The call lasted about 90 seconds, and it was difficult for the dispatcher to hear the woman. The dispatcher asked her several times to repeat what she was saying.
The woman, who didn’t want her name used, told this news organization in an interview that as she witnessed the events unfold this morning, it was like watching “a bad movie.”
She said Cooper was intoxicated at the time. Still, she said, his actions were “very much out of character.” He had never been arrested before in Middletown, she said.
When Cooper stole the police cruiser, then rammed another cruiser a short time later, his girlfriend was unsure if he survived the crash. She was “thankful” when Cooper was pulled out of the mangled cruiser.
“I didn’t know whether to expect him dead or alive,” she said.
When police arrived at 12:54 a.m. today, officer Patrick Glassburn was told by the woman that Cooper was intoxicated and he was hiding in the bushes outside their apartment.
Cooper came at Glassburn with a knife in his right hand, police said. Glassburn shocked Cooper with a taser, but it had no effect, police said. Cooper stole the cruiser, then crashed into another cruiser, driven by officer Ryan Morgan, who was responding to the accident.
Cooper was transported to Atrium Medical Center where he’s still a patient and Morgan was treated and released from Middletown Kettering Medical Center, police said.
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