On Dec. 11, 2017, Liliana Vasquez found her brother dead in his bedroom in the Avondale apartment they shared with another sister and their children.

Jesus Real, 25, had been shot twice in the face, probably while he slept.

Liliana went to find her sister Griselda, and they called Real’s girlfriend, Desaree Coronado, and then returned to the apartment. Coronado called police.

Police immediately suspected Liliana’s boyfriend, Cleophus Cooksey, a would-be rapper and ex-convict.

Eight days later, at a press conference in downtown Phoenix, Mayor Greg Stanton stood with the police chiefs of Phoenix, Glendale and Avondale and other municipal and federal law enforcement officials to announce Cooksey’s arrests for nine murders over a three-week shooting spree in November and December. The victims included Cooksey’s mother and stepfather.

And Jesus Real.

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The mayor and the law enforcement officials spoke confidently about how all the murders had been linked by the most up-to-date ballistic testing. It seemed likely that Cooksey killed Real. He was allegedly a frequent overnight guest of Liliana Vasquez in the apartment where Real was killed. She told police she had broken up with Cooksey the night before. They tracked his phone calls and his whereabouts.

But when a grand jury brought up an indictment against Cooksey on March 1, there were only eight murders listed. Real was no longer included.

And in subsequent legal documents, the prosecution said Real’s death was immaterial to the death-penalty case against Cooksey. Capital cases crawl slowly through the legal system, usually taking years and years to come to trial.

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On Aug. 24, Gary Beren and Stephen Kunkel, attorneys for Cooksey, raised some obvious questions: Where is the evidence relating to the murder of Jesus Real? And if the ballistics so closely matched those of the other eight murders, why was Cooksey not charged with that death?

Deputy Maricopa County Attorney Susie Charbel responded that the murder is still under investigation, and she called the motion for disclosure a “fishing expedition.”

And though nobody mentioned the obvious in the court papers, maybe Real’s death just complicates prosecution strategy: All of the other murders – Parker Smith, Andrew Remillard, Salim Richards, Latorrie Beckford, Kristopher Cameron, Maria Villanueva, Rene Cooksey and Edward Nunn — seemed to have been carried out by a lone wolf.

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Cooksey was arrested on Dec. 17, immediately after police say he shot the last two victims, his mother and stepfather. Neighbors heard him arguing with Nunn and screaming about the devil before shots were fired, and police found the bodies on the other side of the apartment screen door when they forced their way past Cooksey.

But Real’s death had three possible witnesses after the fact — the Vasquez sisters and Coronado. They were initially arrested and charged with hindering prosecution, tampering with evidence and false reporting. Then the charges disappeared, and apparently, so did the three women.

According to police reports, the officers who responded to Real’s murder saw a phone charger and earbuds near the body, but no cellphone. The three women denied knowing what happened to the phone.

Police got a warrant to track the phone, and for several days there was no GPS signal coming from it because the phone was obviously turned off. But when it was powered up again, investigators followed the signal to a Goodyear motel, where they found Coronado and the Vasquez sisters.

Coronado had the phone in her sweater. Coronado, who was Real’s girlfriend and the mother of at least one of his children, said that she wanted to protect personal photos and messages in the phone.

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Liliana at first was evasive about when she had last seen or heard from Cooksey and then admitted to police that she had spoken to him the day after the murder, according to a probable cause statement by police after her arrest. She told police that Cooksey slept there several nights a week but that she had broken off their relationship the night before.

The probable cause statement for Cooksey as it related to Real’s death stated that he had made two phone calls and sent a text message, though whether he was communicating with the victim or the women was redacted out of the report. According to records, six cellphones were confiscated.

All three women were arrested, taken to jail and had initial appearances in the jail’s courtroom that were recorded on the court’s video system.

In their probable cause submittal to the courts, Avondale police claimed the weapon used to kill Real matched one stolen from another of the murder victims linked to Cooksey, and upon questioning, Cooksey said he knew “something” had happened in Avondale.

RELATED:Why Avondale police didn't publicize a murder for 38 days

Then came the Jan. 18 press conference.

Phoenix Police Chief Jeri Williams talked about the nine homicide victims.

“Nine deaths, three weeks, nine people shot in our communities in Avondale, Glendale and Phoenix,” she said. Then she read their names, including Real’s.

A public information officer from Avondale Police Department spoke specifically about Real.

“Our detectives continued to investigate what happened by collecting evidence, physical evidence through forensic science and witness statements we were able to develop probable cause for Mr. Cooksey in this case,” he told the reporters at the press conference.

But when the indictment was handed up in March, Real was not among the victims. Coronado and the Vasquez sisters were never charged with evidence tampering or hindering prosecution.

Beren and Kunkel would not comment on their filing, titled “Motion for Disclosure of Brady Material.”

Brady refers to a 1963 U.S. Supreme Court case, Brady vs. Maryland, which says that prosecutors must turn over evidence that may exonerate defendants in criminal cases.

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“Perhaps the government’s evidence regarding Mr. Real points to a perpetrator other than Mr. Cooksey,” they wrote. “Perhaps the nine murders are not linked by ballistics evidence. Whatever the truth, defense counsel are entitled to know all the information that undermined the government’s boast that ballistics evidence linked all nine deaths to Mr. Cooksey.

"Knowing the investigative flaw(s) that led the government to no longer allege that Mr. Cooksey killed Mr. Real may reveal similar flaws in the investigations undergirding the charges that Mr. Cooksey faces.”

On Aug. 29, Charbel filed a response that said, “The homicide of Jesus Real is an ongoing police investigation and is not part of the current indictment.”

And, “There is nothing in the defendant’s motion that suggests the information is somehow material to the current, pending charges,” she wrote.

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“This motion is nothing more than a ‘fishing expedition,’ expressly forbidden (by law),” she wrote.

County Attorney Bill Montgomery agreed that his office has to disclose only information for crimes that are charged, not for those they chose not to charge.

In an email to The Arizona Republic, he wrote, "In our Response, (Charbel) makes clear that the Real case is an ongoing investigation. She does not say there was no crime. She makes clear that our Brady obligation is centered on 'the particular crimes with which the defendant is charged.' That is accurate. The case posture reflects murders that meet our charging standard and can be constitutionally joined for one trial."

Cooksey is scheduled to be back in Maricopa County Superior Court on Oct. 1.

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