:38,480
Speaker 2: you're exhausted, you're emotionally depleted. You know, that was the

514
00:30:38,520 --> 00:30:41,720
Speaker 2: state he was in. You start to kind of reassociate

515
00:30:41,760 --> 00:30:43,800
Speaker 2: in your mind, and he's up there in this crane

516
00:30:43,880 --> 00:30:47,680
Speaker 2: cab and he has this image for the first time,

517
00:30:48,280 --> 00:30:51,640
Speaker 2: he has this image of Paula Cooper on death row.

518
00:30:52,080 --> 00:30:54,480
Speaker 2: He was there in court. He took time off from

519
00:30:54,520 --> 00:30:56,680
Speaker 2: work to be there in court the day she was

520
00:30:56,760 --> 00:30:59,360
Speaker 2: given the death sentence because there was a rumor that

521
00:30:59,360 --> 00:31:01,360
Speaker 2: that's how it was going to go. And he wanted

522
00:31:01,400 --> 00:31:02,960
Speaker 2: to be there to see the girl who had killed

523
00:31:02,960 --> 00:31:06,000
Speaker 2: his grandmother get death. And this is the first time

524
00:31:06,080 --> 00:31:09,160
Speaker 2: really that he'd thought about that, and he thought to himself,

525
00:31:09,160 --> 00:31:12,320
Speaker 2: you know, her cell's probably the size of this cab.

526
00:31:12,760 --> 00:31:16,920
Speaker 2: She's probably sitting in the dark. She's alone, and she's

527
00:31:17,160 --> 00:31:20,160
Speaker 2: far more desperate than I will ever be, regardless of

528
00:31:20,160 --> 00:31:22,719
Speaker 2: how I feel about all of the fuck ups in

529
00:31:22,800 --> 00:31:25,560
Speaker 2: my life. Right, this is someone who's in a far

530
00:31:25,640 --> 00:31:30,840
Speaker 2: wars situation. And then he saw his grandmother the way

531
00:31:30,880 --> 00:31:34,800
Speaker 2: she was before her death. There was a family photo

532
00:31:34,800 --> 00:31:36,560
Speaker 2: that had been used in a lot of the press

533
00:31:36,600 --> 00:31:39,520
Speaker 2: around her murder. It's like one of those studio portrait

534
00:31:39,600 --> 00:31:43,479
Speaker 2: kind of Midwestern studio portrait photos, you know, where everyone's

535
00:31:43,480 --> 00:31:46,200
Speaker 2: got their hair perfect, and they're done up for the session,

536
00:31:46,760 --> 00:31:51,520
Speaker 2: and he pictures his grandmother and he pictures her weeping,

537
00:31:52,040 --> 00:31:55,160
Speaker 2: and it's really kind of it reminded me of those

538
00:31:55,240 --> 00:31:59,560
Speaker 2: moments where people imagine they've seen the Virgin Mary crying.

539
00:31:59,720 --> 00:32:02,760
Speaker 2: This a statue of a Catholic saint crying, right. It

540
00:32:03,480 --> 00:32:06,480
Speaker 2: was a spiritual moment for him, and he believed that

541
00:32:06,520 --> 00:32:09,560
Speaker 2: this image came to him because his grandmother would have

542
00:32:09,680 --> 00:32:14,400
Speaker 2: wept at the idea of this young girl being executed

543
00:32:14,720 --> 00:32:18,040
Speaker 2: in her name. He walks away that night, he leaves

544
00:32:18,200 --> 00:32:21,120
Speaker 2: the mill feeling for the first time that he actually

545
00:32:21,120 --> 00:32:23,400
Speaker 2: has a sense of purpose in his life. He has

546
00:32:23,400 --> 00:32:25,800
Speaker 2: a mission. Now. The next thing he's going to do

547
00:32:25,840 --> 00:32:27,560
Speaker 2: is he's going to reach out and he's going to

548
00:32:27,600 --> 00:32:29,520
Speaker 2: write to this girl on death row and he's going

549
00:32:29,560 --> 00:32:31,320
Speaker 2: to figure out what he can do to help her.

550
00:32:31,560 --> 00:32:35,000
Speaker 2: And he ends up the next day sitting down writing

551
00:32:35,040 --> 00:32:39,560
Speaker 2: a letter and mailing it to the teenage kid who

552
00:32:40,040 --> 00:32:41,040
Speaker 2: murdered his grandmother.

553
00:32:41,640 --> 00:32:44,320
Speaker 1: If we take one step back, because I've been curious

554
00:32:44,320 --> 00:32:49,480
Speaker 1: about this, how would you describe Paula's demeanor through this

555
00:32:49,640 --> 00:32:53,320
Speaker 1: whole thing once she's caught. Is there a sense in

556
00:32:53,360 --> 00:32:58,920
Speaker 1: the court or in jail of remorse or understanding, or

557
00:32:59,120 --> 00:33:02,200
Speaker 1: is she so hot, hardened based on her background and

558
00:33:02,280 --> 00:33:05,360
Speaker 1: now being a fifteen year old in a women's prison,

559
00:33:06,080 --> 00:33:08,600
Speaker 1: that there's no way to get through to her.

560
00:33:09,080 --> 00:33:12,680
Speaker 2: I spent some time wrestling with the question of whether

561
00:33:12,760 --> 00:33:16,360
Speaker 2: or not Paula had any remorse for her crime. But

562
00:33:16,400 --> 00:33:23,160
Speaker 2: I also asked myself how capable a teenager is of remorse,

563
00:33:23,400 --> 00:33:25,600
Speaker 2: or at least the kind of remorse that would be

564
00:33:25,640 --> 00:33:29,680
Speaker 2: recognizable to an adult. I don't have the answer to that.

565
00:33:30,280 --> 00:33:34,120
Speaker 2: I know that at her sentencing hearing she received her

566
00:33:34,400 --> 00:33:37,400
Speaker 2: public defender did not do a great job. His performance

567
00:33:37,520 --> 00:33:40,280
Speaker 2: was thin at best, and I think that, going by

568
00:33:40,280 --> 00:33:43,000
Speaker 2: the court transcripts, I don't think Paula was coached at

569
00:33:43,000 --> 00:33:45,400
Speaker 2: all as to how to behave in a courtroom in

570
00:33:45,440 --> 00:33:50,360
Speaker 2: the kinds of statements that you should try to make

571
00:33:50,560 --> 00:33:53,840
Speaker 2: in that scenario. I think she was angry. I think

572
00:33:53,880 --> 00:33:59,479
Speaker 2: she was overwhelmed. The judge ultimately commented on what seemed

573
00:33:59,560 --> 00:34:02,440
Speaker 2: like her lack of remorse at the time. I think

574
00:34:02,480 --> 00:34:07,320
Speaker 2: it took her a long time to understand what she

575
00:34:07,440 --> 00:34:11,920
Speaker 2: had done. She ended up having a relationship with Bill Pelk.

576
00:34:12,160 --> 00:34:15,239
Speaker 2: They had a correspondence that was very deep and went

577
00:34:15,280 --> 00:34:18,279
Speaker 2: on for years and years and years, and I was

578
00:34:18,320 --> 00:34:22,160
Speaker 2: able to read hundreds of letters between them, maybe about

579
00:34:22,560 --> 00:34:25,720
Speaker 2: you know, nine months to a year into their correspondence,

580
00:34:25,719 --> 00:34:29,160
Speaker 2: I started to feel that she was genuinely trying to

581
00:34:29,200 --> 00:34:31,760
Speaker 2: express to him her shock at what she had done

582
00:34:31,960 --> 00:34:34,640
Speaker 2: and how terrible it was that she had taken this

583
00:34:34,719 --> 00:34:38,040
Speaker 2: special person from his life, you know. And one of

584
00:34:38,080 --> 00:34:40,520
Speaker 2: the first things Bill wrote her about is he said,

585
00:34:40,520 --> 00:34:43,319
Speaker 2: I want to tell you about my grandmother, you know.

586
00:34:43,440 --> 00:34:46,080
Speaker 2: He would just try to describe how much she was

587
00:34:46,120 --> 00:34:48,200
Speaker 2: loved and the people in her life and what made

588
00:34:48,239 --> 00:34:51,600
Speaker 2: her special to him, And eventually he sent her a

589
00:34:51,640 --> 00:34:55,040
Speaker 2: photo of his grandmother, you know. And so part of

590
00:34:55,080 --> 00:34:58,239
Speaker 2: the process on Bill's end was trying to get her

591
00:34:58,239 --> 00:35:02,120
Speaker 2: to understand what she had done done. He never came

592
00:35:02,200 --> 00:35:04,120
Speaker 2: right out and said, you know, I need to know

593
00:35:04,200 --> 00:35:05,359
Speaker 2: why you did what you did.

594
00:35:05,719 --> 00:35:08,480
Speaker 1: I'm sure he realized that she probably didn't know that.

595
00:35:08,560 --> 00:35:10,920
Speaker 1: It was just this sort of you know, the background,

596
00:35:10,960 --> 00:35:15,160
Speaker 1: it's everything, everything happening in her life. But what role

597
00:35:15,280 --> 00:35:19,359
Speaker 1: is Bill playing to Paula? Why answer his letters at

598
00:35:19,360 --> 00:35:22,080
Speaker 1: all and then start to show some sort of softening

599
00:35:22,120 --> 00:35:24,920
Speaker 1: and real hundreds of letters over the years.

600
00:35:25,680 --> 00:35:29,120
Speaker 2: Look, I think, honestly, something that drew me in and

601
00:35:29,600 --> 00:35:33,719
Speaker 2: what really really got its hooks into me was, let

602
00:35:33,760 --> 00:35:36,000
Speaker 2: me just think about it. You have a forty year

603
00:35:36,040 --> 00:35:41,000
Speaker 2: old white man steel worker Vietnam Vett, Yeah, who's writing

604
00:35:42,040 --> 00:35:48,120
Speaker 2: very intimate, personal, emotionally raw letters to the then sixteen

605
00:35:48,200 --> 00:35:53,080
Speaker 2: year old girl, black girl from Gary, from a community

606
00:35:53,160 --> 00:35:56,719
Speaker 2: he has nothing in common with, who's a runaway from

607
00:35:56,719 --> 00:36:00,920
Speaker 2: an abusive home. And what connects them is that she

608
00:36:01,800 --> 00:36:06,120
Speaker 2: brutally murdered his grandmother. Can you imagine, like, what is

609
00:36:06,160 --> 00:36:10,279
Speaker 2: that correspondence? And I was so drawn into that. To me,

610
00:36:10,320 --> 00:36:15,000
Speaker 2: that had the psychological complexity of a novel. And there

611
00:36:15,040 --> 00:36:17,839
Speaker 2: was a degree to which at first Bill had the

612
00:36:17,880 --> 00:36:22,120
Speaker 2: power in a way because he was extending his generous

613
00:36:22,160 --> 00:36:26,600
Speaker 2: forgiveness towards this girl in a desperate situation. But there

614
00:36:26,600 --> 00:36:30,680
Speaker 2: were moments where Bill would write to Paula and confess

615
00:36:30,719 --> 00:36:32,440
Speaker 2: how tough of a time he was having in his

616
00:36:32,560 --> 00:36:37,040
Speaker 2: breakup with Judy, and she would write back with friendly advice.

617
00:36:37,920 --> 00:36:41,359
Speaker 2: It was unlike any other relationship that either of them

618
00:36:41,400 --> 00:36:44,640
Speaker 2: had ever had, and I think that's what opened them

619
00:36:44,719 --> 00:36:49,840
Speaker 2: both up. That was something I found totally extraordinary. Another

620
00:36:49,880 --> 00:36:52,520
Speaker 2: topic but worth noting. The letters also proved to me

621
00:36:53,000 --> 00:36:55,399
Speaker 2: that even though Paula had bounced around nine to nine

622
00:36:55,480 --> 00:36:59,160
Speaker 2: or ten schools before her arrest, had skipped classes all

623
00:36:59,200 --> 00:37:02,799
Speaker 2: the time, she really had no meaningful education. Within the

624
00:37:02,800 --> 00:37:05,520
Speaker 2: first year of writing these letters, she had taught herself

625
00:37:05,560 --> 00:37:09,520
Speaker 2: to write. She expressed herself beautifully. She had this raw,

626
00:37:09,640 --> 00:37:12,440
Speaker 2: kind of weird sense of humor that came out. She

627
00:37:12,560 --> 00:37:16,760
Speaker 2: was very brave. She wrote sassy letters to the ACLU.

628
00:37:17,160 --> 00:37:20,920
Speaker 2: This story takes on this incredible scope where she's she

629
00:37:21,040 --> 00:37:24,120
Speaker 2: literally wrote a letter directly to Pope John paul the

630
00:37:24,200 --> 00:37:28,520
Speaker 2: Second and he received it personally. You know, you see

631
00:37:28,560 --> 00:37:34,440
Speaker 2: Paula's voice evolving and her intelligence, and I really felt

632
00:37:34,960 --> 00:37:39,040
Speaker 2: the loss of what she could have become under a

633
00:37:39,080 --> 00:37:44,040
Speaker 2: different circumstance. After she was sentenced to death, her case

634
00:37:44,160 --> 00:37:47,440
Speaker 2: was taken up by an appellate public defender in Lake County,

635
00:37:47,480 --> 00:37:51,479
Speaker 2: Bill Touchet, who also brought on board Monica Foster, who

636
00:37:51,920 --> 00:37:55,320
Speaker 2: was a young attorney a few years out of law school,

637
00:37:55,360 --> 00:37:58,880
Speaker 2: honestly not that many years older than Paula herself, and

638
00:37:59,480 --> 00:38:04,520
Speaker 2: both of them worked passionately on Paula's behalf and Monica

639
00:38:04,960 --> 00:38:07,279
Speaker 2: when she first went to visit Paula on death row,

640
00:38:07,520 --> 00:38:11,040
Speaker 2: was so was honestly frightened. You know. She admitted that

641
00:38:11,080 --> 00:38:12,759
Speaker 2: to me that she thought she was going to go

642
00:38:13,239 --> 00:38:15,560
Speaker 2: and have a meeting with someone who was almost like

643
00:38:15,560 --> 00:38:18,160
Speaker 2: an animal. She couldn't imagine what kind of young person

644
00:38:18,239 --> 00:38:21,280
Speaker 2: was capable of committing such a terrible crime. And instead

645
00:38:21,400 --> 00:38:26,520
Speaker 2: she met a girl who was overwhelmed, probably clinically depressed,

646
00:38:27,320 --> 00:38:30,319
Speaker 2: who could not stop weeping during their meeting, and who

647
00:38:30,880 --> 00:38:33,600
Speaker 2: was convinced that because she'd been sentenced to death, she

648
00:38:33,680 --> 00:38:36,280
Speaker 2: was going to be carried off to the death house

649
00:38:36,480 --> 00:38:40,000
Speaker 2: at any moment. No one had explained to her, and

650
00:38:40,040 --> 00:38:43,200
Speaker 2: she was young enough she had no understanding of the system, right,

651
00:38:43,239 --> 00:38:45,840
Speaker 2: No one had explained her. No, No, there's a process.

652
00:38:46,280 --> 00:38:48,640
Speaker 2: She honestly woke up every day thinking that that might

653
00:38:48,680 --> 00:38:51,080
Speaker 2: be the day she was taken to the electric chair,

654
00:38:51,120 --> 00:38:52,960
Speaker 2: and Monica had to be the one to sort of

655
00:38:53,000 --> 00:38:54,960
Speaker 2: try to walk her through. No, this is how the

656
00:38:55,040 --> 00:38:58,319
Speaker 2: system works. It's going to be years. We have a

657
00:38:58,320 --> 00:39:01,520
Speaker 2: lot of options, and you have to calm down. I

658
00:39:01,640 --> 00:39:06,200
Speaker 2: bring Monica up, because she then took it upon herself

659
00:39:06,239 --> 00:39:09,600
Speaker 2: with her very modest kind of green attorney's salary to

660
00:39:09,880 --> 00:39:14,520
Speaker 2: pay for an independent therapist, or Paula to pay for

661
00:39:14,600 --> 00:39:17,960
Speaker 2: her to have a tutor, to pay for her education

662
00:39:18,440 --> 00:39:22,520
Speaker 2: at first. And it was through that relationship that Paula

663
00:39:22,840 --> 00:39:25,880
Speaker 2: you can almost almost to the date when she starts

664
00:39:25,920 --> 00:39:29,600
Speaker 2: having those conversations with Monica, she starts writing in her

665
00:39:29,680 --> 00:39:31,480
Speaker 2: letters to Bill about.

666
00:39:31,160 --> 00:39:32,960
Speaker 1: The future positive role models.

667
00:39:33,040 --> 00:39:35,960
Speaker 2: Yeah, when I get out, I might become a businesswoman

668
00:39:36,560 --> 00:39:39,000
Speaker 2: or you know whatever the fantasy of the week was.

669
00:39:39,080 --> 00:39:42,680
Speaker 2: But up until that point, there was there was no

670
00:39:42,719 --> 00:39:46,360
Speaker 2: looking ahead. There was only today, twenty three hours in

671
00:39:46,400 --> 00:39:49,239
Speaker 2: the same cell. Because also she was, you know, she

672
00:39:49,280 --> 00:39:53,120
Speaker 2: was a very very young person being kept in total segregation.

673
00:39:53,920 --> 00:39:57,880
Speaker 1: Let's talk about the issue with Bill Helk's family. Is

674
00:39:57,880 --> 00:40:02,040
Speaker 1: it too simplistic to say that They all said, Bill,

675
00:40:02,120 --> 00:40:04,880
Speaker 1: why are you doing this? This is infuriating us. You

676
00:40:04,920 --> 00:40:08,840
Speaker 1: were trampling on, you know, Ruth's memory. How could you

677
00:40:08,880 --> 00:40:12,520
Speaker 1: support this killer? How could you write her and you know,

678
00:40:12,680 --> 00:40:14,920
Speaker 1: try to be close to her. Was that sort of

679
00:40:14,920 --> 00:40:15,560
Speaker 1: their reaction?

680
00:40:16,000 --> 00:40:23,400
Speaker 2: Oh? Absolutely, it was discussed confusion, total alienation, heartache. I

681
00:40:23,600 --> 00:40:28,560
Speaker 2: sympathized with them, feeling really seis wiped by this. They

682
00:40:28,719 --> 00:40:33,280
Speaker 2: just did not see this decision coming, especially Bill's parents,

683
00:40:33,400 --> 00:40:37,120
Speaker 2: and so his father, Bob, remember is the one who

684
00:40:37,200 --> 00:40:41,479
Speaker 2: discovered Ruth's body on the carpet in the dining room.

685
00:40:42,000 --> 00:40:45,560
Speaker 2: I mean, it was a terrible situation. He testified in

686
00:40:45,600 --> 00:40:49,400
Speaker 2: the hearings of all four girls and made very clear

687
00:40:50,000 --> 00:40:52,920
Speaker 2: that he was speaking on behalf of the family that

688
00:40:52,960 --> 00:40:56,799
Speaker 2: they wanted the ultimate punishment for this terrible crime, and

689
00:40:56,840 --> 00:41:00,640
Speaker 2: that was that he spoke as a devout Christian, as

690
00:41:01,280 --> 00:41:05,000
Speaker 2: a war veteran, you know this. Our country should not

691
00:41:05,200 --> 00:41:08,400
Speaker 2: allow a crime like this to go unpunished. And he

692
00:41:09,200 --> 00:41:11,560
Speaker 2: was made to believe, in part by the prosecutor that

693
00:41:12,040 --> 00:41:14,800
Speaker 2: if this girl was not sentenced to death, it would

694
00:41:14,840 --> 00:41:18,360
Speaker 2: not be sufficient. Life in prison was not what he

695
00:41:18,440 --> 00:41:21,359
Speaker 2: was looking for. They wanted to send a message. There

696
00:41:21,360 --> 00:41:25,200
Speaker 2: were ultimately some headlines in local papers, sometimes on the

697
00:41:25,200 --> 00:41:30,359
Speaker 2: front page, that pitted Robert Pelke versus Bill Pelki, his son,

698
00:41:31,000 --> 00:41:35,359
Speaker 2: and they would have pull quotes the answers forgiveness from

699
00:41:35,360 --> 00:41:38,080
Speaker 2: Bill and then his father. You know, my son is

700
00:41:38,120 --> 00:41:40,920
Speaker 2: of the generation that thinks that people shouldn't have to

701
00:41:41,000 --> 00:41:48,040
Speaker 2: pay for what they've done. Ultimately, within several months, Bill

702
00:41:48,280 --> 00:41:51,320
Speaker 2: ended up having a conversation in private with a cousin

703
00:41:51,360 --> 00:41:55,879
Speaker 2: of his who he loved dearly, and she revealed to him.

704
00:41:56,000 --> 00:41:59,239
Speaker 2: You know, I've been reading the coverage in the newspapers,

705
00:41:59,239 --> 00:42:01,279
Speaker 2: and I want you to know that I feel the

706
00:42:01,320 --> 00:42:05,280
Speaker 2: same way. I don't want this girl's life to be taken,

707
00:42:05,400 --> 00:42:08,479
Speaker 2: and I do think that our grandmother would have forgiven her,

708
00:42:08,800 --> 00:42:11,359
Speaker 2: you know. And then there was another family member, right,

709
00:42:11,480 --> 00:42:15,760
Speaker 2: And so there were people who quietly they didn't want

710
00:42:15,800 --> 00:42:18,160
Speaker 2: to hurt the rest of the family, so they had

711
00:42:18,239 --> 00:42:21,080
Speaker 2: really not engaged in this discussion, but they reached out

712
00:42:21,160 --> 00:42:26,080
Speaker 2: to him personally. Many years later, Bill and his father

713
00:42:26,280 --> 00:42:30,680
Speaker 2: reconciled around this. Bill had such strength of conviction around

714
00:42:30,680 --> 00:42:33,480
Speaker 2: this that he was willing to take the risk of

715
00:42:33,520 --> 00:42:35,280
Speaker 2: breaking apart the rest of his family.

716
00:42:35,920 --> 00:42:39,600
Speaker 1: So they are writing to each other for years. Paula

717
00:42:39,800 --> 00:42:44,239
Speaker 1: and Bill, Ultimately, what happens with all of this, and

718
00:42:44,440 --> 00:42:46,640
Speaker 1: tell me what happens with the other girls too, because

719
00:42:46,640 --> 00:42:48,800
Speaker 1: I don't think we talked about their sentences, But really,

720
00:42:48,840 --> 00:42:52,160
Speaker 1: where do we end up over the next twenty thirty

721
00:42:52,239 --> 00:42:54,560
Speaker 1: years with this case, the other.

722
00:42:54,440 --> 00:42:59,840
Speaker 2: Three girls, Karen, April, and Denise, all received serious prisons

723
00:42:59,840 --> 00:43:04,000
Speaker 2: and stances. Death was only on the table ultimately for

724
00:43:04,160 --> 00:43:07,040
Speaker 2: Paula Karen had a capital charge, but she was not

725
00:43:07,160 --> 00:43:10,200
Speaker 2: sentenced to death. Paula's case ultimately goes up to the

726
00:43:10,239 --> 00:43:16,920
Speaker 2: state Supreme Court in Indiana, and because of really risky,

727
00:43:17,000 --> 00:43:20,600
Speaker 2: brave actions taken by a number of different characters we

728
00:43:20,680 --> 00:43:23,839
Speaker 2: meet along the way, a scenario is set up where

729
00:43:23,840 --> 00:43:25,840
Speaker 2: this case is kind of teed up for the Indiana

730
00:43:25,920 --> 00:43:30,520
Speaker 2: Supreme Court and they have a way by resting on

731
00:43:30,600 --> 00:43:33,879
Speaker 2: the state constitution and also a recent US Supreme Court

732
00:43:33,920 --> 00:43:37,839
Speaker 2: decision at the time to commute her sentence. Wow, So

733
00:43:38,520 --> 00:43:43,080
Speaker 2: Paula is instead given a very long prison sentence sixty years,

734
00:43:43,480 --> 00:43:46,759
Speaker 2: which in Indiana realistically is about half that amount of

735
00:43:46,800 --> 00:43:48,719
Speaker 2: time if you have good conduct in.

736
00:43:48,680 --> 00:43:51,359
Speaker 1: Prison and time served, right, So she had already been

737
00:43:51,400 --> 00:43:52,879
Speaker 1: in for how long at that.

738
00:43:52,920 --> 00:43:58,040
Speaker 2: Point, a couple of years. And what's interesting is I

739
00:43:58,120 --> 00:44:01,840
Speaker 2: think Paula's reaction to it was in credibly mixed because

740
00:44:02,440 --> 00:44:06,239
Speaker 2: she understood that she'd won, so to speak. But at

741
00:44:06,239 --> 00:44:09,560
Speaker 2: that point, she was eighteen or nineteen years old. You know,

742
00:44:09,560 --> 00:44:10,960
Speaker 2: she'd been on death row for two and a half

743
00:44:11,000 --> 00:44:14,320
Speaker 2: three years. To hear that you're going to spend thirty

744
00:44:14,440 --> 00:44:17,320
Speaker 2: years in prison sounded to her a little bit like

745
00:44:17,360 --> 00:44:19,919
Speaker 2: the rest of her life. I mean, that's not even

746
00:44:19,920 --> 00:44:22,600
Speaker 2: the halfway point of the book, I will say, because

747
00:44:22,600 --> 00:44:28,920
Speaker 2: the story evolves and becomes more complex. Bill Pelki ends

748
00:44:29,040 --> 00:44:33,560
Speaker 2: up taking this kind of self transformation that occurred through

749
00:44:34,360 --> 00:44:37,640
Speaker 2: the relationship he had with Paula Cooper. His identity now

750
00:44:37,680 --> 00:44:42,040
Speaker 2: has forever changed. He can't just go back to clocking

751
00:44:42,040 --> 00:44:45,520
Speaker 2: in at the mill and keeping his head down. He

752
00:44:45,600 --> 00:44:50,720
Speaker 2: now wants to change the criminal justice system. He wants

753
00:44:50,800 --> 00:44:53,960
Speaker 2: to talk about the death penalty as someone who's a

754
00:44:54,040 --> 00:44:58,960
Speaker 2: murder victim's family member, and he begins reaching out and

755
00:44:59,120 --> 00:45:04,720
Speaker 2: actually disc one by one other murder victims family members

756
00:45:04,719 --> 00:45:09,640
Speaker 2: around the country who also did not want death for

757
00:45:09,719 --> 00:45:12,040
Speaker 2: the person who killed their loved one, right And at

758
00:45:12,040 --> 00:45:14,840
Speaker 2: the time, these people were unicorns, you know, and this

759
00:45:15,000 --> 00:45:19,160
Speaker 2: was not you were not seeing murder victims family members

760
00:45:19,640 --> 00:45:23,760
Speaker 2: in the public eye as voices in the justice system.

761
00:45:24,239 --> 00:45:26,719
Speaker 2: And part of that was because a lot of you know,

762
00:45:26,920 --> 00:45:29,600
Speaker 2: the shame that they felt in their community. They were

763
00:45:29,680 --> 00:45:34,200
Speaker 2: pariahs in a lot of cases. But also the prosecutor

764
00:45:34,239 --> 00:45:37,600
Speaker 2: handled their case did not want a family member who

765
00:45:37,640 --> 00:45:41,759
Speaker 2: was going to come forward and challenge his agenda. For

766
00:45:41,880 --> 00:45:46,160
Speaker 2: someone who's personally really fascinated by the many facets of

767
00:45:46,160 --> 00:45:50,080
Speaker 2: our criminal justice system. There was, I do want to mention,

768
00:45:50,160 --> 00:45:51,919
Speaker 2: there was this other piece of it for me, which

769
00:45:51,960 --> 00:45:56,040
Speaker 2: is I'd never really, i'd never really before had the

770
00:45:56,160 --> 00:45:59,200
Speaker 2: palpable sense of how tough this kind of work can be.

771
00:46:00,160 --> 00:46:03,160
Speaker 2: Someone like Monica Foster who grows to really care about

772
00:46:03,160 --> 00:46:07,840
Speaker 2: Paula Cooper and she goes on to represent other people

773
00:46:08,040 --> 00:46:12,839
Speaker 2: who are possibly up for death, knowing each time that

774
00:46:12,880 --> 00:46:15,759
Speaker 2: you can lose your client, this person you have a

775
00:46:15,880 --> 00:46:20,360
Speaker 2: year's long relationship with, and it will be very hard

776
00:46:20,520 --> 00:46:22,360
Speaker 2: for you to convince yourself that some part of that

777
00:46:22,440 --> 00:46:26,120
Speaker 2: wasn't your fault. That added another human dimension to the

778
00:46:26,160 --> 00:46:29,560
Speaker 2: process for me, and also to see members of the media.

779
00:46:29,920 --> 00:46:32,240
Speaker 2: You know, I mentioned these two Italian journalists for instance,

780
00:46:32,800 --> 00:46:38,040
Speaker 2: who chose to amplify a different side to the headline

781
00:46:38,320 --> 00:46:41,960
Speaker 2: and actually ended up making a difference as a result.

782
00:46:42,360 --> 00:46:46,120
Speaker 2: You know, there really are these opportunities to change the

783
00:46:46,160 --> 00:46:49,640
Speaker 2: course of events for the better. And you see that

784
00:46:49,800 --> 00:46:53,840
Speaker 2: in different different moments in this story, where someone chooses

785
00:46:53,880 --> 00:46:57,360
Speaker 2: to make an unconventional choice, they choose to forgive in

786
00:46:57,440 --> 00:47:01,080
Speaker 2: a scenario in which that's considered reritibly out there they

787
00:47:01,160 --> 00:47:03,400
Speaker 2: choose to make an effort to kind of step out

788
00:47:03,440 --> 00:47:07,200
Speaker 2: of their lane and jump in the fray with this

789
00:47:07,320 --> 00:47:11,720
Speaker 2: incredibly fraught circumstance. Right, ultimately, with all that in mind,

790
00:47:12,000 --> 00:47:15,040
Speaker 2: Paula's case, you know, I connect the dots between her

791
00:47:15,120 --> 00:47:17,520
Speaker 2: case and all the issues involved with that all the

792
00:47:17,560 --> 00:47:20,440
Speaker 2: way up to the end of the death penalty for

793
00:47:20,520 --> 00:47:23,759
Speaker 2: juveniles in this country in two thousand and five, because

794
00:47:23,760 --> 00:47:26,359
Speaker 2: a number of the players actually are the same. So

795
00:47:26,560 --> 00:47:28,960
Speaker 2: that was really remarkable to see how you start with

796
00:47:29,080 --> 00:47:33,080
Speaker 2: one crime on one corner in Gary, Indiana, and you

797
00:47:33,280 --> 00:47:36,920
Speaker 2: end up impacting the fates of a lot of teenagers

798
00:47:36,920 --> 00:47:47,359
Speaker 2: in this country.

799
00:47:48,400 --> 00:47:51,359
Speaker 1: If you love historical true crime stories, check out the

800
00:47:51,400 --> 00:47:54,440
Speaker 1: audio versions of my books The Ghost Club, All That

801
00:47:54,560 --> 00:47:58,000
Speaker 1: Is Wicked, and American Sherlock. This has been an exactly

802
00:47:58,120 --> 00:48:02,680
Speaker 1: right production. Our senior producer is Alexis Amrosi. Our associate

803
00:48:02,760 --> 00:48:07,640
Speaker 1: producer is Christina Chamberlain. This episode was mixed by John Bradley.

804
00:48:07,840 --> 00:48:11,880
Speaker 1: Curtis Heath is our composer, artwork by Nick Toga. Executive

805
00:48:11,960 --> 00:48:16,320
Speaker 1: produced by Georgia Hardstark, Karen Kilgarriff and Danielle Kramer. Follow

806
00:48:16,360 --> 00:48:20,240
Speaker 1: Wicked Words on Instagram and Facebook. At tenfold more Wicked

807
00:48:20,520 --> 00:48:23,080
Speaker 1: and on Twitter at tenfold more. And if you know

808
00:48:23,080 --> 00:48:25,560
Speaker 1: of a historical crime that could use some attention from

809
00:48:25,560 --> 00:48:29,000
Speaker 1: the crew at tenfold more Wicked, email us at info

810
00:48:29,080 --> 00:48:33,160
Speaker 1: at tenfoldmorewicked dot com. We'll also take your suggestions for

811
00:48:33,239 --> 00:48:35,440
Speaker 1: true crime authors for Wicked Words