June 1996

 https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/102205583/

BATAVIA A Clermont County grand jury on Wednesday indicted a Goshen teen who authorities say has confessed to beating, strangling and slashing the throat of his 59-year-old grandmother. JR Collins Cooper, 17, was indicted on two counts of aggravated murder, one count of aggravated robbery and one count of grand theft in connection with the slaying of Dorothy Cooper, Clermont County Prosecutor Don White said.

Mr. White said the youth could be convicted of only one of the two counts of aggravated murder. One charge involves premeditation; the other, the robbery and theft charges. Those charges assert that JR took money and a vehicle belonging to his grandmother at the time of her slaying. During a hearing last week, Goshen Township Police Lt.

William Johnson, the department's acting chief, testified that the Goshen High School sophomore had confessed to the killing. Authorities have said Mrs. Cooper was likely killed between 10 p.m. and midnight May 19 at the Goshen Township home she shared with her grandson, in the 6700 block of Wood Street. Mrs.

Cooper was found dead late May 20, and authorities picked up the boy in Union Township for questioning early May 21. The youth told police that before killing her, he lured her to his room by burning some incense, knowing that the smell irritated her. Apparently, Mrs. Cooper was struck with a board. Police say Mrs.

Cooper fell on the boy's bed, and he punched her. The youth took a "telephone-type" cord and strangled his grandmother, then took out a pocket knife and slashed her throat, he told police. The preliminary cause of death was determined to be strangulation. For now, authorities are not saying what might have prompted JR to allegedly plot the death of his grandmother. The boy had been charged as a juvenile, but was turned over to adult court because state law requires that anyone 16 years and older charged with such a crime be automatically bound over as an adult.

If convicted, he could face 32 years to life imprisonment, Mr. White said. JR would not be eligible for the death penalty because he was a minor at the time of the slaying. He is being held at the Clermont County Jail in lieu of $100,000 bond set last week by Judge Stephanie Wyler of Clermont County Juvenile Court. The teen's attorney, R.