Prosecutors may drop a murder charge in a plea deal for Hammond man accused of killing his estranged wife’s girlfriend inside her Merrillville apartment, filings show.
Malik Bunch, 29, pleaded guilty Friday to burglary, a Level 1 felony. He faces up to 30 years in prison.
If a judge accepts, his sentencing hearing is July 30.
From the start, the case was unusual. The victim, Je La Cooper, 25, was found a few days later inside her apartment.
Prosecutors chose to put the case before a grand jury to charge it, an atypical move for county court.
In the plea deal, Bunch admits he broke into Cooper’s apartment on the 4000 block of W. 77th Place, in late March 2022 to “stop her from contacting his wife,” then strangled her and “staged” it as if Cooper “passed out drunk on the floor.”
She was found face down in her bedroom, wearing a grey tank top and nude from the waist down. She was holding a nearly empty wine bottle that had Bunch’s fingerprint on it. A broken lanyard was under her body.
A pathologist’s examination found the cause of death was at first undetermined. Later — with more facts Merrillville Police Det. Joshua Miskus gave from the investigation during an 2024 bond hearing, he noted marks on her face and neck — her cause of death was changed to homicide. She was likely strangled, the pathologist concluded. A rape kit turned up nothing.
Post-Tribune archives contributed.
