Murder suspect changes statement

Ashley Cook took the witness stand Tuesday. (T-G Photo by Brian Mosely) [Click to enlarge]

During the second day of the trial, defense attorneys for Cook repeatedly tried to place the blame for the murder of Ross on his wife Kimberly instead of the woman who has admitted pulling the trigger, saying Cook was manipulated into committing the crime by "the mom I never had."

However, the prosecution systematically challenged Cook's new story, claiming contradictions and gaps in logic throughout her testimony given yesterday.

Cook is facing charges of first degree murder and conspiracy to commit first degree murder for the shooting death of Bill Ross. Defense attorney Jack Dearing has said that Cook should be charged with something less than first degree murder.

Ross was shot three times while he slept in his bed at his Wartrace Pike home on Feb. 14, 2007. His wife, 38-year-old Kimberly Ann Ross, was sentenced to life in prison last November after pleading guilty to first degree murder for her role in planning the slaying.

District Attorney Chuck Crawford says Cook pulled the trigger while Justin Young, age 20, allegedly loaded the gun and let Cook enter the home to shoot Ross in order to make the death look like part of a home invasion.

When questioned by defense attorney Jack Dearing, Cook claimed that on the night of the murder, Young called her and said that Bill had beaten and raped Kimberly and asked her to come over. Cook said she could hear Kim Ross in the background "in hysterics." Cook said Kimberly was directing Young in what to say, telling Cook to come in through a window in order not to wake Bill. When she entered the house, Cook claimed that she did not have latex gloves on and that Young pulled her in.

Once inside, she testified that she saw Young and Kimberly standing in the living room and "thought something wasn't right." Cook told the jury the two were passing a gun back and forth to each other, arguing over who was going to kill Bill.

"I'll do it," Cook testified Young said. "No, I'll do it," is what Cook claimed Kimberly said.

Cook told the jury that she hoped no one would do anything, stating she didn't want either of them to go to jail. She said as the three of them stood in the bedroom doorway, they kept passing the gun back and forth about six or seven times.

Then Cook said that Kimberly Ross pushed the gun in her face and did not say anything.

Cook told the jury she turned toward where Bill Ross slept and pulled the trigger three times.

When asked about her reaction, Cook said, "oh my God, I can't believe I just did this ... I was in shock."

Cook testified that Kimberly handed her the keys to her car, $30 and said "I'll handle everything." Cook said she took the car and left.

She told the jury that when got returned home, she was "sick ... scared ... I couldn't believe I had done it."

Finger pointing

Cook said sheriff deputies later came to her trailer and took her in for questioning. She said she didn't not confess to the murder until TBI special agent Wayne Wesson told her that Kimberly Ross and Young were pointing the finger at her.

"I thought they set me up," Cook said. "I was upset."

Cook also said that Kimberly "had a lot of control over my thoughts," and that she would have done anything for the woman she called "Mom."

She told the jury that she felt remorseful about the shooting and that its "something I live with every day. I have trouble living with myself." She said she did not go there to kill Bill Ross or participate in a plot to kill him and did not know he was going to die.

Cross examination

Assistant District Attorney Mike Randles then began a long series of questions, asking Cook if Kimberly could work her like a puppet and make her follow her instructions. Cook replied that she was there when Kimberly needed her.

Randles asked if Kimberly talked about killing her husband before, which Cook replied she had, but thought "she was crazy."

"I never intended to kill Bill. Yes, I killed him, but she never asked me to kill him," Cook said. She said she just wanted to get Kimberly away from her husband. However, Randles asked why Kimberly called her several days earlier asking if Cook could find someone to murder her husband, which Cook had already admitted to on the stand.

Cook appeared flustered and changed her story on the stand, saying it was a "slip of the lip." Cook then appeared to try to implicate her former girlfriend, Megan Jones, in that earlier plot.

Randles also questioned the logic of Young calling Cook to the home via a taxi to get Kimberly away from Bill Ross when there was already a car there -- Kimberly's Nissan Versa.

"Kim wanted me to go over there, so I did," she said.

The prosecutor also wondered how Bill Ross did not wake up if her wife was having a crying fit, and why he never awoke with three people standing in his bedroom door arguing over who was going to shoot him.

Randles also questioned why she went through the window instead of the two doors in the home, and pointed out various contradictions of what happened during the taxi ride and at the Golden Gallon, where Cook was seen on video tape by the jury earlier in the day.

Cook said she had "no thoughts in her mind" when Kimberly handed her the gun, but Randles asked that if she now had control of the weapon, she had just saved Bill's life and stopped Young and Kimberly from going to prison for conspiracy.

"So why did you turn 180 degrees and fire three unaimed shots toward Bill Ross?" Randles asked Cook.

Randles also asked if all of them were passing the gun back and forth, why were there no fingerprints. How did Young and Kimberly tie each other up after Cook left? Why did Kimberly give Cook her car and latex gloves, and tell her to hide the gun, calling the exchange "a strange parting gift for someone who just murdered her husband."

Questions also arose why Cook had changed her story significantly from her two written statements to the TBI the day of the murder.

"I was scared, I don't know," Cook said.

Randles then asked why she took an hour to write a four-page statement admitting the murder and a conspiracy to commit it.

"I was still in shock and scared," Cook said.

"So you just made up this murder conspiracy?" Randles asked.

"I guess," Cook replied.

Following this exchange, Randles had no more questions and the defense rested their case.

Earlier evidence

Earlier that day, jurors heard the 911 call made by Kimberly Ross, claiming that two black men had broken into the home and shot her husband. Ross sounded hysterical and could not be understood during most of the call, but the dispatcher was able to get enough information to send law enforcement to the residence. Kimberly told the dispatcher she had been tied up. Members of the Ross family that attended the trial were in tears while listening to the recording.

Security tapes from the Golden Gallon at the intersection of U.S. 41-A South and State Highway 64 were also viewed by the jury. The first witness testifying on Tuesday was Megan Jones, who told District Attorney Chuck Crawford she was involved in an intimate relationship with Cook and had lived with her until a week before the slaying. In testimony that lasted most of the morning, Jones described how she had heard Kimberly Ross, Cook and Young talking about Bill Ross "four or five times," stating that at first Kimberly said she wanted to get rid of him.

Jones said she had suggested divorce, but Kimberly had said she would be left with nothing. Jones testified the conversation turned to killing Bill Ross and that Kimberly said "we have to get rid of him, we need to off him."

Jones also testified that Kimberly came up with the ploy to fake a home invasion and have someone else do the killing. She said she did not believe that Kimberly and Cook would really go through with the murder, and wished she had taken it seriously.

"I wish I had warned him. He was a good man," she testified.

She said she is currently in therapy due to the events in which she found herself involved.

While the jury was out, Dearing asked Judge Robert Crigler to include Jones as an accomplice, but he ruled that just hearing the plans for the murder didn't make her part of the crime.

Justin Young also took the stand, explaining his role in the slaying. Young said neither he nor Cook objected to murdering Bill Ross. During the investigation, Young stuck to the cover story, but he eventually confessed to his part in the plan to kill Ross during an interview with TBI agent Wayne Wesson.

Young said had the plot worked, he would have moved to Oklahoma with Kimberly and her son Travis to start a new life. However, Cook was not part of that plan.

He also said that he had been in jail for more than a year and a half and has accepted that he had destroyed Bill Ross' life and his own. Young said he received no promises from the D.A.'s office, but is hoping that cooperating with authorities will lessen his jail sentence. He also said he exercised free will in the slaying and that Kimberly exerted no "control" over him or Cook.

Medical examiner Dr. Thomas Deering was not available to appear, so the testimony from the previous trial in July was read aloud to the jury. The doctor had stated that any one of the three shots fired by Cook could have been fatal to Bill Ross.

Closing arguments in the case were expected to begin at 9 this morning.