CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (KCRG) – Karina Cooper will spend the rest of her life in prison. A jury found her guilty of first-degree murder.
Karina Cooper was found guilty of murdering her husband, Ryan Cooper.
In June 2021, Ryan was found dead at his home in Traer. He died from two gunshot wounds to the face.
Three years later, in February 2024, Karina Cooper was arrested in connection to the incident.
On Friday, the State and the defense made one last argument to the jury about why Cooper should or should not be found guilty of murder.
Watch the trial here:
Much of the trial focused on an affair Karina Cooper had with Huston Danker, who is also accused of murder in this case.
Cooper’s defense was Danker acted alone and killed Ryan Cooper.
The State argued Cooper and Danker planned the murder together, and she’s the one who pulled the trigger.
When Cooper testified in her own defense, she said she believed Danker killed her husband but she never told law enforcement about his possible involvement because she was scared of him.
“She may be an idiot in her relationship with Huston. But she didn’t participate in the murder of her husband. Please think it through. Find her not guilty,” Cooper’s public defender Nichole Watt said.
Cooper and law enforcement officers testified Cooper was found sitting in her dead husband’s lap when authorities arrived, covered in his blood.
The State said Cooper did that intentionally.
“Why would you sit on your dead husband who had just been shot and rub your face all over his face? Directly over the wounds? Soaking your face and hair with his blood? Because you shot him,” Iowa Attorney General’s Office attorney Michael Ringle said.
The mandatory sentence in Iowa for first degree murder is life in prison.
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