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Cooke gives his version of murders
mrder01WEB
Defense attorney Bud Sharpe talks to Bryan Cooke during his murder trial at Warren County Courthouse.
Saying memories of the night he stabbed his in-laws to death began returning to his mind more than a year after the grisly crime, Bryan Cooke told jurors his memory is now “sharp” when it comes to the details of that night.“You have a memory of convenience,” accused District Attorney General Lisa Zavogiannis after Cooke told his version of how he killed Gary and Gail Dodson inside their home.“My memory is sharp,” he shot back, his legs bouncing uncontrollably as he recalled the events of the evening of June 28, 2015.Cooke first told investigators he could not remember anything about the killings because he had blacked out due to an interaction of psychiatric drugs and over-the-counter medicine.However, in taking the stand on his own behalf during the defense phase of trial Tuesday, Cooke said portions of the fatal evening began returning to his memory. Cooke said it is not unusual to begin remembering things that happened during his drug-induced blackouts months or years later. Cooke maintained he had woken up on many occasions in different states with no recollection of how he got there after taking heavy doses of the over-the-counter medicine he was addicted to.As for the night he stabbed his in-laws to death, Cooke testified prosecutors had jumped to the wrong conclusions when they claimed he had broken into his in-law’s home to steal money and stabbed them in their sleep.“Gary answered the door,” Cooke claimed, noting he had driven to his in-law’s home on Toney’s Lane in the Fairview community to apologize for his most recent drug-induced disappearance which found him waking up in a psych ward in Florida.“I told him, ‘Pops, I’m sorry for everything I’ve done,’” he recalled, saying his father-in-law was angry about his latest indiscretion.