Cochran's case warms up
Since Goodwin told the BDN in June of 1985 “The investigation into the case will continue ... the investigation ... is far from being over,” there had not been one thing more mentioned about the investigation of Mike’s murder until this article in Oct. of 1986, 16 months later.  I eagerly began to read the small article that said Cochran Case Warms Up thinking that something positive was happening concerning Mike’s murder, since it said the case was warming up. But my hopes were absolutely dashed since all it did was smear Mike. 
New information has surfaced in the five-year-old investigation of the Michael Cochran murder case, but a state prosecutor said Wednesday [Oct. 1, 1986] that Maine State Police do not anticipate any arrests in the near future.
     Thomas Goodwin, an assistant attorney general, said he could not elaborate on the specific nature of the information received by the police nor could he speculate on the likelihood of a breakthrough in the lengthy investigation. ‘We are still actively involved in this case" said Goodwin. "Our investigation has never been closed out.’
...
     In their investigation of the case, state police uncovered evidence that Cochran was associating with other drug traffickers during his fugitive period and that he may have been involved in some plans to steal quantities of cash and drugs from other narcotics dealers.
     As I lay the newspaper down, I was shaking. Those dirt bags! What were Shuman and Goodwin trying to do now—connect Mike to Cormier and Pollard’s armed robberies? Mike was in court on November 26, 1980 to answer to his arrest when DEA agents entered an apartment he was living in with others in March of 1980 and found $2,000 in marijuana, pills and paraphernalia. He was dead when Lionel Cormier, Paul Pollard and Robert Smith arm robbed Charles Dolan on March 27, 1981.  Percy Sargent, Lionel Cormier, and Paul Pollard had killed him on February 18.
     I thought of all the crimes that Pollard had been involved in: forgery,  shooting up a family’s residence, and transporting a load of firearms, shotguns, and dynamite stolen during burglaries and transported them from Massachusetts to Bangor, Maine Police Department where officers carried it all into the police station. Mike's murder and immunity in two armed robberies he was involved in in Nov. 1980 and Mar. 1981— while it was all taken care of by the law officials who were slandering Mike. 
     Was it a coincidence that Goodwin gave this information to the BDN shortly after I contacted Dr. Ryan, and Deputy AG LaRochelle trying to find out if Mike had been shot? Goodwin’s slanderous statement against Mike brought back what Shuman told me the fall of 1983 (when Pinkham hid behind the door) when I visited him at the Maine State Police barracks to ask if they had any new information about Mike’s murder. Shuman told me that Percy did have Mike killed but it had nothing to do with Percy's arrest in the drug bust. He said it was because he and Mike had planned a $20,000 rip-off and when Percy was arrested he feared Mike would tell about the rip-off (that never happened) and had him killed. He said they didn't know who Percy contacted to have Mike killed  and because Mike’s murder was drug related, he didn’t think it would ever be solved.
     The first time I met Shuman at DA Cox’s office in March of 1981 he threatened me with charges. He said for knowing Mike’s whereabouts and not reporting it. I told him if I had known where Mike was I wouldn’t have left him lying under a pile of burned fire rubble for six days. Shortly after my meeting with Shuman, DA Cox found us in default on our murdered son’s bail bonds which was our home.
      Each time I contacted the authorities concerning Mike’s murder it seemed like they tried to punish me. October 2, 1986 was only 34 days after Cormier’s August trial ended. What really was the purpose of Goodwin releasing to the public that Cochran’s case warms up but the State Police did not anticipate any arrests in the near future. I believe the only purpose of the article was to smear Mike, the victim. They refused to do an investigation of Mike’s violent murder, but they could smear him after he was murdered and wasn’t able to answer their slander. I believe that Shuman and Goodwin knew what they were doing when they released slanderous statements like this to the public against Mike. Who would care if the unsolved murder of this fugitive (he had tried to turn himself in to the authorities but was rejected), who was planning to rob drug dealers, ever got solved? And I believe they intended to make it as difficult as they could for me to find out what had happened to Mike.
     Richard Sargent gave me a copy of a recorded telephone conversation he had with his brother Percy Sargent on April 14, 1986 while Percy was incarcerated at Maine State Prison for rape and drug trafficking. During the conversation Percy told Richard, “Well, they [Pollard and Cormier] were robbing drug dealers in town. Cochran wasn’t much for it. He kept telling me that he didn’t want any part of it...  He didn’t like the idea. He just wanted to get out the State of Maine.”
     Homicide Det. Shuman and Assistant AG Goodwin never told the news that Lionel Cormier, Paul Pollard, or Percy Sargent may have been involved in Mike’s murder. And there was no may-have-been about the crimes the three men committed. Their State Bureau of Identification records show years of crimes except for Paul Pollard (whose crimes the DA and AG wiped clean):  Percy Sargent SBI — Lionel Cormier SBI — Paul Pollard SBI. And the news had  never reported that it was Pollard who fled the murder scene leaving Mike to lie under a pile of burned fire rubble for six days.
     In 1985 Pollard told Shuman that he, Cormier, and Percy Sargent went back to the murder scene before Mike's body was found and kicked around in the rubble trying to uncover Mike’s body but that information was disregarded by Shuman.
    In Higgins article he also said, “Various theories have been offered concerning the circumstances leading up to Cochran’s death, including the possibility that he was knocked unconscious, and locked inside the camp before it was set ablaze. A Hartford Fire Insurance report says that Shuman gave an agent this information in May of 1981.
     He said that I had spent the last five years “attempting to determine who was responsible for [my] son’s murder.” It is now thirty-six-years since Higgins' 1986 article and I know who is responsible for my son’s murder and I didn't learn who is responsible from Det. Shuman and Assistant AG Thomas Goodwin who blocked me from every direction and protected Pollard while they smeared Mike.