Last Friday, April 12th, 2024, a standoff erupted in Henderson, Nevada, involving local police and an armed, suicidal individual barricaded in an apartment. The suspect, wanted for a violent crime, eventually died during the multi-day incident.
Despite attempts to de-escalate, the situation intensified over the weekend, prompting a SWAT team deployment. The subject opened fire on the entering tactical unit, but no injuries were reported. Authorities resorted to using an excavator to breach the building.
Approximately thirty hours later, the standoff concluded with the death of the subject, identified as 31-year-old Trevor Cooper.
Multiple media outlets have begun to report on Cooper’s background, touching on his background in Jiu-Jitsu.
But, Mendocino County is well-acquainted with Trevor Cooper. His criminal record within the county is extensive, and he was a known entity in the local martial arts circuits. A local woman even remembers him for his kindness towards his adopted animal companion.
Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office Lieutenant Andy Porter told us Cooper was known to local law enforcement as a skilled martial artist and a dangerous person.
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The Anderson Valley Adverstier’s Catch of the Day column indicates he was a Redwood Valley resident on or around May 16, 2017, when he was booked on charges of driving with a suspended license.
The Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office asked the public for help on June 14, 2017, after reports emerged of Cooper reportedly going missing.
According to a post on the agency’s Facebook page, he went missing on June 13, 2017, around 9:30 p.m. and was last seen by his mother in a 2017 Ford F-150. The vehicle would later be found on the 1300 block of McNab Ranch Road “with some of his personal effects inside of it” and with “indications that Trevor may be injured”. MCSO wrote at the time, “Trevor’s location and well-being is unknown.”
Cooper eventually arrived at Willits’s Howard Memorial in the early morning of Thursday, June 15, 2017, alleging he had been kidnapped and held overnight. An article from KZYX said that Cooper did not give much detail about his alleged abduction due to his “minor injuries”
Lieutenant Porter told us that upon questioning about the alleged abduction investigators came to believe Cooper staged the kidnapping trying to build an alibi for charges of stalking and domestic violence he would later face.
A police log from the Ukiah Daily Journal dated October 20, 2017, indicates that 24-year-old Cooper was arrested on suspicion of stalking, threatening injury and conspiring to commit a felony and domestic battery. A review of the Mendocino County Superior Court records indicates these charges would later be dismissed.
In November 2018, officers with the Ukiah Police Department responded to a home on the 800 block of West Mill Street after receiving reports of cannabis being grown in the backyard. A press release from UPD states Cooper answered the door, acknowledged having cannabis, and allowed officers to enter the home to see the cannabis. Inside officers located equipment used to make butane honey oil, 4 “replica assault weapons”, and $5,000.
But not all of Cooper’s Mendocino County legacy is problematic.
Ukiah resident Chris Edwards remembered Cooper as a “great jiu jitsu mentor” and “one of the most talented Jiu Jitusu guys I had ever known.”
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Edwards told us Cooper began his Jiu Jiutsu career at Ukiah’s Mendocino Combat Club and later moved to Thailand to further his training. When Cooper returned to the United States, he briefly returned to his Ukiah fighting gym which was now the Mendo Training Center.
Eventually, Edwards said Cooper studied under Dave Terrell, a well-known Jiu-Jitsu trainer out of the Nor Cal Fighting Alliance in Santa Rosa.
Becca Edwards, the Dog Kennel Manager at the Humane Society for Inland Mendocino County, told us Cooper adopted a dog from them around six years ago, and she remembers Cooper as a “very nice guy in all my experiences with him.” He “took very good care of his dog.”
The last time she heard from Cooper was in August 2023 when he messaged Edwards on Instagram asking her about pet insurance.
After hearing the news of this weekend’s standoff, Edwards is concerned about the dog’s well-being. She asked if anyone knows about the status of the dog to email her at dogteam@hsimc.org
But this last weekend, Cooper had a horrific interaction with law enforcement in Henderson, Nevada that ended with police literally tearing apart the building he had barricaded himself in. Images of that fatal encounter have headlined news sites in the Nevada area these last few days.
Kristina Pelly Filocamo, a woman who lived in the Henderson, Nevada neighborhood where the standoff took place, told us she watched as law enforcement yelled out “Trevor come out, this isn’t a game, you need to come out with your hands up”. She said that Cooper had “created havoc in our normally very sleepy neighborhood.”
Law enforcement reports that the suspect was “making suicidal statements, refusing to surrender.” Eventually, they said, “On April 13, 2024, at about 8:45am, Henderson’s SWAT team made entry into the residence where the suspect discharged multiple rounds.” They left and no one was reported to be injured.
In the early hours of April 14, law enforcement reported they found Cooper dead. Media states that he may have overdosed.
Filocamo, the neighbor in Henderson, Nevada who witnessed the barricade speaks for many when she kindly says, “Please pray for all of the families who have been displaced, and also pray for Trevor’s family- they lost their son and that breaks my heart as well. No one would want this to happen to their family members.”
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