Update: At a news conference moments ago, a Denver Police Department spokesman identified the woman arrested in a fatal hit-and-run that took place yesterday afternoon in the vicinity of 13th and Kalamath as Latoya Nelson, thirty. The victim in the case has also been ID’d. He was Charlie Herrera, 85,…
In recent days, members of Colorado’s general assembly have been battling over legislation intended to outlaw the death penalty in Colorado. Yesterday, however, the proposal failed in the House Judiciary Committee. This development distressed the Colorado ACLU; see the group’s statement below. But it was good, or at least positive,…
Attorneys for Fox News reporter Jana Winter, who reported that Aurora theater shooting suspect James Holmes sent a notebook “full of details about how he was going to kill people” to a psychiatrist, are fighting to postpone a hearing at which she has been subpoenaed to testify about where she…
Family members of the victims in several mass murders, including Columbine and the Aurora theater shooting, are calling on the federal government to establish a protocol for a “national compassion fund” that would ensure that any money donated in the wake of a tragedy goes directly to the victims. “Our…
Update: Earlier this month, we told you that Warren Watson had been captured in Idaho after being named a person of interest in the slaying of Lakewood family attorney Claudia Miller; see our previous coverage in its entirety below. Now, a grand jury has named Watson in eighteen charges, including…
March 22 was a brutal night — snow, sleet, chilly temperatures — and no doubt mom Zama Bee Khan wanted to get her two kids, Za May, eight, and Ah Zet, six, out of the cold and into the warmth. But she never got the chance. As she crossed the…
Earlier this month, we told you about a reported sexual assault of a man in Capitol Hill by two still-unknown male assailants. Afterward, a reader argued that the case had gotten so much attention because the victim was male, whereas incidents of women being raped in Capitol Hill happen frequently…
Update: The tale of Evan Ebel, the man shot during a gun battle with law enforcers in Texas on Thursday (see our previous coverage below), seems to grow stranger with each passing day. Hours after Ebel was taken off life support, as evidence that he had killed both pizza-delivery man…
Here’s one of the oldest examples of reefer madness we’ve dug up so far for Colorado Cannabis Time Capsule. This article, which ran August 24, 1904, in the Telluride Daily Journal (as well as several other small papers across the state later that week), frames marijuana as a plant that…
The Denver District Attorney’s Office is a big fan of Katie’s Law, which allows the state to collect DNA samples from anyone arrested for a felony, in part because of the growing number of times when this evidence links to cases that have long since grown cold. As an example,…
Update: We’ve been following a series of surprising incidents involving Gunsmoke Guns, a Wheat Ridge store that served as the setting of American Guns, a reality TV series that was recently canceled by the Discovery Channel; see our previous coverage below. First, there was a robbery. Then, there was an…
Last week, the FBI added onetime Coloradan Edwin Ernesto Rivera Gracias to its Ten Most Wanted list. In conjunction with this announcement, the agency also put together two other most-wanted compilations focused on Denver, including one called the “Top Ten Fugitives Arrested/Located Within the Denver Division” — although, strangely enough,…
The crime bears all the marks of an assassination: A political appointee with a high-profile position overseeing the state’s prison system answers his door one night and is immediately shot in the chest by an unknown assailant. We have no confirmation at this writing that the attack was carefully planned…
We’ve all seen the public-service announcements that tell television viewers, “Never shake a baby.” But while the delivery of this line may seem overwrought, the message is inarguable: Parents frustrated with a child may actually kill him or her by reacting in a way that may seem totally natural but…
“They didn’t take his phone. They didn’t take his car. Twenty bucks and maybe a pizza? That’s worth his life?” These very good questions are posed by Bernadette Alness, mother-in-law of Nathan Leon, a 27 year old whose second job was as a pizza delivery man. Hours after going missing…
“Strangers are using smartphone apps with GPS to track down children and have sex with them.” That’s the word from the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office and the 18th Judicial District Attorney’s Office, which want to warn parents about the dangers of smartphone apps such Grindr and Blendr, which allow adults…
The combination of St. Patrick’s Day and alcohol can make for a volatile brew. And that’s especially true when the annual March 17 celebration falls on a weekend, as it did this year. The result this time around was at least two metro-area incidents involving gunfire — the first taking…
The Federal Bureau of Investigation has updated its Ten Most Wanted list — an FBI tradition for more than sixty years. The individuals highlighted this time around include one who made the roster due to alleged actions in Colorado: Edwin Ernesto Rivera Gracias, who’s thought to have killed a man…
During the early hours of Sunday morning, a particularly brutal crime took place on Capitol Hill. According to the Denver Police Department, a man was sexually assaulted by not one but two suspects. The pair managed to get away, but the victim was able to provide investigators with detailed descriptions…
Last July, Gary Sheats was more than three times over the legal limit for intoxication when he plowed into a vehicle driven by Heather Surovik, a pregnant 27 year old only days away from delivery. She survived the crash, as did her mom and a five year old also in…
In November 2008, Elijah Archuleta, age two, died due in large part to burns covering 75 percent of his body — and his mother, Isela Reyes-Talamantes, received a twenty-year sentence for her role in his death circa March 2010. Why, then, did it take until the past few days for…
Update below: James Holmes, the suspect in the July 20 shooting at an Aurora movie theater that killed twelve people and wounded seventy others, was widely expected to plead not guilty by reason of insanity at an arraignment hearing today. Instead, Judge William Sylvester entered a not-guilty plea for Holmes…
