News

The Straight and Marrow Regarding “Courting Disaster,” in the November 2 issue: I read with interest Eric Dexheimer’s feature on the biopolitical plight of women with advanced-stage breast cancer struggling to get insurance coverage for bone marrow transplants. Dexheimer explored not just the issues but their history, and he gave…

A popular nurse at the Denver General Hospital AIDS clinic was forced to resign last week–under the threat of being fired–for bending the city’s residency rule. The rule requires that city employees, including those at the hospital, live within the city and county of Denver. However, nurse Georgia Caven contends…

Crime is on the rise these days, although not necessarily on the streets. Television programs such as Cops show real-life alleged perpetrators (their faces tastefully obscured) being busted by real-life cops. Others, such as America’s Most Wanted, reenact crimes and ask viewers with information to call the appropriate law enforcement…

One thing’s certain about reporter Steve Paulson’s recent news stories about Denver International Airport for the Associated Press: They could hardly be getting better play. One of them–charging that expansive soils are causing the widespread cracking of runways at the new airport–went out on the AP’s national wire in August…

part 2 of 2 There’s not much sense lecturing someone in an HIV clinic about the long-term hazards of smoking, although Myers suspects a link between smoking and Kaposi’s ability to attack the lungs of people with AIDS. Sam has a more immediate concern. At first, the Daunoxome reduced the…

part 1 of 2 September 15, 1994–Denver General Hospital Dr. Adam Myers picks a surgical mask off the wall outside an isolation room on the ninth floor. Placing it over his mouth and nose and smoothing his short, silver-gray hair, he knocks on the door and enters. The mask is…

A woman’s work is never done: In anointing Sandy Martin its 1994 Businesswoman of the Year, the Northwest Business and Professional Woman’s Organization cited Martin’s fifteen years of service and “unselfish commitment” to the city of Arvada, as manifested in her work as director of human services for the city…

The roller coaster and Ferris wheel for the relocated Elitch Gardens amusement park in downtown Denver are going up quickly–but the lobbying firm that helped grease the skids for the company’s move appears to be sinking fast. Late last month Denver City Clerk Arie Taylor banned White & Cole Associates,…

In June 1992, three little boys, ages eight, six and four, were taken from their mother, Mrs. M., and handed over to the Jefferson County Department of Social Services. Mrs. M., it was alleged, had allowed all three of her sons to be sexually molested by at least two different…

Bringing Up the Rear Patricia Calhoun’s editorial relating to Bruce Benson’s gubernatorial campaign (“Preserved for Posteriority,” October 26) was a beautiful piece, absolutely mature with a reasonably subtle dig. I laughed with tears in my eyes. Congratulations. One of the things Calhoun might want to explore someday, and I hope…

cartoon…

part 2 of 2 As much as their cases have become a rallying cry for women seeking payment for the controversial bone marrow transplant treatment, Barbara Tepe and Cynthia Snow could just as easily be held up as examples of why insurance companies ought not to pay. After all, both…

part 1 of 2 Last spring, when Barbara Tepe walked out of her California home, slipped into the car next to her husband and began driving to Colorado, it was not the beginning of a pleasure outing. It was a journey to stay alive. Six months earlier Tepe had been…

Strike while the irony is hot: Timing is everything–particularly when you’re Ken Hamblin, Denver’s mouth that roared, then bored. “Hamblin ramblin’ to be `black Rush,'” read a headline in the Washington Times last week. “Mile-high talk host climbing fast.” Anyone who read last January’s New York Times profile of Hamblin…

Denver Post columnist Ken Hamblin was suspended last week after it was discovered that his October 18 column contained several paragraphs that had been plagiarized from an October 16 Rocky Mountain News story. He told his editors it was “a stupid mistake,” and he was quoted in the Post as…

It started out as a way to save the Boulder Theater. But ballot initiative 2C, to be decided by Boulder voters on November 8, has become more than that–a lot more. Even Kent Zimmerman, the executive director of the Boulder Bureau of Conference Services and Cultural Affairs, as well as…

Neder Say Die I would like to thank Westword for printing the article on David Shortridge, candidate for the RTD board and a member of the Nederland Board of Trustees (“Sick Transit,” October 26). Reporter Arthur Hodges painted a grim picture of Shortridge, focusing on his history of filing allegedly…

John and Jim Cipriani hope to accomplish in federal civil court what police and prosecutors have been unable to do for the past four years–prove that Colorado State Patrol trooper Bob Benefiel murdered their sister, former El Paso County sheriff’s deputy Cecilia Cipriani Benefiel. Benefiel has denied killing her (“A…

A real estate deal touted by Denver city officials as key to the redevelopment of Stapleton International Airport suffered another blow last week when the King Soopers grocery chain missed a second closing deadline. King Soopers officials have told the Denver City Council that the company needs more time to…

It was twilight when Jack Ducey’s family arrived at his dark hulk of a house in north Denver. They’d come when their phone calls went unanswered and they spotted the newspapers collecting on his stoop. There was no sign of life. To the contrary, one of Jack’s dogs was lying…