A SPECIAL REPORT BY DANE STERLING

Introduction:

Several years ago, I was watching a ‘True Crime’ show. One case stood out. A real estate broker was contacted, a client wanted to see a house. The real estate broker accompanied him to the house. Later that night, the broker told his girlfriend that the client had a pronounced limp and walked with an cane.

The man would call the broker again and request to see the house a second time. The broker would later be found dead, beaten to death, in the house.

Investigators came to a dead end, when they checked the broker’s background, he had no gambling debts, drug problems, outstanding loans, nor was he having an affair and the case remains unsolved.

Was this a practice kill? A practice kill is when a professional killer, who hasn’t killed in several years, decides to get his chops up to par. Therefore, he chooses a random victim to kill; this murder also perfects his method before he kills his ‘actual target.’

PRACTICE KILL?

Has the killer of the real estate agent struck again? On March 24, 2004, in Aurora, Colorado, Al Kite had been tortured and stabbed to death in the basement of his townhouse.

Like the real estate agent, Kite had nothing suspicious in his background and the killer took several long hours to kill him. Investigators wonder, how did he know that the murder wouldn’t be interrupted? The killer also took a shower and ate a meal before departing.

Everyone close to Al Kite (1st photo) checked out. Everyone; except one mysterious character who walked with a limp and used a cane. In the week's leading up to the murder, Kite had been looking for a roommate to help pay his mortgage.  Just days before the murder, he'd apparently found a taker.  And now, that new tenant was gone.  The investigation had an early focus.

Detective Sobieski began tracking down the mysterious roommate.  Early on, Sobieski found a renter's information sheet that showed the roommate was named Robert Cooper.  It gave addresses, phone numbers, social security numbers.  It seemed like all the clues were to going to quickly lead to the killer.

But the more Sobieski learned, the less he knew.  All the information on the sheet was deliberately false.  That told Sobieski two things. First, it told him he was not nearly as far along in the investigation as he originally thought.  But worse, this killer had planned the whole thing out.  The suspect knew cops would be in pursuit, so he decided to make it as hard as possible to figure out who he was.

The deception continued. Sobieski learned that the killer used Kite's ATM card shortly after the murder. But when he pulled the surveillance stills, all he saw as a man in a mask.  The stills barely showed anything.

The next trail came from cell records. At the crime scene, cops found a handwritten note which said "Robert" and gave a phone number. It was the killer's phone and it was still being used. Cops tracked the phone's activity all over Denver. But once again, the killer was one step ahead. Apparently after the murder, the killer left the phone in an area where homeless people hung out.  He did this on purpose so that a homeless person would use the phone, forcing cops to track the wrong person, yet again.

The paper trail was going nowhere, so Detective Sobieski turned to the few people who'd seen Robert Cooper.  One was Al Kite's girlfriend.  Though she never saw his face, she did note the man dressed nicely and more notably, walked with a limp and used a cane.

When Sobieski talked to another woman who'd met Cooper, he was told a different story. This Robert Cooper did not limp but did speak with a Romanian accent.  This same woman said that Cooper had showed up at her place after she advertised for a roommate but she knew something was wrong as soon as he walked through the door. The hairs stood up on the back of her neck. Due to her gut feeling, she denied his rental application, which probably saved her life.

One of Kite’s neighbors came face to face with the suspect on a walking trail, near Kite’s residence. She said, she spoke to him and he stared right through her without speaking and he did not walk with a limp.

So now, the question is: which of these clues provide insight into the killer and which were planted by the killer to help him get away with murder and is this the same suspect who killed the real estate agent several years ago? Are the cases connected?

Don’t be fooled. Some would think this still (below) prove that (ATM) robbery was the motive. Cops say that's not true because the killer could have taken much more money than he did. This could be another trick to throw off the investigation.