Several teenage suspects in the killing of Matthew Silliman of Apex talked online about how their 18-year-old friend died, a Wake prosecutor said in court last week.

The electronic conversations are part of the evidence being collected from multiple computers.

They were seized as part of the investigation into Silliman's killing in December, said Melanie Shekita, a Wake assistant district attorney.

Silliman is a former Eagle Scout who struggled with mental health issues.

He was found dead in a vacant mobile home days after he was reported missing.

Medical examiners listed his cause of death as asphyxiation.

But he had enough of the antidepressant bupropion in his body to be fatal.

Four of his friends were charged with killing him: Drew Logan Shaw, 17; Ryan Patrick Hare, 18; and Aadil Shahid Khan, 17, all of Apex; and Allegra Rose Dahlquist, 18, of Cary.

Search warrants taken out by Wake sheriff's investigators accuse the teens of beating him on the head with a hammer.

They are also accused of binding him with zip ties and reading his future using tarot cards and suffocating him with duct tape.

In court on Thursday, Shekita said that plea offers are being considered for Shaw and Khan.

The other two suspects could be looking at a March trial.

Shekita made the comments during a daylong series of homicide status hearings.

During the hearings, a judge, prosecutors and defense attorneys went over most of the pending murder cases in the county.

Cooper faces trial in 2010 or later

RALEIGH Brad Cooper, the Cary father accused of killing his wife Nancy, in July 2008, will have a fall 2010 trial date, at the earliest.

The case is resting on evidence taken from computers and Web sites still being sorted out by police, Wake prosecutors and Cooper's two defense attorneys.

Last year, investigators searched a laptop computer belonging to Brad Cooper's employer and assigned to him. They learned that all incoming e-mail to Nancy Cooper's account was being copied and sent to an account associated with Brad Cooper's Web site.

A search warrant in the case shows that Cooper was intercepting his wife's e-mail and read some messages the day before she disappeared.

Some notes intercepted earlier were between Nancy Cooper and her lawyer, who was drafting a separation agreement between the Cary couple.

Felled tree kills Cary man

CARY A man died when a tree fell on him in his yard. He was trying to cut it down.

Cary Police Lt. Ken Quinlan said the accident occurred about 5:30 p.m. on Aug. 25 at 1816 Tarbert Drive. It happened in a residential neighborhood in southwest Cary. The man was identified as Adam Young Hughes, 39.

Quinlan estimated that the tree was 25 feet tall. Hughes had apparently tied a rope around the tree to keep it from falling on his house.

The tree was dead, according to Quinlan. "It appears everything is accidental at this point and there is no foul play," Quinlan said.