'He took my daughter from me:' Providence man handed double life sentences for killing of girlfriend
PROVIDENCE – A potent mix of grief and rage filled the courtroom Tuesday as a judge ensured that the man who shot his girlfriend and then crammed her body into a refrigerator will spend his remaining years behind bars.
Calling him an incorrigible reoffender whom society must be protected from, Superior Court Judge Robert D. Krause sentenced Nathan Cooper, 54, to consecutive life sentences for shooting Sherbert Maddox, his professed girlfriend, and then leaving her to bleed to death instead of calling 911.
“It’s clear from your comments today … that you persist with the baseless claim that it was an accident,” Krause said in rejecting as fiction Cooper’s testimony that the gun accidentally discharged as he moved to wipe away water Maddox had splashed at him.
Krause said that account didn’t square evidence of the cruel and venomous man Cooper revealed himself to be in multiple text messages sent to friends and family. He disparaged Maddox, who went by Strawberry, as the “worst chick I’ve ever ran [sic] into in my life.” Another read “I swear on my mother this ain’t going to end well.”
Those comments displayed a malicious desire to harm, Krause said, calling the case one of the most unsettling he's seen in his 37 years as a judge.
Cooper failed to call 911
Evidence at trial showed that Cooper shot 40-year-old Maddox in the shower at 43 Parkis Ave. in the city’s Elmwood neighborhood and continued to do drugs for days instead of calling for help. He called a friend to bring him shrink wrap and proceeded to wrap it around her body before shoving her into a refrigerator with a note that read “I don’t trust you.”
The Providence police began investigating on March 22, 2022, after members of Maddox's family flagged down a Providence police officer on Parkis Avenue, saying Cooper had murdered Maddox and her body was being stored in his apartment.
A family in pain
“He took my daughter from me” and left a daughter with no mother, Maddox’s mother, Sherbert J. Perez, said. “Why the hell did he do that?”
Perez promised “He’s going to get his.”
Deshana Maddox, a sister, lamented that every day she has to drive by the house where her sister was murdered. “Just remember, what goes around comes around,” she shouted in delivering comments in court.
Ariel Pittner, who prosecuted the case with Scott Erickson, called Cooper’s crimes vile and heinous in asking that he serve two consecutive life sentences plus 20 years to serve. Providence Detective Angelo A'Vant led the investigation.
In pleading for leniency and a chance for Cooper to spend his final years as a free man, his lawyer Kara Hoopis Manosh attributed his actions to being shackled by a substance use disorder.
“I did some things wrong that could have probably saved her life,” Cooper said. “I miss her just like everybody else. I’m sorry to you all.”
Cooper was convicted by a jury in May of second-degree murder, discharging a firearm while committing a crime of violence that ended in death, and two counts of unlawful possession of a firearm after a six-day trial.
Krause sentenced him to consecutive life sentences for second-degree murder and the discharging a firearm charge. He received concurrent 10-year terms for the two gun charges.
“We’ll see you in hell,” a Maddox family yelled as deputy sheriffs led Cooper from court.
This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: Nathan Cooper sentenced to life for killing girlfriend, hiding body in fridge
