Email Author Alan Prendergast
Awards
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2011 - Gerald Loeb Award for Distinguished Business and Financial Journalism, published February 11, 2010
"You're in Bad Hands"
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2011 - Best of the West/First Amendment Funding, Inc., published September 30, 2010
"Black Out"
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2011 - Best of the West/First Amendment Funding, Inc., published November 4, 2010
"Like an Open Book"
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2011 - AAN AltWeekly Awards, published February 11, 2010
"You're in Bad Hands"
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2011 - Society of Professional Journalists/Colorado Chapter, published February 11, 2010
"You're in Bad Hands"
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2010 - National Council on Crime and Delinquency/Prevention for a Safer Society Award, published October 22, 2009
"The Quality of Mercy"
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2010 - AAN AltWeekly Awards, published May 14, 2009
"The Giveaway"
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2010 - Maggies: The Magazine Awards of Western Publishing, published February 11, 2010
"You're in Bad Hands"
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2009 - Society of Professional Journalists/Colorado Chapter, published April 10, 2008
"Miles and Miles"
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2008 - Sigma Delta Chi Awards/Society of Professional Journalists, published August 16, 2007
"The Caged Life"
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2008 - AAN AltWeekly Awards, published February 8, 2007
"The Punisher"
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2006 - National Council on Crime and Delinquency/Prevention for a Safer Society Award, published December 8, 2005
"Catch-16"
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2006 - AAN AltWeekly Awards, published May 12, 2005
"If the Shoe Fits"
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2006 - AAN AltWeekly Awards, published June 23, 2005
"Welcome to America"
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2006 - AAN AltWeekly Awards, published September 8, 2005
"Duke of Oil"
2012 Stories by Alan Prendergast
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FEATURED STORY
Colorado lawmakers inclined to legalize hiking the Manitou incline
published Dec 31, 2012
While the clock ticks away on last-minute negotiations to avoid plunging the nation's economy over the dreaded fiscal cliff, the U.S. Senate did take steps late last night to provide a path up the sid... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
Denver Broncos Super Bowl favoritesr Don't bet on it yet
published Dec 27, 2012
So the boys in Vegas now have Your Denver Broncos as 3-1 favorites to win Super Bowl XLVII, ahead of annoying New England (7-2), the hot-hot Seahawks (6-1), and the snowball-chance-in-hell Vikings (10... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
Five guys Ken Salazar should offer to punch out
published Dec 26, 2012
Uneasy hangs the cowboy-hatted head of the man in charge of one-fifth of the land mass in the United States. The strain of running the Department of the Interior seems to be catching up with Ken Salaz... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
Steered straight: Teens should know what DeWayne Harris knows
published Dec 21, 2012
When he was seventeen years old, people told Gary DeWayne Harris they didn't expect to see him reach twenty-one. He was running with the wrong crowd, selling drugs, headed for trouble. Harris figured ... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
Bye-bye, Aspen: Homeless troubador John Baker is on the road again
published Dec 20, 2012
When we last caught up with John Baker, irascible author/songwriter/culinary guerrilla, he was celebrating the richness in spirit of the downtrodden by performing his song "The Homeless Bums of Aspen"... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
Newtown, Aurora and Columbine: Mass shootings, gun hysteria...and MK Ultrar
published Dec 18, 2012
The first, fragmentary accounts of a shooter's rampage through an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut, were just starting to make headlines last week when the cyberchatter about a conspiracy beg... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
Fracking the North Fork: Protests pour in over BLM lease plan
published Dec 17, 2012
When Colorado native son Ken Salazar became Barack Obama's Secretary of the Interior four years ago, it was widely expected that he would steer a more "balanced" course through the energy wars across ... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
Hentzell Park: Board rejects Mayor Michael Hancock's plan to trade open space for building
published Dec 14, 2012
Despite a personal appeal from hizzoner himself, the Denver Parks and Recreation Advisory Board gave a thumbs-down last night to a controversial plan by Mayor Michael Hancock's administration to swap ... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
Hentzell Park flap: Should Denver trade open space for officesr
published Dec 13, 2012
Five years ago, Denver park officials thought highly enough of a little-known parcel of open space along the Cherry Creek corridor, containing some of the last traces of native prairie vegetation to b... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
Water wars: Deal reached on Upper Colorado diversion project
published Dec 10, 2012
Prolonged drought and a rising population have put the squeeze on Western Slope water supplies. But Colorado River activists have something to celebrate in their long battle with Front Range developme... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
Bob Autobee "drops out" of death penalty battle for son's killer, Edward Montour
published Dec 04, 2012
Frustrated by a decade of legal delays and setbacks, the father of slain state corrections officer Eric Autobee says that he now opposes further efforts to obtain the death penalty for inmate Edward M... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
Denver cabbie novelist Gary Reilly rides again on Monday
published Nov 30, 2012
Denver writer and part-time cab driver Gary Reilly was more interested in writing novels -- many of which had to do with a cabbie named Murph who also wrote novels -- than publishing them. But since R... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
Erik Jensen, juvenile lifer, hangs onto hope "now more than ever"
published Nov 30, 2012
Erik Jensen was seventeen when he got mixed up in the deadly domestic drama of Nate Ybanez, his best buddy. Ybanez is now serving a life sentence for the 1998 murder of his mother, Julie; Jensen is al... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
Juvenile lifers: Who are the 51 in Colorador
published Nov 29, 2012
This week's feature, "The Old Boys," explores an emerging quandary in the criminal justice arena. Colorado has 51 state inmates serving life without parole for crimes committed when they were under ei... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
Johnathan Jordan letter clears co-defendant in murder -- but will anyone believe itr
published Nov 28, 2012
Jailhouse confessions tend to be treated skeptically by judges and juries, and with good reason; inmates have a bad habit of lying about their crimes, either to brag or to blame someone else. But the ... More >>
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COVER STORY
Will juvenile lifers get a second chance?
published November 29, 2012
The day his old life ended, Jeff Johnson was jonesing for a cigarette. He was tall and gangly, a bit of a rebel and a goof. He liked to shoot... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
James Holmes: Inmate's strange tale of "confession" and suicide efforts
published Nov 20, 2012
Steven Unruh is having a hard time convincing anyone that he spent hours talking to Aurora theater shootings suspect James Holmes shortly after his arrest last July. Jail officials say there's no way ... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
Ken Salazar offers to "punch out" reporter Dave Philipps for wild horse question
published Nov 14, 2012
Nobody has ever mistaken Ken Salazar, the mild-mannered, 57-year-old Secretary of the Interior, for Mike Tyson. Except, perhaps, Salazar himself. Taken by surprise by a question about one of his agenc... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
George Brauchler wins hotly contested DA race to succeed Carol Chambers
published Nov 08, 2012
Update, November 8, 3:55 p.m.: I just connected by phone with George Brauchler, the winner in the much-scrutinized race for district attorney in the 18th Judicial District, discussed in detail below. ... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
Eric Swanson: Mayhem concert assault nets seven-year prison sentence
published Nov 06, 2012
Eric Swanson's troubled past caught up with him last week in an Arapahoe County courtroom -- although not with quite the vengeance prosecutors had in mind. At one point facing habitual criminal charge... More >>
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Bustin’ Loose
published October 25, 2012
By the time he turned 36, Damien Echols had spent half his life on death row for a crime he didn’t commit. How he managed to sustain hope... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
Thomas Eric Espinoza: Appeals court affirms murder conviction, rejects insanity defense
published Oct 26, 2012
Thomas Eric Espinoza, who beat a female neighbor to death and then attempted to mount an insanity defense, has had his conviction upheld by the Colorado Court of Appeals. The case had posed numerous l... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
Damien Echols on the West Memphis Three, exoneration and Life After Death
published Oct 23, 2012
Is there life after deathr After eighteen years behind bars for a crime he didn't commit, most of them spent in the debilitating confines of death row, Damien Echols plans to find out. In 1993 Echols... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
Edward Montour: The other death-penalty decision facing the new DA
published Oct 19, 2012
This week's feature, "Lethal Election," explores how the race for district attorney in the 18th Judicial District has drawn a national spotlight because the winner will have to decide whether to pursu... More >>
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FEATURED STORY
James Holmes case exploited on Facebook by district attorney candidater
published Oct 18, 2012
This week's cover story, "Lethal Election," reports on one of the most keenly fought local contests in Colorado this fall, the race for district attorney in the state's largest judicial district. Sinc... More >>
