Derek Cooper Jr., 28, was found shot to death on the night of April 10, 2015, inside an apartment in the 200 block of South Sixth Street in downtown Las Vegas. Officers had been called around 8:30 p.m. after reports of an argument and gunfire; two men were seen running from the building moments later. The Clark County coroner ruled the death a homicide caused by a gunshot wound to the chest, noting multiple gunshot wounds.
In the days that followed, detectives said Cooper had argued with two men just before the shooting. They asked the public for help locating 63-year-old Ivory “Pops” Hawkins, whom they wanted to question in connection with the case, though police did not immediately say whether he was one of the two men seen fleeing.
Weeks later, a grim twist emerged more than 150 miles away: Hawkins' body was discovered off a frontage road near Summit, Utah. According to court records summarized in news reports, investigators obtained a section of Hawkins' femur so Las Vegas police could compare DNA to blood found in a car tied to the inquiry. The affidavits also recounted witness statements alleging that another man, Jacktorian Harvey, had been inside the apartment and shot Cooper during a robbery planned by Hawkins. Harvey, 34, was arrested April 30 on drug-trafficking charges after police served a search warrant, but at that time he had not been charged in the killing.
Contemporaneous reporting indicated that the assailants had not been found and that the homicide investigation remained open, with no public announcement of a homicide arrest. Cooper's name and age were released by the coroner in the days after the shooting, and police continued to seek information from anyone who might have witnessed the confrontation that preceded his death.
