Pa. teen pleads guilty to killing 12-year-old girl, showing body on video chat

BENSALEM, Pa. (TCD) — An 18-year-old suspect will spend 15 to 40 years in state jail after killing a lady in November 2022 after which exhibiting the sufferer’s physique on video chat.

In accordance with the Bucks County District Legal professional’s Workplace, Ash Cooper, who beforehand glided by Joshua Cooper, pleaded responsible Thursday, March 21, to third-degree homicide, possession of an instrument of crime, and tampering with or fabricating bodily proof. Cooper was initially charged with legal murder.

A decide subsequently handed down the sentence, and the defendant was “ordered to comply with all the foundations and suggestions of grownup probation and parole and bear psychological and psychiatric evaluations.”

On Nov. 25, 2022, shortly after 4 p.m., Bensalem Township Police obtained a name a couple of attainable murder on the Prime of the Ridge Trailer Park on Gibson Highway. Officers discovered a juvenile reportedly spoke with Cooper, who was 16 years previous on the time, on Instagram video chat. Cooper “flipped the video picture and confirmed the legs and ft of somebody lined in blood.” In accordance with prosecutors, Cooper requested the juvenile witness to assist clear up the crime scene and eliminate the sufferer’s physique.

Officers responded to the Gibson Highway property and observed a juvenile operating out of the again of the house. Upon entry, police discovered 12-year-old Morgan Connors useless on the toilet flooring with an obvious gunshot wound, the district legal professional’s workplace mentioned. Investigators suspected that “substantial steps had been taken to wash up the crime scene.”

Officers created a fringe across the trailer park and situated and apprehended Cooper shortly after.

In accordance with prosecutors, the gun used within the deadly taking pictures belonged to the defendant’s father and had been stored in a protected throughout the residence. Cooper reportedly gained entry to the protected by changing the batteries the defendant’s father had “eliminated to make the mixture lock inoperable.”

In the course of the defendant’s sentencing, Chief Deputy District Legal professional Kristin McElroy learn an influence assertion from the sufferer’s grandfather, who mentioned he felt “intense ache and heartbreak” after Connors’ dying. The sufferer’s grandfather additionally wrote, “The human coronary heart isn’t constructed for such heartbreak.”

MORE:

TRUE CRIME DAILY: THE PODCAST covers high-profile and under-the-radar instances each week. Subscribe to our YouTube web page and don’t overlook to comply with us on Instagram, Fb, and Twitter. You may also subscribe to our True Crime Day by day e-newsletter.