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 he had the street smarts to make a go of it, but his choices cut short his…
As we reported earlier this month, the shooting of Chloe, the beloved dog of Gary Branson, has caused quite a stir. The incident was caught on video, and footage showing an officer firing shots at the dog five times has led to an outpouring of support on a petition page…
Last Friday, Stephen Barton, a survivor of the Aurora theater shooting and now a vocal advocate for stronger gun policies, was back in Colorado, doing outreach work. While in Denver, he heard the news about the shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. It was hard to comprehend,…
The tragic shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut last week has reignited policy debates in Colorado that had quieted since the July 20 massacre in Aurora. And for victims of the theater shootings, the devastation in Connecticut can also trigger painful memories. That’s why officials in Aurora…
Kirsten Hamling is sorry she stole more than $200,000 from a charity she started to raise money for Children’s Hospital burn-unit victims. Her nonprofit group, Fired Up For Kids, collected money with an annual firefighters’ calendar — which got only positive attention until accusations surfaced that Hamling was pocketing donations…
We reported yesterday that Representative Ed Perlmutter, a Democrat, plans to introduce an assault weapons ban on the very first day of the new Congress. But his colleague, Democrat Diana DeGette, is pushing for gun-control action even sooner with a bill to ban high-capacity assault magazines that she wants to…
Secretary of State Scott Gessler has faced a lot of pushback for his efforts to identify immigrants who are illegally on Colorado’s voter rolls. But over the summer, those criticisms escalated to a new level when he received multiple violent threats, some targeting his family. Through an Open Records request,…
Update, 10:30 a.m.: The man who allegedly killed three others in a Longmont home yesterday and then shot himself had been released from jail a few hours before the shooting, according to the Weld County Sheriff’s Office. Daniel Sanchez, 31, reportedly showed up to the home where his ex-girlfriend was…
Just days after a gunman broke into an elementary school in Connecticut and killed twenty children and six adults, Monica Avila, a 34-year-old Denver mother, is facing charges for allegedly bringing a gun to a middle school and threatening students who may have bullied her daughter. She was arrested after…
This morning’s press conference to unveil Colorado’s new mental-health plan was scheduled weeks earlier — but the announcement ended up being very timely, since it took place just days after one of the worst mass shootings in history. And just as Governor John Hickenlooper’s recent-gun control comments have been thrust…
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 began. This is not just some lone nutcase engaged in senseless killing for his own indecipherable reasons, the mutterers assured each…
After the tragic mass shooting in Connecticut on Friday, Governor John Hickenlooper, no stranger to devastation, said the time has come to talk gun control. President Obama has also signaled his interest in policy changes. But thousands of Colorado residents are having a different reaction: They are looking to purchase…
In summer 2011, we told you about the arrest of Ricky Scott for the murder of Anthony Silva, a Fort Carson soldier; see our original coverage below. Now, Scott has been convicted of first-degree murder in the crime, which appears to have taken place after a fight over $200 worth…
Five months after suffering their own losses, family members associated with deceased victims in the Aurora theater shooting have set up a fund to help Newtown school shooting victims, including Emilie Parker, age six, pictured here. Calling themselves VictimsFirst, the group said the money will go directly to victims’ families…
Late last month, we told you about William Costello, charged with being a serial rapist after his DNA scored strikes on three previous sex assaults; see our original coverage below. Since then, he’s been linked to two more crimes, yet his bond was actually lowered — and he’s since been…
Update: A silver Ford Explorer ran through a red light last week in Fort Collins, colliding with a cyclist and sending him flying off his bike before the driver fled from the scene, leaving the cyclist on the ground. So says the police’s official accident report, on view below, along…
In the immediate aftermath of the Aurora theater shooting, Governor John Hickenlooper said it was too soon to talk about gun control. He remained virtually silent until, in a Thursday interview calling for a debate on the topic. One day later, the unimaginable shooting in Connecticut that claimed the lives…
As we all know, Colorado has been shaken by some extraordinarily startling crimes in 2012 — and they’re reflected in the mug shots that accompanied our coverage of these stories. Below, we’ve assembled the images associated with the best known among them, as well as other tales that give us…
Each year, as we pull together roundups of the year’s most memorable mug shots, we’re startled anew by some of the photos — those in which the subjects are so intense, pissed off or something that the images are burned into our brains. Below, see the twenty from 2012 that…
Update: Last week, we told you about a strange hit-and-run case in which the driver who struck a teen briefly picked her up before dropping her at a 7-Eleven and speeding off; see previous coverage below. Initial debate centered on whether the guy was being Good Samaritan of a sort,…
Just past 6 p.m. on December 6, Zewde Ali, 61, stepped out of a bus and crossed to a center median on South Parker Road, as many people in the area do every single day. But before she could cross to the other side, Ali was struck and killed by…
Update: On Monday, we reported about the arrests of CU students Thomas Cunningham and Mary Essa for “pot brownie assault” — secretly feeding a professor and classmates dosed sweets, prompting three hospitalizations; see previous coverage below. Cunningham was originally busted on suspicion of four felonies, but yesterday, he was charged…
