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 and sanity in the bowels of a supermax prison is just part of the story found in Life After Death (Blue Rider…
Is there life after death? 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, then eighteen, and two other Arkansas teenagers were arrested and charged with the murders…
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 pursue the death penalty in prosecuting James Holmes, the suspect in the Aurora theater shootings. It’s a hot topic,…
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. Since Carol Chambers is term-limited, the winner in the 18th District (which includes Arapahoe, Douglas, Elbert and Lincoln counties)…
For Ethan Feldman, the siren’s call came as he presided over his courtroom in Arapahoe County, watching a procession of newly stamped prosecutors making tentative efforts to process an increasing logjam of cases. “It was clear that there were excellent attorneys in that office, but a lot of them had…
The tradition of the small-town social is vanishing even faster than Colorado’s small towns. All the more reason to head out to the eastern plains this weekend for The Big Feed, a unique blend of art show, county fair, hoedown and foot-stomping celebration of rural culture unfolding at the rodeo…
The news keeps getting worse for a coal-fired power plant in Lamar that was supposed to provide cheap electricity for southeast Colorado. Already a target of criticism for cost overruns, operational failures and pollution concerns, the project recently suffered a major setback in federal court that could subject the plant…
A recent push by state prison officials to crack down on the sexual content of inmates’ mail has greatly expanded the range of books and magazines intercepted by prison censors, including such staid fare as Rolling Stone and Men’s Health. The move has also prompted complaints from inmates’ loved ones…
This week’s feature, “The Happiest Man on Death Row,” delves into Colorado’s execution of Joe Arridy, a man with an IQ of 46, for a murder he almost certainly didn’t commit. It happened in the 1930s, when the state’s gas chamber was kept busy with a string of customers. But…
And the epitaph reads: HERE LIES AN INNOCENT MAN.
This week’s cover story, “The Happiest Man on Death Row,” examines the 1939 execution of Joe Arridy, a Pueblo man with an IQ of 46, for a murder he probably didn’t commit — and the twenty-year battle by author Robert Perske to clear his name. Although the miscarriage of justice…
A prisoner’s lawsuit against the Colorado Department of Corrections, claiming a latex allergy so severe that he’s suffered burns and respiratory problems when touched by glove-wearing guards, appeared to have been resolved last month when DOC officials testified that they no longer use latex in their facilities. But Albert Abeyta…
There was a time in the mid-1990s when Dorothy Rupert, then a state senator from Boulder, made a point out of touring every prison in Colorado. No easy feat, since at the time the state had the fastest-growing corrections system in the country. “I was just appalled at the rapid…
Film festival season in Colorado kicks off every September with the oh-so-glamorous parade of celebs and their pet projects through Telluride, followed by a chain of lesser festivals aspiring to such glory across the state. But if you crave truly independent cinema; if you long for the days when film…
Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar is on record as saying that hydraulic fracturing methods to extract oil and gas “can be done safely,” but he’s not overly impressed with varying state rules overseeing the drilling process. He’s been pushing in recent months for his department to tighten its requirements…
College student Eugene Elliott’s campaign to save remaining buildings at the old Gates Rubber factory on South Broadway from demolition, the subject of last month’s feature “Trouble in the Rubble,” has failed to impress Denver’s Landmark Preservation Commission — which voted 9-0 yesterday not to recommend landmark status for the…
Some government jobs are too important to be left up to the whims of voters. That, at least, seems to be the thinking behind the exit strategy of Summit County Coroner Joanne Richardson, who announced her upcoming resignation this week — just after the deadline passed for scheduling an election…
A Denver jury has awarded a verdict of more than $2 million, including $1.5 million in punitive damages, to a former client of Anderson, Hemmat & Levine in what amounts to a legal malpractice case against the prominent personal-injury law firm. Daniell Goff claimed that the firm’s lawyers pressured her…
In what amounts to a landmark decision, a federal judge has ruled that the conditions of solitary confinement at the Colorado State Penitentiary constitute “a paradigm of inhumane treatment” and must change — notably, so that inmates locked down in their cells 23 hours a day can have at least…
Update: I just heard from David Warren, executive director of Open Door Ministries, whose zoning permit for a boarding house at 740 Clarkson for recovering addicts and alcoholics was recently declared invalid by a Denver judge. “The city is not appealing this ruling,” he notes. “I know this has been…
The law firm of Anderson, Hemmat & Levine doesn’t keep its light under a bushel. Commercials and billboards across the Front Range boast of how hard the personal-injury firm fights for its clients. The AHL website proclaims that “Justice for Victims Begins Here.” But a disgruntled former client is seeking…
This week’s feature, “Trouble in the Rubble,” looks into the controversies triggered by student Eugene Elliott’s effort to save what’s left of the Gates Rubber Company complex on South Broadway from demolition by filing for landmark preservation status. Response to the story has been sharply divided, with some readers denouncing…
