TRAER, Iowa (TCD) — Officials recently arrested a 47-year-old woman nearly three years after they found her husband dead in a chair.
According to an affidavit posted by the Tama County Sheriff’s Office, on June 18, 2021, shortly after 4:30 a.m., deputies received a call from a home at 1846 K Ave. regarding a person shot. The first responding deputy found Ryan Cooper laying in a recliner chair with an apparent gunshot wound to the head, and he was pronounced dead at the scene.
The Sheriff’s Office also observed the victim’s wife, Karina Cooper, sitting on top of her husband, and they removed her and her three children from the home.
The Iowa Office of the State Medical Examiner later determined the victim’s cause of death to be two gunshots wounds to the face, and his death was ruled a homicide.
Deputies reportedly recovered a .22 shell casing at the scene, but they did not locate a firearm.
According to the sheriff’s office, two witnesses said Karina Cooper told them she “wanted Ryan Cooper dead and could shoot him in the face.”
On Monday, Feb. 19, following a yearslong investigation, officials arrested Karina Cooper at her home. She was booked into the Tama County Jail on a charge of first-degree murder, where she remains held on $1 million bond.
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