Eideard

Detention Center named for Sheriff Sullivan – now holds him

Patrick Sullivan was the kind of lawman Coloradoans loved: a straight-shooting Republican sheriff who once crashed a Jeep through a fence to rescue two deputies from a gunman and pleaded with legislators to keep assault weapons off the street lest any more citizens get shot.

On Tuesday afternoon, though, investigators from the same sheriff’s department he oversaw for nearly two decades found themselves monitoring a home near Denver that Mr. Sullivan was seen entering. Soon after, the police arrested Mr. Sullivan, now 68 and retired from the Arapahoe County sheriff’s office, on charges that he had been trying to exchange methamphetamines for sex with a man. He was booked that night at a local county jail that proudly bears his name…

Sheriff Robinson said the police began an investigation into Mr. Sullivan’s activities on Nov. 17 after several people informed the authorities that he might be involved with methamphetamines…

According to a probable cause statement filed in court on Wednesday morning, two confidential informers told the police that they had engaged in sexual activity with Mr. Sullivan before, in exchange for methamphetamines or cash…

Mr. Sullivan, whose dramatic rescue of his deputies in 1989 was captured on television, was named national Sheriff of the Year in 2001 and became a widely respected law enforcement figure here.

Certainly this wouldn’t disqualify him from running for office again as a Republican candidate? I bet he’d do well in a primary.

Cantaloupes rotting in the Jensen Farms fields in Colorado
Daylife/AP Photo used by permission

Potentially contaminated processing equipment and problems with packing and storage of whole cantaloupes at a Colorado farm likely led to the deadliest listeria outbreak in the United States in 25 years, which has so far claimed 25 lives in a dozen states…

Pools of water on the floor of the Jensen Farms packing facility in Granada, Colo., equipment that was not easily cleaned and sanitized and failure to cool newly harvested cantaloupes before sending them to cold storage all contributed to the outbreak, the first-ever listeria contamination blamed on whole melons, federal Food and Drug Administration officials said Wednesday…

Investigators tested fruit samples and equipment from Jensen Farms and confirmed the presence of four outbreak strains of the listeria monocytogenes bacteria confirmed in the illnesses and deaths.

The FDA said Jensen Farms, which is based in Holly, Colo., had recently bought used equipment that was corroded and hard to clean. For example, the equipment used to wash and dry cantaloupe showed signs of dirt and product build-up, even after it had been disassembled, cleaned and sanitzed, the FDA’s report said. The equipment had been previously used to process raw potatoes, officials said, which could have left listeria bacteria behind.

In addition, a truck used to haul culled cantaloupe to a cattle operation was parked near the facility and could have introduced contamination to the facility, investigators said. Low levels of listeria in the field also could have introduced the bacteria into the packing facility. And the design of the plant allowed stagnant water to pool on the floor. The FDA had not inspected the farm before the Sept. 10 session that first detected listeria problems…

The outbreak has claimed lives in a dozen states, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said. They include six in Colorado, five in New Mexico, two each in Kansas, Louisiana, New York and Texas and one each in Indiana, Maryland, Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma and Wyoming…

Four illnesses were related to pregnancy, including a newborn who fell ill. One miscarriage has been reported.

Rest assured our elected officials are on top of the situation. Between Congress, the White House, the bureaucrats within the Food and Drug Administration and the US Department of Agriculture — the company has been mailed a warning letter detailing violations.

WTF?

Belinda Ellis’ farewell went as she wanted. One by one, her family placed juniper boughs and logs about her body, covered in red cloth atop a rectangular steel grate inside a brick-lined hearth. With a torch, her husband lit the fire that consumed her, sending billows of smoke into the blue-gray sky of dawn.

When the smoke subsided, a triangle-shaped flame flickered inside the circle of mourners, heavily-dressed and huddling against zero-degree weather.

“Mommy, you mean the world to me and it’s hard to live without you,” called out Ellis’ weeping daughter, Brandi, 18. “It’s hard to breathe, it’s hard to see and it’s hard to think about anything but you.”

The outdoor funeral pyre in this southern Colorado mountain town is unique. Funeral and cremation industry officials say they are unaware of any other place in the nation that conducts open-air cremations for people regardless of religion. A Buddhist temple in Red Feather Lakes, Colo., conducts a few funeral pyres, but only for its members.

Ancient Vikings lit funeral pyres to honor their dead, and it is accepted practice among Buddhist and Hindu religions. But the practice is largely taboo in the U.S….

While Belinda Ellis “did not have a religious bone in her body,” according to her husband, Randy Ellis, she had attended a Crestone funeral pyre and told her family it was what she wanted. Ellis, 48, died of a massive heart attack Jan. 9 and was cremated three days later.

Bob Biggins, spokesman and former president of the National Funeral Directors Association, applauded the practice.

“As a culture, we need to say goodbye,” Biggins said. “And I think watching some of the things that this organization is doing for their community, the word that comes to my mind is, ‘Hooray!’ Because they’re encouraging people to bear witness.”

Though I’ve celebrated more than a few Celtic wakes in my life, I’m not in agreement about the celebration. But, being a hermit, that may be me as much as anything else. I don’t do funerals.

As an atheist, everything coming an end is tough enough to deal with. Crestone is far enough into the boonies to avoid most concerns from pollution to zoning, anyway. That’s what a lot of living in the Rockies is about.

A rare miniature cow with markings similar to a panda bear was born on a farm in northern Colorado.

The so-called “panda cow” born in Larimer County is thought to be one of only about 24 in the world.

The (Loveland) Reporter-Herald reports the male calf named Ben was born Friday morning. His mother is a Lowline Angus cow…

The miniature panda cow is the result of genetic manipulation. A white belt encircles the animal’s midsection, and the cow has a white face with black ovals around the eyes, giving it a panda-like appearance.

The mini-cattle are bred solely as pets. Farmer Chris Jessen says panda calves can sell for $30,000.

Well, it’s almost a panda – sort of.

The canyon floor – former uranium mining area near my home

NATURITA, Colorado — The future of nuclear power in America is back on the table, with all its vast implications, as global warming revives the search for energy sources that produce less greenhouse gas.

But in this depressed corner of western Colorado — one of the first places in the world that uranium, nuclear energy’s primary fuel, was ever dug from the ground in industrial scale — the debate is both simpler and more complicated. A proposal for a new mill to process uranium ore, which would lead to the opening of long-shuttered mines in Colorado and Utah, has brought global and local concerns into collision — jobs, health, class-consciousness and historical memory among them — in ways that suggest, if the pattern here holds, a bitter national debate to come…

To residents here like Michelle Mathews, the fact that many opponents of the mill hail from Telluride is a crucial strike against their arguments.

“People from Telluride don’t have any business around here,” said Ms. Mathews, 31, who works as a school janitor and ardently supports the idea of bringing back uranium jobs. “Not everyone wants to drive to Telluride to clean hotel rooms…”

“They say it’s going to be different this time around,” said Craig Pirazzi, a carpenter who moved to the Naturita area from Telluride a few years ago and is now a member of the Paradox Valley Sustainability Association, which opposes the mill. “But our opposition to this proposal is based on the performance of historic uranium mining, because that’s all we have to go on — and that record is not good.”

Supporters, meanwhile, say that the opponents of Piñon Ridge are guilty of promulgating ignorant fears about something they do not understand…

“They’re saying not in my backyard — now how big is their backyard?” said George Glasier, a local rancher and investor who founded Energy Fuels, the company proposing the mill, and is now a stockholder and consultant. Energy Fuels is a publicly traded company based in Canada; a United States subsidiary would operate the mill.

I hate to say both sides have legitimate points; but, relying on past worst practices to describe how 21st Century mines and mills will be run is not only lousy politics and logic – it begs the question of critics taking responsibility to fight for best practices when the mines and mills reopen.

We live several miles from a closed uranium claim and, again, upstream where we are – and downstream at a tiny community around 400 years old – there has been no trace of radiation-related illness. The processes needn’t be destructive. And we the people have as much a responsibility – maybe more of a commitment – to keep things that way. That doesn’t include being a Luddite.

Mammoth fossils turned up by earthmover

An Ice Age fossil site recently discovered in Snowmass Village, Colorado, is providing a trio of U.S. Geological Survey scientists with a laboratory to study more than 100,000 years of vegetation and climate records in Colorado.

The USGS team is studying about 22 feet of fossil-bearing sediments from the…excavation, which appear to encompass more than 100,000 years of prehistoric time…

“A vegetation and climate record that covers this much time at such a high altitude—about 8800 feet—is unprecedented in Colorado to our knowledge,” said Jeff Pigati, a USGS geologist on the team.

Sediments that contain the fossils appear to have been deposited in a small lake or marsh that formed when a stream was dammed by a glacial moraine, or accumulation of glacier debris, at least 130,000 years ago…

The Ziegler Reservoir megafauna site was discovered while crews were enlarging the reservoir, which provides water to Snowmass Village and, to some extent, the nearby ski area for making snow…

Thanks to a bulldozer operator who knew enough to apply the brakes, notify folks what he’d unearthed.

New research…takes a look at birth outcomes and maternal smoking, building urgency for more states and cities to join the nationwide smoke-free trend that has accelerated in recent years. According to the new data, strong smoke-free policies can improve fetal outcomes by significantly reducing the prevalence of maternal smoking.

The study…compared maternal smoking prevalence in one Colorado city where a smoking ban has already been implemented to that of a neighboring city where there is no ordinance.

Researchers from the University of Colorado School of Pharmacy collected data from mothers residing in Pueblo, Colo., before and after a citywide smoking ban took effect. Results show a 23 percent decrease in the odds of preterm births and a 37 percent decrease in the odds of maternal smoking in Pueblo following the ban. Birth outcomes in El Paso County, Colo., however, showed no such drop during the same time period. Findings in this first-ever study in United States reflect similar findings as national data from Dublin, Ireland.

The study suggests that smoking bans have a significant and immediate positive impact on the health of infants and mothers. Pre-term babies stand a greater likelihood of experiencing cardiovascular issues later in life.

“This research proves that smoking is an irrefutable risk factor for expectant mothers who are acutely more affected,” said Associate Professor Robert Page, PharmD, MSPH, at the University of Colorado Schools of Pharmacy and Medicine, and lead researcher on the study, who presented the findings. “The good news is that implementing strong tobacco control policy can protect even the most vulnerable from the deadly consequences of smoking.”

There are sufficient self-detructive so-called adults who consider this a libertarian issue. The silly part is they uniformly deny one’s right to legal suicide. But, it’s OK to kill yourself, your family, children and co-workers because of your addiction. One with no redeeming social value whatsoever.

A man accused of shooting an 80-year-old man in the head and stuffing the body into the trunk of his own car waited to tell police so he could spend a day gambling with his mother, according to court documents.

Robert L. Johnson, 40, of Byers, is being held without bond at the Arapahoe County Jail on suspicion of first-degree murder. The body was found in a car trunk Saturday as police searched a vehicle, parked at the Arapahoe County Justice Center, for a bomb.

Johnson had arrived at the justice complex at about noon Saturday to turn himself in on a failure to appear warrant out of Denver. While there he asked to talk to someone privately because he “wanted to confess to a murder,” according to the arrest affidavit…

Johnson told investigators that he had called the 80-year-old man and told him his truck wouldn’t start. The victim came in his vehicle to help, opened the trunk to get a tow rope and Johnson, who was standing directly behind him, shot the man in the back of the head, the court document said.

The victim fell half way into the trunk and Johnson shoved the body in the rest of the way, closed the trunk and wiped up some blood…

After the shooting, Johnson drove to the victim’s home in Byers and fed the man’s cat. Johnson, according to the affidavit, “opened several cabinet and dresser drawers to make it look like a robbery took place,” but decided that it was a “dumb thing to do and closed everything back up.”

He had wanted to tell authorities about the shooting on Thursday, but he waited so he could go gambling with his mother on Friday…

On Saturday morning Johnson went by the victim’s home and fed the cat again before heading out to the Arapahoe County Jail.

OK. There are dumb murderers. There are strange murderers. Then, there are dumb, strange, truly weird murderers.

A Montana woman was arrested Wednesday at a Colorado museum after she destroyed an artwork that some observers say depicts Jesus engaged in a sex act…Kathleen Folden of Kalispell, Mont., was taken into police custody after she entered the Loveland Museum/Gallery in Loveland, Colo., and destroyed a work called “The Misadventures of Romantic Cannibals,” a lithograph by Enrique Chagoya. The police told The Denver Post that Ms. Folden had used a crowbar or similar tool to break the plexiglass in front of the work and then tore it up. She has been charged with criminal mischief, a felony punishable by a fine of up to $2,000.

For several days the museum has faced protests for displaying the work, which also depicts comic book characters, images from Mexican pornography and Mayan symbols. The Post reported that Daryle Klassen, a Loveland city councilman, objected to the display during a council meeting, calling it “smut” and adding, “That’s not what our community is about.” Some Roman Catholics in Loveland had also sought to have the work taken down.

Mr. Chagoya, a professor of art and art history at Stanford University, told The Post that the lithograph was a commentary on revelations of child abuse by Catholic priests.

“My work is about critiquing institutions and politics,” Mr. Chagoya said. “I wasn’t trying to portray Christ; it’s a collage of cutouts from different books.”

Folden screamed, “How can you desecrate my Lord?” as she smashed the plexiglass in front of the lithograph and then ripped up the lithograph.

No doubt she will defend her Christian act as being above the law.

One day two summers ago, an elderly couple walked into a local museum, shyly offering up the surprisingly well-preserved quilt for sale. The 90-year-old man, who had lived his whole life on the flat plains an hour north of Denver, was divvying up family heirlooms when he found the mysterious quilt.

The man didn’t remember seeing the quilt before and wasn’t sure who made it. His mother and sister had been avid quilters, as had so many women of his childhood. Maybe they made it together and it was tucked away when his mother died in 1934. His sister was also dead, so there was no one left to ask.

JoAnna Luth Stull, registrar at the museum, was working that day and gently explained that the museum didn’t buy items but suggested where the couple could get the quilt appraised. She was immediately transfixed by the workmanship as she smoothed the cloth across a table, not noticing the bold geometric pattern.

“Oh, wow,” said the museum superintendent as he happened by. “That’s a swastika quilt.”

Stull, 55, did a double take. Arranged across the quilt in shades of red, pink and beige were 27 swastikas. Her reaction was immediate and visceral. She saw an emblem of hate. “That’s what my generation sees,” she said.

So began an unlikely dilemma for the small museum in a city named for Horace Greeley, the New York newspaperman who famously cajoled all to “Go West.”

Could they display the quilt? Should they?

“Our mission is to preserve and interpret the history of Greeley. This is a cultural artifact,” said Erin Quinn, museum director. Greeley was founded in 1870 as a utopian community, with strict covenants requiring temperance and modest living. Quinn can imagine women only a generation or two removed from the city’s founders gathering to socialize and make something functional.

I had this discussion with a friend of mine, thirty years ago. She had a hatpin with a swastika on it – that had belonged to her grandmother – made before WW1. She wore it, once in a while, mostly to get discussions going to see where her neighbors really had their heads during the war with the Nazis.

She was always willing to explain the differences – and ask questions.