Page 52 - John Sutton News Today

I cant even think what that would be like. heavy. >> memorizing things, and going into court when -- hes a pretty determined guy. >> yeah. its great. >> but adapting, even successful adapting, using a talking typewriter, for example, wasnt enough for john sutton. as he waited for his sons long-delayed trial, he pursued with something like an obsession a quest to regain his eyesight. most people might have given up by then, you live with it. >> not even close. i wont take no for an answer. >> som...

Still, christopher demanded the hospital take special precautions. >> i do recall him as very adamant that my dad be placed under john doe, so that whoever did this could not find him and finish off what they had started. >> so you were pretty paranoid guy lying in that -- >> most certainly. >> and with good reason. because the killer was still out there, knew exactly where john sutton was. coming up, but unfortunately, police had no idea where the killer was. >> everyone wos somewhat of a suspe...

It was months after john sutton lost his wife and his own eyesight to an intruder with a 9 millimeter handgun. miami detectives were plowing their way through mounds of interview transcripts and tips and e-mails and phone records, anything to narrow down their list of suspects. and in the pile of material from the phone company, they came across a name. >> we isolated within a three or four-hour period of the murder, five or six different names, and one of those came back to garrett kopp. >> who...

Ran aground on friday was found on land before the evacuation was complete. the death toll now stands at five. the captain is being investigated on charges that include manslaughter and abandoning ship. a brazen insurgent attack claimed the lives of seven preliminary in the anbar province. now back to "blind justice." the fact that john sutton was alive at all after that mystery invader killed his wife and shot him in the face was a medical marvel, frankly. the rest of the news was not so ...

>> but then the dream got worse. teddy was a possible murder suspect. >> one of the homicide detectives related to me that there had been a problem with the polygraph. >> because he was actually a suspect. >> i suspect so. anybody that was probably anywhere near me was a suspect. >> but as sutton was absorbing the news of his wifes apparent betrayal, montoto slipped off the list of top suspects. for one thing, he couldnt have been the shooter. he was on the phone with susan when it happened. rec...

>> i want to flip this tragedy, this catastrophe into a posit e positive. >> meanwhile, in miami, it was decision time. the alleged shooter, garrett kopp, had finally agreed to plead guilty, and testify against suttons son, christopher. in exchange for a 30-year sentence, and no death penalty. sutton confronted the killer the day he entered a plea. >> during the next days, months, years, 20 years, 30 years, i want you to think about what you planned and what you did that night. you can be assure...

>> this might be a good time for a break anyway. >> that night, whether juliet knew it or not, christopher and his drug-dealing hitman garrett kopp were already leaving a trail for detectives. a trail of phone calls. 17 in all, one just an hour after the murder, as christopher and juliet left the movie theater that august night. >> garrett kopp. >> and here was the man on the end of that phone. the man who said he did it, garrett kopp. 25 years old, short, scruffy, the self-confessed killer shuf...

>> we knew that christopher sutton had complained that he had been hog-tied, beaten. >> when his family was allowed to visit him about a year later, there did seem to be a distinct change. a huge improvement. they found a buff, cleaned-up young man who excelled at sports. it was, as you can clearly see, a happy family reunion. >> firefighters a really happy event. we cried, we hugged, we said, you know, our hellos and loved each other, and he was proud of what hed learned and showed off at least...

The next thing you knew, i woke up and i was on the floor. >> john sutton answered the questions as if the defendant sitting before him was a man he had never met. as if this was not the boy he had raised from birth. neither father nor son displayed the slightest emotion. >> that doesnt make any sense to get on the witness stand and cry in front of the jury. it can cause a mistrial. so i dealt with it. i did what i had to do. >> so he did. but was he right about his son? did the state really hav...

>> we werent focused on finding the farthest place we could possibly send him. and we were very hesitant about samoa. but we investigated it rather thoroughly. >> it was expensive. paradise cove charged about $25,000 a year. but -- >> we just had enough. >> yeah. >> what else could we do. >> the suttons knew there was no way christopher would agree to go on his own, so attorney sutton did what attorneys do best. and got a court order to have christopher forcibly sent to samoa. >> he was kidnappe...