A valley full of questions

The death of a child under suspicious circumstances was the focus this week of a three-part series in The Press called Death in the Valley.

After a year of research, public records requests and interviews with more than a dozen people, the series, written by Keith Cousins, raised far more questions than it answered. The question that still haunts Brianna Cook’s family and friends is this: Was justice served in the investigation of her death? To this day, family members say, they have never received definitive word that Brianna committed suicide.

Their refusal to be silent is spurred by more questions: If it was suicide, why do so many of the facts in the case cast doubt on that finding? Why would she kill herself on her beloved sister’s birthday? How could Brianna tie a sophisticated knot to hang herself when she had never learned to tie her own shoes? Why were there marks on her knees as if she’d been kneeling on a mat around the time of her death? Why was there evidence of a blow to her head? How could she hang herself from a shower rod in her father’s bathroom when her feet could easily have touched the floor? And why would the deputy coroner, who examined Brianna’s body minutes after it had been brought to the hospital, be convinced that Brianna did not kill herself? And is there a murderer walking around free today?

Those aren’t the only questions family, friends, readers and others interested in the case are asking. Even some who are not sympathetic to a family whose drug use was well known in the Silver Valley wonder, if this had been a prominent family of leading citizens, would more effort and expertise in the investigation have been rigorously applied?

We apologize if that question casts an unfair blanket over some tremendous professionals in law enforcement, but a thorough investigation early on would have precluded much of the theorizing and anxiety that have shadowed Brianna’s death for more than two years. This story hasn’t died because it’s about much more than a grieving family failing to come to grips with grim reality. It’s about the need for the highest possible standards being applied whenever a body is discovered — particularly when that body belongs to a child.

Brianna Cook is dead. That’s tragic. But as her mother, Teresa Palin, points out so eloquently, this story doesn’t end with Brianna’s death.

“She wasn’t just a mixed-up, teenage drug-user,” Palin said. “She was an amazing athlete and she was an awesome person. She was a teenager who deserved to make bad choices and have a chance to grow up and change.

“And no matter what it costs us, we never want another family to face this because we don’t want to add any additional pain to the excruciating trauma we are already being subjected to. If we keep the silence, whatever happened to her can happen to someone else.”