BECKLEY, WV (WOAY) – The trial of a woman accused of murdering her husband has been delayed, moving it from August 12 to October 28.
Natalie Cochran has been charged with first-degree murder for the death of her husband, Michael Cochran. She’s already serving a federal prison sentence for a Ponzi scheme that she pled guilty to.
She pled not guilty to the murder charges at her arraignment in January.
Cochran was supposed to go to trial on August 12. However, there were issues in the case over the exchange of evidence between the state and the defense.
The defense says that it just received a packet of federal files from the prosecution this week. However, according to the postmark, the packet was mailed in June.
Nobody is certain why it took that long to arrive.
Further, the defense says it has had issues getting ahold of electronics being held in evidence by law enforcement.
Because of this, the defense says it has not had enough time to assess all of the evidence.
Raleigh County Prosecuting Attorney Ben Hatfield disagreed with this assessment, arguing during the hearing that the case is ready to be presented and that the defense had all the time it needed during the hearing.
Afterward, he told us that there was no new, important evidence on the electronic devices.
“I think they’re doing, professionally, a diligent job trying to find something that exonerates their client. It just is not there. If I had something that pointed to the fact that she didn’t do this, I wouldn’t be prosecuting,” Hatfield said. “I’ll gladly have every device that they want ran reran, and I’ll provide them the reports from those electronic devices.”
Ultimately, Judge H.L. Kirkpatrick agreed with the defense, although it was not a decision he wanted to make.
“I’m a little bit upset by the fact that the defense only received this federal file yesterday. I can’t understand why because it was sent out in June, and received on July 22 or thereabouts. But, that appears to be the circumstance that we are facing,” Kirkpatrick said.
Counsel also discussed where Cochran would be housed in the lead-up to the trial. The state asked that she be kept in Southern Regional Jail, and not FCI Hazelton, to facilitate her transport to and from the courthouse.
At this point, Cochran was visibly frustrated. Her lawyers told the judge she believed that she would be penalized for not being in a federal facility. However, Judge Kirkpatrick said he didn’t believe that would be the case. He also agreed to arrange transport for her to doctor’s appointments in Morgantown.
When she was being held in FCI Hazelton, her trips to the courthouse were a six hour round trip, and both a male and female officer had to accompany her. Now that she is in southern regional jail, transport is much easier.
Hatfield said her defense lawyers can visit her much more easily.
“I would argue that if Natalie had been in Southern Regional Jail this entire time, we probably could have got this case tried by now. It’s just so much easier to have her at Southern Regional Jail because now all we need is this transport order from the judge, and she can be in the courthouse in 30 minutes from Airport Road,” Hatfield said. “Having her here is better for her case, in honesty. It’s probably not the most comfortable for her. It’s probably not as nice as the confines of the federal prisons.”
The trial is scheduled to begin on October 28. A pretrial hearing is set for October 8.
