Email Author Alan Prendergast

Awards

• 2011 - Gerald Loeb Award for Distinguished Business and Financial Journalism, published February 11, 2010

  "You're in Bad Hands"

• 2011 - Best of the West/First Amendment Funding, Inc., published September 30, 2010

  "Black Out"

• 2011 - Best of the West/First Amendment Funding, Inc., published November 4, 2010

  "Like an Open Book"

• 2011 - AAN AltWeekly Awards, published February 11, 2010

  "You're in Bad Hands"

• 2011 - Society of Professional Journalists/Colorado Chapter, published February 11, 2010

  "You're in Bad Hands"

• 2010 - National Council on Crime and Delinquency/Prevention for a Safer Society Award, published October 22, 2009

  "The Quality of Mercy"

• 2010 - AAN AltWeekly Awards, published May 14, 2009

  "The Giveaway"

• 2010 - Maggies: The Magazine Awards of Western Publishing, published February 11, 2010

  "You're in Bad Hands"

• 2009 - Society of Professional Journalists/Colorado Chapter, published April 10, 2008

  "Miles and Miles"

• 2008 - Sigma Delta Chi Awards/Society of Professional Journalists, published August 16, 2007

  "The Caged Life"

• 2008 - AAN AltWeekly Awards, published February 8, 2007

  "The Punisher"

• 2006 - National Council on Crime and Delinquency/Prevention for a Safer Society Award, published December 8, 2005

  "Catch-16"

• 2006 - AAN AltWeekly Awards, published May 12, 2005

  "If the Shoe Fits"

• 2006 - AAN AltWeekly Awards, published June 23, 2005

  "Welcome to America"

• 2006 - AAN AltWeekly Awards, published September 8, 2005

  "Duke of Oil"

More

2009 Stories by Alan Prendergast

• The Obama administration: a Colorado College cabalr

  published Oct 05, 2009

  Every presidency has its own biases about the kind of education that makes for good leaders. JFK stacked the deck with Harvard grads; Bush I and Bush II leaned toward Yalies, of course. Snobbery, East... More >>

• In the Florence pen, it's risky not to join the riot

  published Oct 02, 2009

  The dysfunctional high-security federal penitentiary in Florence has been the scene of all sorts of gang-related mayhem, from the grisly 1999 disembowelment of inmate Joey Estrella to the 2008 racial ... More >>

• Think you've got a right to court recordsr Think again...

  published Oct 01, 2009

  Over the past few years, the ability of journalists (or any private citizen, for that matter) to access various forms of public records in Colorado has been greatly diminished, from police reports to... More >>

• Ken Salazar takes a step forward by booting Interior's royalties program

  published October 1, 2009

  One of Ken Salazar's first moves as Secretary of the Interior was to visit the Lakewood office of the Minerals Management Service — an... More >>

• 

  FEATURED STORY

  DA Chambers cuts corners on a death penalty case again

  published Sep 28, 2009

  Since she took over as district attorney five years ago, Carol Chambers has let wrongdoers in the Eighteenth Judicial District know that she's going to hold them accountable. She's pursued lengthy hab... More >>

• Fort Carson: Those aren't our black helicopters!

  published Sep 18, 2009

  A recent blog item featured several photos of the black helicopters of Yoder, which have been buzzing Shellie Kirby's ranch in the southeast corner of El Paso County for the past three years. Kirby ha... More >>

• Ken Salazar pulls the plug on a boneheaded royalty scheme

  published Sep 17, 2009

  One of Ken Salazar's first moves as Secretary of the Interior was to visit the Lakewood office of the Minerals Management Service, an obscure agency responsible for collecting billions in oil and gas ... More >>

• Sticking it to the myths about hepatitis C

  published Sep 16, 2009

  This week's cover story, "Going Viral," looks into how one drug-seeking hospital worker probably infected dozens of Colorado surgery patients with hepatitis C -- and the emotional fallout of Kristen P... More >>

• Hep C victims speak out about getting stuck by Kristen Parker and Rose Medical Center

  published September 17, 2009

  "WHERE WERE YOU IN APRIL?" Lauren Lollini was the first. Not the first to be exposed, certainly, and probably not the first to get... More >>

• They're baaaack: the black helicopters of Yoder

  published Sep 14, 2009

  All Shellie Kirby wants is a place where she and her husband Mark can live in peace with their Spanish mustang, Rebel, and their other horses and burros. But their seventy-acre ranch in the southeast ... More >>

• From Canon City to Maui: Ex-con Weldon Long's strange trip

  published Sep 10, 2009

  It sounds like a tidy piece of inspirational fiction: A coke-snorting, booze-guzzling dropout squanders every opportunity in life, turns to armed robbery, burglary and sleazy telemarketing scams, spen... More >>

• Caustic coroner at crux of cranky county term-limits crump

  published Sep 01, 2009

  For an elected official to try to brush aside term limits might seem a little self-serving. That's probably why the effort currently underway in Adams County to ask voters to allow county incumbents t... More >>

• Entering the Twilight Zone of Denver's new zoning code

  published Aug 28, 2009

  Being civic-minded and all, you've probably already spent a great deal of time on the City of Denver's spiffy new zoning code website, absorbing all the new terminology and figuring out exactly how it... More >>

• The promise that died with Pastor Charles Blair

  published Aug 24, 2009

  The expected tributes to the late Rev. Charles E. Blair, the man who transformed Denver's Calvary Temple into one of the largest nondenominational churches in the country and presided over its growth ... More >>

• No place for wild horses on Ken Salazar's New Frontierr

  published Aug 19, 2009

  The Obama administration talks tall about its fresh ideas and new directions. Especially at the Department of the Interior, where Secretary Ken Salazar has vowed to change course from the Bush years a... More >>

• Denver's pit-bull ban snares more than pit bulls

  published Aug 17, 2009

  He was in our front yard and a little hard to miss. About as inconspicuous as a Hummer in a rose garden. And my wife, Lisa, wanted to rescue him. Maybe it's because of all the old houses and flimsy f... More >>

• Former "King of Torts" David Moskal dies

  published Aug 12, 2009

  Disbarred attorney David John Moskal, who became embroiled in legal controversies in Colorado while on supervised release from federal prison for stealing millions from clients in Minnesota, died Augu... More >>

• In search of superstars, Crocs finds... Drew Careyr

  published Aug 11, 2009

  A mere four years ago, at the height of the mid-Bush economic frenzy (post-9/11 recession, pre-mortgage meltdown), a certain Niwot-based manufacturer of plastic boat shoes could do no wrong. Crazily c... More >>

• Life on the street for homeless parolees: "It sucks"

  published Aug 05, 2009

  Three years ago, in a feature titled "Over and Over Again," I looked at one of the primary reasons for the staggering failure rate of parolees in Colorado. That would be the fact that more and more pr... More >>

• A sunny day for Secretary Solarczar, but a slog aheadr

  published Aug 04, 2009

  Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar was back in Colorado today, August 4, touring a Longmont solar panel company as a way of pushing the Obama administration's vision of a clean energy economy. But ... More >>

• How to cross I-70 if you're a beast: a primer

  published Jul 31, 2009

  In this week's cover story, "The Bridge to Somewhere," I look at the rising animal-vehicle collision rate across Colorado and the effort to build a wildlife bridge over Vail Pass. Our relentless inter... More >>

• Flying high with the trapeze artists of Westminster

  published Jul 29, 2009

  The scene: A vacant field at 76th and Stuart in Westminster, now home to the rig of the Imperial Flyers, quite possibly the oldest continuously operating amateur trapeze group in the world. The cas... More >>

• Colorado's most hazardous roads - for wildlife

  published July 30, 2009

  Colorado reported 35,302 collisions between animals and vehicles from 1986 through 2004. The actual number may be much higher, since the... More >>

• In Colorado, it's not about why the wildlife cross the road, but whether they'll survive the trip

  published July 30, 2009

  No one knows exactly when the first elk wandered into the median around milepost 142, but after a few days they were hard to ignore. By that... More >>

• Springs family foregoes vengeance in daughter's death

  published Jul 27, 2009

  Back in March, I wrote about the remarkable tributes at a memorial service for Whitney deMoraes Hendrickson, an 18-year-old college freshman who died in a freak accident in Colorado Springs when anoth... More >>