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911 testimony describes screams, chaos at murder scene
OBERLIN, Kansas -- Dylan Coryell, the Oberlin, Kansas, man accused of felony murder, identifies himself to a 911 dispatcher in the very early morning hours of Sunday, Oct. 16, 2011, explaining, quietly, "We need an ambulance."
There's a female's high-pitched screaming, slightly muffled, in the background.
The dispatcher asked Coryell, "What happened?"
Coryell responds, "It was a bad accident." A pause ... Coryell again, "Oh, my God. Oh, my God." Screaming, possibly sobbing, continues in the background.
The dispatcher tells Coryell that Ryan McEvoy is on the other 911 line, and he can give her directions to his rural Decatur County house on N Lane.
Dylan continues, "Oh, my God ... oh, my God."
A police broadcast at 1:47 a.m. tells officers that "Corey Cook has been shot and that Everett Urban is believed to be involved."
A couple other 911 calls had come in regarding the same incident, according to testimony Wednesday in the courthouse in Oberlin, but they weren't played by the state's attorneys prosecuting Dylan Coryell for the premeditated murder of Corey Cook, then a 22-year-old airman home on leave.
Today was the second day of testimony in Coryell's trial.
Rachel Montgomery, who had partied at Ryan McEvoy's house throughout the day Saturday and Saturday evening, said she woke up to screaming. "It annoyed me. I thought someone was playing a game," she said. The screaming didn't stop, and Montgomery said she realized it wasn't a joke.
Montgomery said that she found Sarah Campbell, the girlfriend of Corey Cook (who was also having a sexual relationship with Dylan Coryell), "doubled up on the floor and screaming, 'Corey was shot!" Montgomery testified that she lead Campbell back to the bedroom -- "We need to get you dressed," she told Sarah. Sarah testified later she was wearing only a T-shirt and underpants.
Montgomery said that in the bedroom she saw Corey Cook propped up on the bed, "maybe on pillows, and he was bloody and there was blood on the walls." She described the smell as "a thick, coppery smell of blood."
Outside, Montgomery demanded of Urban, "What happened?" She said Urban told her, "I don't know. This wasn't supposed to happen."
Montgomery told defense attorney Justin Barrett, that, yes, she was surprised that the sound of a shotgun blast inside a house did not wake her up but that Sarah's screaming had.
Ryan McEvoy testified that "everyone was drinking (Bud Light) cans and some liquor" that night and that he, Sarah, Rachel and his cousin's girlfriend, Danielle "Dani" Jeffers, had shot a single-shot .410 shotgun, a handgun and a rifle during the evening. Dani was the last to shoot the shotgun, McEvoy said, and he carried the guns inside and leaned the shotgun against the hallway gun cabinet. He put the half-empty box of Fiocchi 23⁄4-inch shotgun shells on top of the cabinet. The rifle was replaced in the cabinet, he said, and the handgun, he said he "probably" put on top of the cabinet.
McEvoy testified that he was the only one reloading the weapons., and that he did not reload the shotgun after Dani shot it. McEvoy testified that he and Rachel Montgomery went to bed about 11 p.m.
Dakota Cook, Corey's younger brother, woke McEvoy up later, yelling that Corey had been shot and that he (McEvoy) needed to help. McEvoy testified, "Corey had been shot in the face. There was blood ... He was having a hard time breathing normally." He said he could smell gun powder.
McEvoy, too, testified that he was surprised that he was not been awakened by a shotgun blast inside a house.
Dakota Cook testified that his dad, (Michael) Todd Cook, had come out to McEvoy's at some point in the late evening. Todd Cook said he had responded to a text message from Corey about 11 p.m., asking Todd to come to Ryan's house "because Everett Urban and a bunch of guys were coming to beat him (Corey) up." Todd Cook testified that his purpose in going to McEvoy's house was "to stop them."
After an hour or so, Todd Cook said, he decided to go home "because no one was going to show up." He returned to his home in Oberlin about 1:20 a.m.
Dakota testified that "a gunshot" woke him up, and he ran outside to find Everett Urban and Killian Dellere in Urban's white Blazer and Dylan Coryell getting in on the passenger side. Everett told Dakota, that, yeah, it sounded like a gunshot.
Dakota returned to the house and went into Corey's bedroom. Choking on words and tears and memories, Dakota told the court, haltingly, "Corey had blood on his face, and he was gurgling blood up in his mouth. It smelled like a gun had been shot."
At about 1:30 a.m., Dakota called his dad and told him, "Something's happened to Corey." Todd Cook said he immediately called 911, told the dispatcher that there was trouble at McEvoy's ... trouble with Everett Urban.
Todd Cook returned to McEvoy's, and found Corey laying in bed on his right side, shot in the left side of his head.
Todd Cook said he tried to get Corey to respond. "I was shaking him ... pulling his hair." Todd Cook said he got everyone out of the house, but he returned "three ... four times, trying to get Corey to respond."
Outside in the yard, Todd Cook saw Oberlin Police Officer Troy Haas yelling at Dylan Coryell to get out of the Blazer. Sarah Campbell was sitting on the passenger's side hitting Dylan. Coryell surrendered with no resistance.
Coryell was taken into custody and transported to the sheriff's office in the courthouse in Oberlin. Other officers began to arrive.
Sarah Campbell testified that she was having a sexual relationship with Dylan Coryell at the same time she and Corey Cook (who was in Texas in training) decided long-distance, over the telephone, by texting and through Facebook that they were "dating." Sarah said she and Corey Cook had sex 5-10 times in early October when Corey came home on leave.
She also testified however, that she and Dylan Coryell were "no longer in the friend zone" because they were "more than friends" and having sex, at the same time she was deciding to "exclusively" date Corey Cook. She testified that "before and after" she and Dylan had sex, she told Dylan that she was dating Corey and that she loved him. Dylan wanted more to their relationship, Sarah said.
Sarah said that she told Corey about Dylan when Corey came home on leave, "because I felt guilty. We broke up for a day, but he decided he could forgive me and we could move on."
Sarah was 18 years old at the time, with a six-month-old daughter named Lily. She had also just broken off a relationship with another Oberlin man.
Sarah admitted to attorneys that she lied not only to Dylan about who she was with and where she was the day of Oct. 15, but also to Jordan and Everett Urban, with whom she and Lily were living. Corey's parents had Lily the day and night of Oct. 15-16, Sarah said, although she had a playpen for Lily at the foot of the bed in the bedroom that she and Corey shared at McEvoy's.
Corey often stayed at McEvoy's when he was home in Oberlin, McEvoy told the court. Sarah said that she considered her staying at McEvoy's as temporary: she could move to Phillipsburg with her parents if Jordan and Everett kicked her out, although, she said, she and Corey had talked about her moving to Georgia, where he would be stationed next.
Sarah said everyone was drinking at Ryan McEvoy's party that evening and into the night. She said that she knew Corey was drunk "because he did silly things and didn't know what was going on. He was "dancing on the table" and there was no music, she said, while the group of friends played a drinking game called "beer-pong" in the basement. Sarah said that Corey drank Sarah's share of the beer when Sarah "lost" during the game.
Sarah said that she and Corey went to bed about midnight. Corey had no trouble going to sleep, she said, "because he was very intoxicated." Sarah said she was "only just a little tipsy."
Sarah said she was disturbed that Jordan Urban kept calling Corey's phone, so she shut off both their cellphones and fell asleep. She testified that she awoke to Corey making "gurgling sounds." She thought he had a bloody nose, but she couldn't wake him up. The light in the bedroom was on, she said; the room "smelled burnt."
Sarah said she ran out of the room, screaming.
Inside the Blazer in the farmyard, Sarah asked Dylan what he did. She told the court that he said it was all his fault and that he needed to kill himself.
Dylan Coryell's attorney Justin Barrett walked Sarah Campbell through text messages that she and Corey Cook sent each other throughout the evening of Oct. 15, having her explain to the jury her abbreviations, "text speak" shortcuts, misspellings and what she meant by some of her texts.
Sarah giggled when Barrett asked her how she acts when she's "just a little tipsy, but not completely drunk." She replied, "I misspell texting more when I'm drinking."
Dylan asked Sarah in a text, "You ignoring me? Just talk to me. I can't read your mind."
Sarah wrote, "I'm not myself."
Through testimony, Sarah said that originally Jordan Urban (who had also dated Corey Cook) had encouraged Corey's and Sarah's relationship. Later, Sarah said, Jordan Urban became jealous of Sarah's and Corey's relationship and threatened in a text to throw Sarah's and Lily's things out on the porch when she found out that Sarah was with Corey and not at her mother's in Phillipsburg on that Saturday, as Sarah had told her.
Sarah said she was convinced that Dylan "had" someone else, another girl named Jordan, this one Jordan Dreyer. Sarah testified that she wasn't jealous of Jordan Dreyer. "He (Dylan) was with Jordan. I was with Corey. I wasn't jealous," Sarah told Bassett.
Through text messages that night, Sarah apologized to Dylan for hurting his feelings, to which he replied, "You didn't hurt my feelings. I have no feelings."
Text messages also indicate that Sarah was texting Everett Urban throughout the night, telling him at one point to "leave Corey the f--- alone." Jordan Urban texted Sarah, "Corey doesn't have a gun, does he?"
Oberlin Police Officer Troy Haas testified that Dylan Coryell was taken into custody shortly after 2 a.m., Sunday, Oct. 16, without incident and transported to the jail in the courthouse. Coryell was cooperative, he said, surrendering his clothes, shoes and personal items, including a small pocketknife, in his pockets.
Decatur County Sheriff's Deputy Jay Tate testified that he sealed the McEvoy house's north door with evidence tape and stayed in view of the west door.
Officers transported witnesses to the courthouse.
Kansas Bureau of Investigation officers were requested and were en route. At 6:26 a.m., Dylan Coryell was taken to the hospital for a blood alcohol test.
Testimony continues today at 9 a.m.