Raymond Cook | Was an Innocent Man Sentenced to Hang?
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Only on Netflix, October 18, rated R.

Hey everyone, before we dive into today's episode, I've got to tell you about a new true crime podcast that just dropped about the troubled case against Crosley Green. Crosley Green has spent more than 30 years in prison for a crime he insists he did not commit.

Back in 1989, he was convicted and sentenced to death by an all-white jury for the murder of Chip Flynn, despite significant evidence that casts doubt on the guilty verdict. 48 Hours correspondent Aaron Moriarty, who has been covering Crosley's story for 25 years, takes a deep look into the case, unraveling disturbing details like coerced confessions and allegations of racial hoax.

Today,

The Canadian town of Stettler, Alberta bustles with prosperity. Many of its 6,000 residents work in the oil and gas industries or in agriculture. This is horse and cattle country, and the landscape around Stettler is blanketed with farmers' fields and pastures. Each summer, the town's western history is celebrated in county fairs, rodeos, and stampedes. But another history lingers in the minds of the citizens of Stettler.

A history of murder and the gnawing uncertainty, some six decades later, that the wrong person may have hanged. Part 1: Summer of '59 The summer of 1959 was a busy one, especially for the Queen of England and Prince Philip. The royal couple were in the middle of a grueling 45-day long tour, which saw them visit every province and territory in Canada.

Headlines and photos captured the Royal's progress across the country, delivering speeches, shaking hands, cutting ribbons, and every other detail. And one of those details affected the life of a prison inmate. At the time, 21-year-old Robert Raymond Cook was incarcerated in Edmonton's Prince Albert Penitentiary. He had been sentenced to three years for stealing money and had completed nearly two years of his term.

Robert expected to be out on parole at the end of July. But to honor the royal visit, the Canadian government decided to grant a royal amnesty to all prisoners. For every two years of a sentence, one month would be removed. On June 23rd, Robert Cook walked free, a month earlier than expected.

While the royal tour rolled through Quebec City, Robert and a group of former inmates who had been released at the same time headed into Edmonton to enjoy the taste of freedom and beer at the commercial hotel. One of the former inmates was Oliver Durochet, who disliked Robert and had fought viciously with him while in prison.

In the hotel, trouble started again between the two men. But Robert wasn't long for fighting with former inmates. He wanted to get back to Stettler, his home, even though home held some sad memories for the young man. When Robert was 10, his mother had died.

Robert's father, Ray Cook, was a mechanic, and after his wife's death, father and son moved from the town of Hanna to nearby Stettler. At the time, Stettler was a small town with a population of no more than 3,000. A few years later, Ray met and married local school teacher Daisy Mae Gasper.

The couple would go on to have five children, but with an 11-year gap between Robert and his oldest stepbrother, and after his two-year absence in prison, did he feel like a stranger to his father's new young family. On the afternoon of June 25th, 1959, Robert arrived back in Stettler wearing his prison suit. All prisoners at the Prince Albert Penitentiary were given a new suit made by the prison tailor before starting their lives as free men.

Robert's suit was blue, and with it, he was wearing a white shirt and red tie. Once in Stettler, he went straight to his father's house, which was a little white and green trimmed bungalow at 5018 52nd Street. He changed out of his prison suit and then went downtown and waited for his father to get off work. The two met up, went to a hotel and drank beer, then drove home together in his father's 1958 station wagon.

Sometime after 9pm, Robert took the station wagon and drove to Edmonton. According to Robert, when he left, the family was still awake. And about his relationship with his father, he would say, "It could not have been better." Like his father, Robert was a mechanic, and for a short time, he had even worked with his dad at the same garage. But he had also spent much of his life behind bars, and mostly for theft involving cars.

Robert was a master at hot wiring vehicles. An acquaintance would say that Robert was "very clever and could do almost anything well." Robert testified that on June 25th, when he arrived in Edmonton, he met up with a friend and the pair broke into a dry cleaning business where they stole some coats. Part 2: False Pretenses The next morning Robert turned up at Hood Motors, an Edmonton car dealership.

There, he traded in his father's station wagon for a white 1959 Chevrolet Impala convertible with red interior. He presented his father's insurance and ownership papers. But when the salesman went to check the papers, Robert drove off. That night and into the early morning, he would party with friends in the town of Camrose, an hour north of Staedtler.

The next day was June 27th. It was also Saturday, and Robert was seen cruising the wide main street of Stedford, showing off his new wheels. With his hair greased back in the style of the day, some said he looked like Elvis, and many people recalled seeing him that night in his flashy new convertible. One of them was a Royal Canadian Mounted Police officer who flagged him down,

The officer asked Robert to meet him at the detachment office because he had a matter to discuss. Robert complied, and a short while later, he was interviewed by police. The car salesman back in Edmonton had called to report a car purchased under false pretenses. It would come out that Robert had presented his father's ownership and insurance, but he had also pretended to be his father, using the name "Ray Cook" during the transaction.

Robert was arrested and charged with false pretenses and locked in a cell. An RCMP officer was dispatched to tell Robert's father, Ray, that his son was being held in the local jail. But when he arrived at 5018 52nd Street, he found the Cook bungalow in darkness. The officer knocked on the door, but there was no answer. Part 3: 48 Hours Earlier

Milkman Marvin Larson delivered Daisy Mae Cook's order at noon, as he always did. But the next day, on June 26th, there was no answer. The blinds were drawn. The previous morning, she had received her milk order and made no mention of canceling the next day's order. Robert Moen, a schoolteacher, had made arrangements with Ray Cook to repair his car.

But on June 26th, when he brought the car to the garage where Ray worked, the mechanic had failed to show up for work. William McTaggart, who owned the garage where Ray worked, which was located just two blocks west of the cookhouse, drove by the residence that same morning. He noticed that Ray's station wagon was missing from the driveway. Something wasn't right. The night before, Robert had visited with his family before driving to Edmonton in his dad's station wagon.

But a neighbor had called the house later that night, and a man had answered the phone. When asked where Ray Cook was, the male voice said, "The family's gone to Vancouver." That voice very likely belonged to the person responsible for one of the worst mass murders in Alberta's history.

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Part 4: The Discovery When no one answered his knock, the officer decided to have a look inside the house.

It was after midnight when he entered the premises, flashlight in hand. The officer would give a cursory inspection of the house. In his interview earlier that evening, Robert stated that he gave his father money before leaving for Edmonton. The money was to be used to buy a garage in British Columbia, a business father and son would work out together. But had the family left for BC as Robert said, and as the mysterious voice on the phone also stated,

to the officer who searched the house, it looked like they'd left in a hurry. The next morning, and still not satisfied, the police returned and searched the property more carefully. What the officer had not seen in the dim glow of his flashlight was clear in the light of day, and that was blood, and lots of it. The bedrooms were empty, except for blood on the mattresses and on the floor. The police followed a trail of blood leading to an attached garage.

There, the police would find a heap of items in the middle of the floor: tires, boxes, blankets, and boards. Once cleared, they discovered that the items concealed the opening to a grease pit. The cavity was 2 feet by 4 feet, and 6 feet deep. Ray used it to work on the underside of vehicles, but on this occasion, it was being used in a very different way.

stuffed into the pit were the bodies of Ray and Daisy Mae Cook and their five children, all under the age of 10 years old. They were Jerry, Patty, Chrissy, Kathy, and Linda Mae. They were all wearing their pajamas. The police also discovered a double-barreled shotgun hidden inside a mattress. The gun handle showed clear evidence that it had been used as a club.

After a post-mortem, it would be determined that Ray and Daisy May were both shot in the head, while the five children were beaten to death with the rifle butt. An officer on the scene said, "It appears to be the work of a maniac." On Sunday, June 28th, and just hours after the gruesome discovery, Robert was charged with the murder of his father. When told of his father's death, he sobbed violently. During his arraignment,

He appeared unshaven in a white jacket, dark trousers, and a white and black striped sports shirt. He held his head in his hands as the charge was read, and a mental assessment was ordered. David McNaughton, a young lawyer only four years out of law school, represented Robert. He told reporters his client made no statement. Robert had nothing to say.

The next day, Robert Cook was transferred to the Alberta Mental Hospital in Ponoka, an hour's drive from Stettler. Part 5: Manhunt Four days after they were discovered in the grease pit, the bodies of the seven slain victims were laid to rest in a cemetery near Hanna, Alberta, the small town where Ray Cook was born. Some 300 people gathered under a vast prairie sky to pay their last respects to Ray and Daisy Mae and their five children.

Back in Stettler, the townsfolk grappled with the horror of mass murder. How could someone murder an entire family? How could this have happened in their sleepy little prairie town? Neighbors who had visited Ray and Daisy Mae just hours before the crime was committed shivered and wept at the thought of the family's horrific end.

Meanwhile, two hours away by car, in a cell at the Ponoka Hospital, the firstborn son and accused killer, Robert Cook, waited for his mental assessment. On 25-minute intervals, a guard peered through a peephole in the cell's locked door to check on the young man. Aside from the locked door, the only other distinguishing feature of the cell was a large glass window scored with skin-rippling wire mesh.

Robert, no doubt, felt the minutes drag by. But they wouldn't drag by for long. On Friday, July 10th, exactly two weeks since the murders, the guard peered into Robert's room. The time was 11:25 PM. The accused mass murderer was present and accounted for, but 25 minutes later, the cell would be empty.

In those 25 minutes, Robert managed to smash the glass window, rip the wire mesh from the window frame, climb outside and drop to the ground. Wearing white striped flannel pajamas, the police theorized that Robert ran undercover about one and a quarter mile to the Riverside district of Ponoka. There, he was able to put his skill to work hot wiring cars. He stole a 1951 Chevy and took off.

It would later be revealed that two accomplices helped him escape from the hospital and supplied him with the stolen vehicle. Again, he headed home to Staedtler. In the early hours of Saturday, July 11th, 1959, the police spotted the stolen Chevy on Highway 12. Robert had made it over halfway to Staedtler when the police gave chase. In a field near the town of Nevis, the young man crashed his car, then took off on foot.

By morning, his trail was lost. The citizens of Ponoka, Nevis, Stettler, and all the farming communities in between awoke to the horrifying news that a mass murderer was on the loose. Fear spread, and doors were bolted. Would he obtain a gun? Where was he headed? Would he kill again? Even though Robert Cook had not faced a jury, he was guilty in the minds of most.

As the first day of the manhunt wore on, police reinforcements poured into the area. The RCMP put out a bulletin warning people that Robert may attempt to obtain food, clothing, and even a weapon. Residents were asked to report any strange or suspicious circumstances. Motorists were advised not to pick up hitchhikers. The police warned, "This man is extremely dangerous."

With temperatures in the 90s, the police searched through fields, pastures, and dense bush. Then, on the second day of the manhunt, they got their first clue. A dance hall near the town of Nevis had been broken into. A loaf of bread and some soft drinks were missing. After searching the area, they found a fragment of cloth, which was positively identified as belonging to the clothing of inmates in the Ponoka Mental Hospital.

They also found a slipper. The next morning, the police received a report that a 1957 Mercury Monarch had been taken from a commercial garage west of Nevis. Apparently, Robert had entered the garage after smashing open a lock. Once inside, he found the keys, opened the main doors, and pulled the car up to the gas pumps. Inside the office, he flipped the switch on the pumps, putting them into operation.

After filling up with gas, he drove away. At the same time, a Nevis housewife remembered she still had clothes on her washing line. She got up at 3:00 AM and noticed a car driving up the street, then back again. She didn't see where it went after that. With roadblocks all around town, the police wondered how Robert was able to slip through their net.

As the manhunt continued into its third day, some farmers moved their families into villages to be in more populated areas. And people who were at cottages cut their vacations short, bundled up their families, and returned to the city. One of Robert's relatives told the police he might attempt to visit the cemetery in Hanna, where his family was buried. Residents of the community locked their doors and loaded their guns.

Three days after his escape, Robert was still at large. The police commented that Robert had lived most of his life in the area. They also noted that he was capable of living off the land. Meanwhile, fear of the escaped suspect stirred up false leads and rumors. A prowler was spotted near a barn in Ponoka, but it turned out to be a man petting a dog. Someone reported that Robert had stolen two guns from their home.

but it turned out that a neighbor had borrowed them. There was a sighting of Robert in Calgary and another in Prince George, some 525 miles from where he was last seen. By the fourth day, the police had investigated nearly 300 tips.

Then, the black and white Mercury Monarch was found abandoned in a field near the town of Mir, just south of Bashaw. The car had run out of gas and its driver's side door hung open, the driver long gone. With the stolen car located, the manhunt closed its net around Bashaw. All traffic flowing in and out of the area was checked.

Armed with light machine guns, revolvers, rifles and walkie-talkies, 100 RCMP officers and 50 military police arrived in Bashan. The police believed Robert was in the area, and likely exhausted and hungry. Buffalo Lake, a body of water 8 miles long and a mile and a half wide, lies east of the town of Mir and south of Bashan.

The police thought Robert might swim to the eastern shore, so they encircled three sides of the area, with the lake being to the south. The only potential escape route was into the town of Bashaw, population 800, and growing every hour as officers converged on the city. On the afternoon of July 14, a Bashaw area farmer saw a man near his barn. He told his wife to call the police.

Fifteen minutes later, the farmer, Norman Duva, met the police at the entrance to his farm. An officer asked for a description of the man. Norman said he was wearing khaki pants, a shirt too large for him, and stockings. Just then, the officer looked around and saw a man standing near a barn. The officer said, "Like him?" Norman replied, "Yes, like him." The cop gasped, "That's him!"

The police would find Robert sitting inside the barn, unarmed, half-naked, hungry, and exhausted. He could barely speak. They gave him a ham sandwich to help him get his strength back. There was a pile of coats next to him, which he admitted belonged to the car he had stolen. At 4:04 PM on July 14th, Robert was re-arrested and transported under the heavy guard to a Fort Saskatchewan jail.

The next day would be Robert's 22nd birthday.

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By the time Robert's preliminary trial was underway in Stettler, the Queen and Prince Philip had returned to England. Newspaper readers were looking for a new obsession, and Robert's trial, with its daily front-page coverage and graphic details, was perfect fodder. In front of a packed courtroom, the Crown tried to show there was enough evidence to go to trial. They had originally chosen only one count of first-degree murder to get a fast conviction.

and the trial moved quickly as items were entered as evidence, like the blue prison maid suit Robert had been seen wearing when he first arrived in Stettler. It was found at the crime scene splattered with blood, and five 12-gauge shotgun shells were found in the suit jacket pocket. Also entered as evidence was the shotgun, with its bent barrel and broken stock. The gun was stained reddish-brown and covered in hair-like fibers.

There were no fingerprints on the gun, but there was evidence it had been grasped at the muzzle end. A pillowcase punctured with holes and splattered with red stains was also entered into evidence, as were metal fragments with bone-like tissues adhering to them, which were taken from the mattress in the bedroom where Ray and Daisy Mae had slept. The house showed no signs of forced entry.

Helping the Crown's case, a tailor at the Prince Albert Penitentiary identified the blood-stained blue suit as the one he'd made. But who did the gun belong to? While Robert was in the Prince Albert Penitentiary, Ray Cook had rented his son's room to a man named Leonard Gurney. Leonard had left some personal items in the house, along with two guns: a 12-gauge shotgun and a .22-caliber rifle.

Both were covered in dust. When he was shown the gun from the crime scene, Leonard confirmed that it was not his. And when Robert's flashy convertible was searched, items were found in the trunk: clothes, children's pajamas, a bank book, birth certificates, a marriage license, and some photo albums. When asked about the items, Robert said his family was moving to British Columbia.

The judge decided that there was indeed enough evidence. Robert would stand trial for the murder of his father, Ray Cook. And to the charge, Robert would plead not guilty. Part 7: The Defense Robert's trial got underway in November of 1959, in Red Deer, a community an hour west of Stettler. Lines wound around the block as spectators waited to get a seat in the small courtroom.

The evidence from the preliminary trial was brought into the jury trial, but new details also emerged. A bloodstained white shirt had been found at the crime scene. The shirt had the distinctive laundry mark of Ross. The police testified that they had contacted numerous laundromats, but could not determine the shirt's owner.

The defense would argue that when Robert was cruising in his convertible and stopped by the police, he readily agreed to meet at the RCMP Detachment Office. Was this the behavior of a guilty man? And one who owned the double-barreled shotgun? Again, the police were unable to find the owner. The police were also unable to verify if the mysterious phone call to the Cook residence on the night of the slayings had ever happened.

As for Robert's movements on the night of the murders, witnesses testified that he was in Edmonton breaking into a dry cleaning business. And as for the prison suit, Robert stated that he changed his clothes when he arrived in Stettler. He added that his father tried on his prison suit. The defense suggested that the suit could have been left at the end of Ray's bed. Was that how it became bloodstained?

and all Robert's friends who saw him the day after the slayings and before he knew about the murders said he behaved like his usual self. The defense concluded that Robert could not have committed the murders. He was seen in Stettler around 9:00 PM and less than three hours later in Edmonton, a two hour drive away.

Robert could not have committed the murders and cleaned up the crime scene in the window of time between sightings. And what about Robert's violent interaction with fellow inmate, Oliver Durochet? While in prison, Oliver had cracked a lead pipe over Robert's head. The young man would suffer a concussion and require 27 stitches.

After the attack, Oliver was placed in solitary confinement. But a note smuggled to Robert said that Oliver was not done with him yet. He vowed to finish the job. Could Oliver du Rocher have been the killer? At 200 pounds and over 6 feet tall, he had the strength and motive. Whereas Robert was a measly 150 pounds and only 5 feet 7 inches tall.

And what about the Ross laundry mark? Was a person named Ross the real killer? Finally, at no time in Robert's life was he violent. Yes, he was a thief, but he had never shown any violence in his short, trouble-filled life. The defense stated that the Crown's case against Robert Cook was circumstantial at best and asked for the murder charge against their client to be thrown out. But after deliberating for 92 minutes, the jury found Robert guilty.

About the verdict, Robert would say, "I'm not guilty. I couldn't have done this, and I didn't do it." Robert's defense team put together an appeal, and a new trial was granted. But in the new trial, details came out that seemed to point to Robert as the killer. A hotel clerk from the commercial hotel where the inmates had first stayed after their royal amnesty testified that someone named D. Ross was staying in a room on the first floor.

D. Ross was called to testify. The man could not positively state that the mysterious white shirt was his, but said it was his size and style. Did Robert steal the shirt from his room? And two friends of Ray Cook's testify that he never mentioned traveling to British Columbia. His search for a new garage business was only ever within the borders of Alberta.

The judge was also skeptical about the Edmonton Laundry break-in and suggested to the jury that Robert may never have been part of the burglary, but was in fact back in Stettler murdering his family. The jury agreed and again, Robert was found guilty. Finally, an appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada was denied. It appeared that Robert Raymond Cook had run out of options.

and on November 15, 1960, he was sentenced to hang. While he awaited the final event of his short life, Robert wrote poetry. Part 8: Nature, Nurture, or Injury? Robert's birth mother died from a routine operation when he was 10. The tragic loss must have affected the boy deeply.

Throughout his teenage years, he would be in and out of jail for petty crimes, serving three separate jail terms for non-violent offenses. But would the loss of his mother make him a murderer? Friends described Robert as a popular guy. The owner of McTaggart Motors, where Robert had occasionally worked, recalled that, Robert was always a likable sort of kid. But after the prison attack by Robert Durochet, people noted that Robert became quick-tempered.

Did the concussion scramble his brain? Did his brain injury turn him homicidal? It had happened before. Three years before the Cook family murders, and just a few miles from Staedtler, a man murdered his wife and four children. It would later be determined that the murderer was suffering from manic depression. Was this the case with Robert?

Years later, Robert's defense lawyer, David McNaughton, would comment that if he was judging the case, he would not have found Robert guilty. The young man had never been involved with violence or guns. There was no blood on his shoes, in his vehicle, or on him. He had no cuts or bruises on his hands, and there was no motive. Part 9: At the End of a Rope

Just over three months after Robert's family was slain, another mass murder would make headlines. In Holcomb, Kansas, two men entered the Clutter family home and killed everyone in the house: husband, wife, and two teenage children. As brutal and terrifying as it was, the crime had a motive: money. To this day, the motive behind the Cook family murders is still unknown.

The sky over the Fort Saskatchewan jail was clear and the air was cool when Robert was taken to the gallows, and at two minutes after midnight on November 15th, 1960, Robert Raymond Cook was hanged. He had refused sedation. As Jail Warden Thomas Holt said, "He went like a man." Robert would be the last person hanged in Alberta.

16 years later, the Canadian government abolished capital punishment and replaced it with a mandatory life sentence without the possibility of parole for 25 years. The Ponoka Mental Hospital is now the centennial center for mental health and brain injury. And the little white and green trimmed Cook residence is now the site of a nondescript apartment building. But the stain and memory of violence lingers, along with the possibility of justice ill-served.

People in Stettler still wonder if it was Robert or someone else. On that tragic June night in 1959, a neighbor would tell the police that he had heard a child's terrified scream. That scream echoes across the decades, right along with a young man's unwavering claims of innocence. The last stanza of one of Robert's poems ends this way: "I've heard of justice, but where can it be? I looked in the dictionary. Behold!

There it is to see. When I sent for my lawyer, he just shook his head. Justice will only come long after you're dead. So you people of the world, take note. It's murder when the innocent die at the end of a rope.