Crime & Police

Christian Gulzow, the man arrested for the fatal stabbing of Brian Lucero in the parking lot of Torchy’s Tacos on May 23, is described by two members of The Undertakers, a Denver metal band with which he was once associated, as obsessed with demons, weapons and musical fame that was beyond his ability. They also say that after ending their friendship with him, Gulzow reacted by unleashing violent warnings that are even more disturbing given the current allegations against him.

Brian Lucero has been identified as the victim of a fatal stabbing in the parking lot of Torchy’s Tacos, near the intersection of 11th and Broadway early on May 23. His alleged killer, Christian Gulzow, a Denver-area death metal singer with a substantial criminal record, has been arrested in the death of Lucero, a transient whose fate is evidence of the dangers regularly faced by members of the homeless community.

The man identified by Denver police as Christian Gulzow, the suspect in the fatal stabbing of Brian Lucero in the Torchy’s Tacos parking lot early on May 23, is known online as both Christöf Gülzow and Nürüm Bellüm, a death metal vocalist. His various social media platforms feature multiple images of him with white makeup and gloves with long tips of the sort allegedly worn by the killer in the case, and a video on his Instagram account includes violent and bloody knifings.

Since the election of President Trump in November 2016, there has been an uptick in hate crimes across the nation. Denver is no exception, with some notable examples: Eight days after the election, on November 16, a transgender woman in Capitol Hill found her car spray-painted with swastikas and the…

Working at a for-profit Colorado prison made an indelible impression on Sue Binder, who became convinced that management was more interested in keeping the place as full —and profitable — as possible than helping inmates prepare for release or treating staff fairly.

The Denver Police Department has launched a series of videos intended to reveal myths about sex offenders in the Mile High City. Detective David Bourgeois, who stars in the clips, provided Westword with additional details about myths exposed in the first installment, on view below, and previews future episodes, revealing, for example, that not every registered sex offender can be found online.

This week, Officer John Adsit is officially retiring from the Denver Police Department because of injuries he sustained after being hit by a car while working crowd control during a December 2014 protest about a grand jury decision in the death of Ferguson, Missouri resident Michael Brown. The damage Adsit sustained was so horrific that despite countless hours of rehab and more than two dozen surgeries, he was only able to return to the job for about a week or so over the approximately 29 months that followed.

In 2014 U.S. Senior District Judge Richard Matsch ordered the State of Colorado to retry Mark Ellis, convicted of sexual assault on his daughter, or release him within ninety days. Last week — almost thirty months after the judge’s order — a three-judge panel from the U.S. Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals overruled Matsch and denied Ellis any relief.

This week’s episode of Showtime’s Dark Net devotes a segment to how Denver financial adviser Steve Talley’s “life was ruined after facial recognition technology tied him to a crime he didn’t commit.”

Denver Police Department personnel took part in twelve officer-involved shootings last year, the most in at least half a decade. On average, a shooting took place once per month in 2016. Six people were killed in the incidents, but no police officers were injured, and neither have any cops been criminally charged to date.

Paralyzed in a police shooting, Darrell Havens fought the system tenaciously — until he passed away, at age 29, in a Colorado Springs hospital.

The Denver Police Department provided Westword with the final total of arrests and/or citations for the 2017 version of the Denver 4/20 Rally. The numbers are considerably higher than what was initially reported — twenty citations and five arrests — but fewer than in previous years when the festival was held on a weekend and sometimes covered multiple days.

Denver Police Department statistics reveal the ten Denver neighborhoods with the most crimes per square mile during the early months of 2017. But while the numbers are higher than residents would wish, they’ve actually declined over the past two years in many, if not all, of the areas.

All too often these days, we hear about police violence against suspects, as in the 2015 fatal officer-involved shooting of seventeen-year-old Jessie Hernandez, which recently led to a City of Denver settlement of just under $1 million. But there are plenty of times when cops are the victims of violence from individuals they encounter, as is made clear by some startling statistics assembled by the Colorado Springs Police Department. According to FBI data detailed in a series of graphics on view below, more than 1,000 Colorado police officers have been assaulted annually in recent years, with most of those attacks taking place late at night or early in the morning.