The stark shale cliffs rise north of the interstate, towering over the town of Rifle. From below, the 3,500-foot stone pillars look forbidding and lifeless, like books placed on a shelf for show. But to Joe Clugston, there’s nothing dead about the geologic upheaval looming over his home — not…
All day and all night, I stand here, never moving, on the same sad patch of trampled grass while strangers use me. Eight minutes for 35 cents. A lot of the folks in my ‘hood don’t even pay; they just stick their grubby fingers in my slot and root around…
Only two people truly know who inflicted fatal injuries on Kyran Gaston-Voss a year ago, and they know it beyond any doubt. One of them, Kyran’s mother, has always maintained her innocence. The other, the mother’s ex-lover, changed his story dramatically in the days after eighteen-month-old Kyran was airlifted from…
Kitty Litter You’ve gone too fur: I love Westword and I read it every week, but I hated the cover of the December 25 Year in Review issue. I am a cat lover, and the gun to the cat’s head was in poor taste! Kay Whittle Denver Crossing the feline:…
1. According to an article on page one of the January 1, 2003, Denver Post, downtown Denver looked like what last New Year’s Eve? A. “Fort Lauderdale during spring break.” B. “Baghdad on a bad night.” C. “The National Western Stock Show during the mutton-bustin’ event.” D. “A Franciscan monastery.”…
Here, kitty, kitty: Hysteria over animal mutilations this spring evoked the “cattle mutes” of two decades back — a still-unexplained phenomenon in which cattle throughout the region were found with their innards neatly excised. In a rising yowl of anguish, local news outlets detailed dozens of attacks on pets, typically…
1. Tracy Baker. Arapahoe County’s e-mail-slinging, girlfriend-promoting clerk and recorder has earned a permanent place in the Westword Hall of Shame. After more than a year of very public wrangling with his fellow Republicans in Arapahoe County, Baker still refused to go quietly into the private sector. “I love what…
Linda Donelson pulled into her driveway at six o’clock on a wintry Monday evening in March. She’d just picked up her seven-year-old grandson, Caleb, from daycare, and he was eager to see his mom. But before Linda could open the garage and go in the house, she noticed a piece…
On the sixth floor of Denver police headquarters at 1331 Cherokee Street is a cluster of rooms few people know about. From these spartan offices that overlook the mountains beyond and the city below, murders, rapes and robberies are solved. It’s the cop shop’s very own crime lab, where handwriting…
College senior Sally Vizas is no stranger to the chilly reception law-enforcement types give families and private investigators looking into cold cases. “Calling police and sheriff’s departments has been a huge pain. Some have not wanted to cooperate at all,” she says. “When I called Adams County, someone in the…
David Ryan Urton, a 21-year-old cadet at the United States Air Force Academy, faces possible disenrollment and a $100,000 fine for taking beer to an off-campus party attended by underage cadets. This is the second example in as many days of how the academy is compensating for past indiscretions. In…
1. The Endangered Species Act celebrates its thirtieth anniversary this month. Which targeted critter became the focus of an early fight? A. Plympton’s penguin. B. The snail darter. C. Colorado lynx. D. Dobbs’s bacteria. 2. Speaking of endangered, upon hearing that Homeland Security czar Tom Ridge endorsed legal illegals, Congressman…
Attendance at the premier annual fundraising event for the Denver Public Library was down this year, a sign that tension between the library administration and the Friends of the DPL may be costing the library support. Normally, much of Denver’s high society turns out for the gala event, but just…
Calling Alan Jackson! If ever clothes made the man, it’s apparent in the makeover of new Denver City Council representative-at-large Doug Linkhart. We mean no disrespect. We’re fond of the councilman known as “Leftie Linkhart,” as fellow makeover victim Charlie Brown (Off Limits, December 11) swears the other council reps…
When ex-pitcher Jim Bouton appeared on the November 28 edition of Bill Moyers’s signature PBS program, NOW With Bill Moyers, he thought he was simply promoting his latest book, Foul Ball. But afterward, he and Moyers were beaned by complaints from pretty much every entity Bouton portrays as villains in…
Most of us never come close to solving the great mysteries of life. You know: What’s a “Hoya”? Do Jesus and Mohammed get together for lunch? How does the washing machine know to take in four socks and give back only three? Where have the Bush twins gone? I mean…
The Lost Boy Tales from the dark side: Regarding Laura Bond’s “Nowhere Boy,” in the December 4 issue: My wife and I were foster parents for three years; coincidentally, it was for Lost and Found Inc. Although we had three teenage boys, all dealing with difficult issues that had landed…
Prowers County sits just shy of the Kansas border. Most of the 14,219 people who live here struggle to survive by growing winter wheat and grazing cattle. They know other Coloradans may not consider their home on the southeastern plains to be one of the state’s more scenic regions, but…
The saga of the East Village housing project has finally come to an end. Last week, wrecking crews arrived at the 16.5-acre site off Park Avenue West just east of downtown to begin demolishing what had started as planned housing for the 1976 Winter Olympics but soon deteriorated into a…
1. Which food would not be a breeding zone for bacteria if left at room temp for more than two hours? A. Roast turkey. B. Shrimp. C. Yummy baked ham. D. Brain tacos. 2. Which is not a symptom of food poisoning? A. Rockies pitching. B. Weakness. C. Fever. D…
David Ryan Urton, a 21-year-old cadet at the United States Air Force Academy, faces possible disenrollment and a $100,000 fine for taking beer to an off-campus party attended by underage cadets. This is the second example in as many days of how the academy is compensating for past indiscretions. In…
“I haven’t been measured for anything in years,” says Charlie Brown. Denver City Council’s resident cowboy is standing in Suavecito’s, the Santa Fe Drive boutique run by former social workers Craig Peña and Jay Salas, and he’s looking a little bewildered at the prospect of being fitted for a suit…
