Pastor Charged with Murder, Claims Self-Defense
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Arrested on an outstanding murder warrant --</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There is no punch thrown.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I have never had such heartbreak.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And the man said "I`m coming to F with you.</s>ROBERT COX, PASTOR CHARGED WITH MURDER: They attacked and choked me and punched me in the face.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: One of their leaders went from protecting them against an attacker --</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He acted in full-on self defense.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: -- to being accused of murder.</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: Tonight, a widely popular married youth pastor is charged with murder after a bizarre brawl outside a Las Vegas bar. But here`s the strangest twist. The fight happened a year ago, and the man died six months after the fight. The pastor claims, hey, I was acting in self defense. Tonight, his church says he`s a hero, not a murderer. So is this pastor as innocent as he claims? 35-year-old California pastor, Robert Cox, was leading a ministry trip with his wife with about 20 interns last summer when his group stopped for a late-night dinner at a Las Vegas sports bar. Church members say they were in this parking lot when the man who died, 55 year-old Link Ellingson, suddenly approached, threatened and assaulted them. The man who towered at 6`8" was allegedly drunk and screaming, quote, "I`m coming to bleep with you, and do you want to bleep with me." All right. That`s what he supposedly said. Cops say the pastor initially revealed he punched the victim in the face and then changed his story and said "No, I never hit the other guy." The pastor insists he only pushed him to the ground to protect his group. The man hit his head on the concrete, fell into a coma and died six months later. Now the pastor is charged with murder. And he`s shocked -- he says he`s being railroaded.</s>COX: I`m an honest man so I was blindsided and totally shocked when someone says they`re going to f-ing kill me and then they attack me and choke me and punch me in the face and then go after my students and give a student a concussion. No, I did not throw a punch.</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: Straight out to KLUC, Las Vegas radio host Chet Buchanan. Chet -- you`re in Vegas. A lot of people are saying these cops are on a witch hunt, that this comes like right out of the blue six months after the guy is dead.</s>CHET BUCHANAN, KLUC LAS VEGAS RADIO (via telephone): This is just so weird. Did he throw a punch? Didn`t he throw a punch? Was the bigger guy, Ellingson, was he the aggressor? Why did it take them so long to file charges? Clark County district attorney, Steve Olson, he`s a smart guy, but apparently there was some sort of letter that was sent to the family back in October, stating the charges wouldn`t be filed. Now there are charges filed. It`s all just a mess.</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: It really is very odd. The pastor`s church group claims the man who died was belligerent and he was drunk. The group says, as we have told you, they were leaving the pub. The man confronts them, threatened he`s going to, quote, "bleeping kill them" and then proceeded to punch five people in the group. Here is a witness.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hey, girlfriend, you want to f with me -- the man that approached us. And Rob immediately was like "Oh, my gosh, no." Backed up. "I have kids here. No." And the man said "Well I`m coming to f with you." He (inaudible) five of us multiple times before Rob could even get his arms around him to push him back. And unfortunately when he was pushing him back they tripped and fell. It does make sense if you hear the facts, if you hear the truth, why would it even go to court?</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: And we are very delighted to have with us the pastor`s attorney, Frank Copper. Frank -- if I may call you that -- what`s bizarre about this, is apparently they went -- the Vegas cops went to California and went into his church and handcuffed him like he was some kind of fugitive?</s>FRANK COPPER, ATTORNEY FOR PASTOR COX: Absolutely. It was a very ridiculous decision for them to make, since Pastor Rob had been cooperating with the investigation ever since police first arrived on the scene and thereafter. There was no reason for them to go in and arrest him on a warrant.</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: What do you think is going on here? I mean, it doesn`t add up on its face. He is saying, look, the guy was belligerent, he was drunk, he came after us, he was punching five people. I defended myself. Why do you think cops are doing what they`re doing? Your client is charged with murder?</s>COPPER: And that`s really the point. It`s absurd to suggest that Pastor Rob is guilty of murder, premeditated, deliberate murder against this man that he had never met before? That just doesn`t make any sense.</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: Look, Joe Gomez, the only thing I can think of, and you`re a reporter, KRLD, you`ve covered a lot of these things. He himself, the pastor himself, wasn`t hit by this guy. And he felt perhaps that he had a responsibility to protect some of these younger interns. But can you -- you can`t really claim self defense if you aren`t being attacked, right?</s>J. GOMEZ: Right. I mean, that`s where this gets kind of tricky. If this guy was attacking some of his students, why was he even at a sports bar if he`s a youth minister with students to begin with? That`s what boggles my mind. But if the guy was attacking his students and he jumped in and hew got in a fray with this larger man, I don`t know if he can necessarily claim self defense in that case. Also, how can somebody just die of head trauma if they just fall on the ground without being hit very hard in the face?</s>CLAYPOOL: He can.</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: Brian Claypool.</s>CLAYPOOL: Jane? This pastor can assert self defense if he was --</s>E. GOMEZ: That`s right.</s>CLAYPOOL: -- in reasonable fear that the other kids --</s>E. GOMEZ: Exactly.</s>CLAYPOOL: -- that were with him were going to be attacked.</s>CRENSHAW: Yes.</s>CLAYPOOL: And I`ve got to tell you something.</s>E. GOMEZ: And in Nevada --</s>CLAYPOOL: -- because they`re under his protective care.</s>E. GOMEZ: In Nevada --</s>CLAYPOOL: There`s a specific statute in Nevada --</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: One at a time. One at a time.</s>E. GOMEZ: In Nevada, there is no duty to retreat. In Nevada, there is no duty to retreat. Under these circumstances, his attorney is going to have to successfully prove that this was a justifiable and excusable homicide. And many times the prosecutors don`t have enough evidence, they`ll drop the charges.</s>CLAYPOOL: Ok. You don`t wait until somebody punches you in the face before you protect yourself.</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: But hold on a second.</s>CRENSHAW: Yes, but wait a minute, he could have fell on the ground.</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: He himself was not punched in the face. So if I`m with a bunch of people --</s>CLAYPOOL: You don`t have to be punched.</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: -- let`s say I have interns. And I go outside in the street. Let me just ask you. And let`s say I`m in Nevada with my interns and these are younger kids and I feel protective. And some drunk person comes up and starts -- I have the right to intervene and knock that person to the ground and then say self defense on my part, even though he didn`t attack me?</s>CLAYPOOL: Absolutely. If he`s in reasonable fear that he`s going to be harmed or they`re going to be harmed.</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: All right, Dr. Gabe. Dr. Gabe.</s>CLAYPOOL: This guy fell and tripped because he was drunk.</s>CRENSHAW: Yes.</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: Hold on. Let Dr. Gabe speak.</s>J. GOMEZ: Do we know he was drunk to begin with? No. We don`t know that he was drunk to begin with.</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: Go ahead.</s>CRENSHAW: Going off the argument -- going off the argument they said he was drunk. If that is the case, this is very biological. Cerebellum is going to be screwed up. Because you`re drinking the balance is off. You get pushed, bam, blunt head trauma, you hit the ground, you can die. Nobody has to hit you in the head, doesn`t have to be a fight. He could have just pushed him off because he theoretically was drunk, cerebellum is off, (inaudible) is off. Inside the hindbrain, the dude is going down. And you know what; I grew up in the church. And I know what it`s like.</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: I`ve got to go back to the attorney -- hold on a second, I have to go back to the attorney for the pastor, Frank Copper. Now, the published reports say that the police report says at first he said he punched the guy, but later he said he only grabbed him by the waist and knocked him down. His wife says he`s totally innocent. Let`s listen to her and then we`ll hear you.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He was cleared, and nothing was wrong. He needs a good morale booster. He`s struggling. There was no punch thrown.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He`s 100 percent innocent. He acted in full-on self defense.</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: And here`s a picture of the pastor`s neck. His wife says you can see the choke marks. So here`s what I don`t understand, Frank. The pastor broke a finger. If he didn`t punch him, how did he break his finger?</s>COPPER: Well, I`m in a position where I can`t quite comment on the facts, due to the fact you`re not supposed to try a case in the media, but --</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, then we`re in trouble. Just a little humor there.</s>COPPER: I mean the finger easily could have been broken when he fell. And the pastor fell with Mr. Ellingson, the assailant, after the altercation occurred. So his finger could have been caught in his belt buckle or something like that, which could have caused the injury.</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: What about this whole question that Joe Gomez raised? Why is he taking his interns to a bar in Las Vegas, aka, sin city?</s>COPPER: This was Las Vegas. Just about anywhere you`re going to want to eat is going to serve alcohol. I can certainly say that neither the pastor nor his wife nor any of the kids that were with him were having any alcohol that day. They were having hamburgers.</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: Why do you think -- do you think cops are trying to make a name for themselves? Are they legally obligated? Because there is a dead man -- we don`t want to make light of the situation. There is a man who died and maybe he was intoxicated. So what? I`m 19 years sober -- there are many times I was intoxicated before I got sober. It doesn`t mean I wanted to die.</s>COPPER: Well, I think that sometimes the cops have an attitude that they`re just going to let the courts sort it out. Here, unfortunately, we do have a person who died. That is tragic and it`s very unfortunate. But that`s not enough to say there was a murder or that there was ever any intention to hurt.</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: But now he`s going to go on trial, right? I mean this guy, who is a pastor in California, has got to stay in Las Vegas and go on trial in Las Vegas for murder?</s>COPPER: Well, the next step is a preliminary hearing.</s>VELEZ-MITCHELL: All right. Well, we`ll stay on top of it. Thank you, Frank Copper, for giving us some details. And we don`t try cases on this show. We just discuss them. Let`s let the criminal justice system take its course. Next: chilling new details about the killer couple who stormed a restaurant and executed two cops who are just sitting there eating some pizza. We`ve got new clues about what motivated their terrifying rampage and some new video that will scare you and just shake you to the core.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Because I`ve got five deaths on my shoulders. I should have called the cops. Two cops who have got families that are dead. My best friend is dead, all because of the fact that he was the one.