Walks Away
 
2009
 
Det. Coleman works as security for the Governor of Maine
 
An email from Coleman on March 17, 2009, said, “This is to confirm our meeting at 106 Hogan Road at 1:00 p.m. on Thursday, March 26. See you there. Det. Jerry Coleman.”
     I vaguely remember this meeting at the Maine State Police Headquarters in Bangor. I do know that Derry and I met with Coleman, but I don’t seem to have any recollection or notes on it.
     Six months later, September 1, 2009, Coleman sent me an email that I did not see until weeks later.
“Hi folks, I met with Mrs. Cochran on Friday [Aug. 28, 2009] after learning from her son that she was in the Intensive Care Unit at the Eastern Maine Medical Center. Mrs. Cochran wanted me to pass along that she was sorry we didn’t meet as discussed in July and that she would still like to do so once she is able.” Copies were sent to Stokes, Gardner, and a new AG Victim Advocate, Jackie Theriault.
     In August of 2009, due to a doctor’s negligence, I nearly lost my life while I was on an operating table. I went in the hospital as an outpatient on August 17, 2009. I returned home in a wheelchair after suffering a stroke and being hospitalized for three weeks. It took me a long time to recover, but I will never fully recover. I will live the rest of my life with damage to my right side that makes it difficult for me to walk or use my right hand.
     I lost contact with Coleman during this time and his September email was the last contact I had with him. I have no idea when he went to work as a security guard for the Governor of Maine. We had such high hopes in Detective Coleman. He promised that he would not leave Mike’s case until he solved it. I strongly believe that it was not his decision to leave the case unfinished.
     As we know, while investigating Mike’s murder, Coleman learned of Cormier’s release from prison in the fall of 2002 (after spending 16 years of a 23-year sentence in prison) and that he was again back to his modus operandi—robbing drug dealers. Coleman followed Cormier’s trail after he was released from prison and was instrumental in putting Cormier back behind bars where his life ended in April 2009—less than four years after he was sentenced to 34 years in prison.
    Coleman traveled to Massachusetts and interviewed Cormier (first time Cormier was questioned about Mike’s murder in 23 years). Cormier told Coleman that Mike was a rat and admitted he wrote the 1988 affidavit concerning his, Percy Sargent and Pollard's actions after Mike's murder. He also flew to Florida to interview Percy Sargent but Percy refused to speak with Coleman.  (it was also the first time Percy Sargent was contacted in 23 years.). He apparently was not allowed to interview Paul Pollard; we begged so for that because he was there and was seen fleeing the murder scene. I believed with Shuman on longer on Mike’s murder investigation, Pollard might tell what happened the night Mike was murdered. I also believed the reason Coleman did not contact Pollard was because of the State’s protection of him.
    I will always be so very thankful to Det. Coleman for his hard work and dedication to putting Cormier back behind bars. Cormier was not prosecuted for Mike's murder but with the prosecutor bringing out in her closing arguments that he bragged to others that he did kill Mike was a sort of round about justice for Mike, and mostly it stopped this dangerous man from hurting anyone else. I am sure it was Coleman who asked the prosecutor to include Mike's murder in her closing argument.
     I believe Det. Coleman ran into something not kosher, as PI Bucky Buchanan had said, that caused him to leave the detective department and go to work for the Governor of Maine leaving Percy Sargent and Paul Pollard to walk free.
    
No contact from the Attorney General’s office or Maine State Police concerning Mike’s murder during 2010.
 
2011-2012