Colored Red

In this episode I'll go over some of the more notable events of the Colorado State Penitentiary leading up to the 1970's. I'll cover the execution methods including one odd execution method that was only ever used in Colorado. Also hear about some of the weirder stories of inmates buried at Woodpecker Hill including some gruesome murders.

On Februrary 11, 1987, 15-year-old Tim Masters walked through the field behind his house on the way to the school bus stop in Fort Collins, Colorado. There he discovered the body of Peggy Hettrick who was lying face up with her shirt pulled up and her pants pulled down around her knees. She had been stabbed and mutilated. The investigation that would follow would span over a decade and be bungled so severely that it saw an innocent man behind bars. Many suspects, some more obvious than others, would come to the surface. Will we ever know who killed Peggy Hettrick? 

It's June 19, 1957 and Nora "Lois" Coursey has just dropped off her 11 year old daughter at a birthday party in Englewood, CO. A woman at the party notes she forgot to pick up party napkins and Lois offers to go run an errand for the them. She walks out into her car and drives off, never to be seen by loved ones again. In the coming weeks Denver would find out about the secret life of the Courseys. 

Danyall White couldn't believe what she was seeing when she turned on the news to see helicopters flying over her brother's home in the Park Hill neighborhood of Denver, Colorado in 2003. The reporter said that they were looking for bodies. It would turn out that a lot of people had heard that Richard Paul White had killed women because he told them himself, they just never believed him. 

Denver in the 1880's was rough and full of crime, and no area was more full of crime than the area now known as Lodo (Lower Downtown). Over 60 saloons were in operation but none was more famous than the Palace Theatre, who many locals described as a "slaughterhouse" due to the high volume of murders taking place there. One murder stood out though, that of young 17 year old dancer Effie Moore.

Toni Henthorn and her husband Harold Henthorn were enjoying a weekend getaway to celebrate their 12th wedding anniversary in Rocky Mountain National Park. All was going well and the couple took lots of pictures, until later that night Harold called 911 to report his wife had fallen off of a cliff miles off the trail. The death was suspicious and questions mounted as the truth about Harold was revealed. What was even stranger was this wasn't the first wife of Harold Henthorn to meet a mysterious demise in the mountains of Colorado. 

On November 22, 1928, Eddie Ives was cornered under a bed in a local party house. He shot wildly from under the bed, killing one officer and wounding another officer named Bob Evans in addition to the owner of the home. As Bob Evans recovered in Denver General, a nurse named Farice King approached his bedside and shot him through the head. She then got into bed next to him and shot herself in the chest. But instead of dying next to Bob, Farice lived to tell the tragic tale of their love.

Spider Sabich (Vladimir Peter Sabich Jr) was a professional skier at the top of his game in the early 1970's. He raced in the Olympics as well as the World Cup and owned a chalet in beautiful Aspen, Colorado. He thought he had everything he could have ever wanted until he met Claudine Longet, a beautiful french pop star, and their relationship immediately took off . Yet within the span of 6 short years, their life was headed a different direction, and Claudine had a decision to make. 

It's 1911 and Gertrude Gibson Patterson valued the finer things in life, as evidenced by her taste in designer wardrobes and her secret "benefactor" in the form of a man who was old enough to be her grandfather. She also valued attention from men more her age, which is why she married a secret lover and moved to Denver, CO with him. But life in Denver wasn't what she expected and she had a plan to remedy that.

On April 1, 2011 Kenia Monge vanished from a club in Lower Downtown Denver (Lodo). A bizarre text message is found on her phone by her stepdad and police soon zero in on a strange man named Travis Forbes, who has a history of assault on women. As police try to figure out what he did with Kenia, they cannot imagine the horror he would be involved in next. Check out the Kenia Monge Foundation: https://keniamonge.wordpress.com/Music from Free Music Archive by Lobo Loco, Daniel Birch and Broke for Free. 

In the early morning hours on a hot summer day in June, 1963, Denver Police Department received a distraught call from a man claiming he just killed his pregnant wife and three of his ten children. The bodies were found cleaned and lined up next to each other in a bed. The Monge family secrets were soon uncovered and Luis Monge's trial would go down in history as the last execution before the decade long stay of executions in the United States. 

On October 5, 2012, 10 year old Jessica Ridgeway was walking to school when she disappeared. Her dismembered torso would be found a week later in an open space less than 10 miles from her home. The graphic details of what happened to Jessica would unfold as police interviewed the teenager responsible for her murder, a sadistic pedophile named Austin Sigg. Music From Free Music Archive by Borrtex and Ryan Andersen

It's a cold evening in April, 1942 and 16 year old Alice Porter and her friends have just left the local high school in Pueblo, CO to head home. After leaving her friends, Alice walks the rest of the way home alone. She encounters a man who his lawyers would call a sadist and her life is taken from her after a brutal 6 hours of torture. The gruesome details of the murder would haunt Pueblo for years to come. 

Vincent Darrell Groves is Colorado's most prolific serial killer. He was caught after a man watched him dump a body in an alley behind his house and police stalked him like a shadow for years. He was arrested for one murder and released, only to kill many times over. He wasn't so much cunning as he was utterly invisible and spontaneous, killing any woman who he saw an opportunity to attack. The full extent of his crimes would only be realized in 2010, but that isn't the end of them.

In November of 1910 the body of a woman was found on a ranch 6 miles north of Denver. Her throat was slit to the point that she was nearly decapitated. In the midst of trying to find her murderer, the dismembered remains of a woman who went missing a year prior were discovered on Table Mountain. The stories that would unfold about their murders and the women at the center of them would horrify the people of Denver. 

A short episode talking about some of Colorado's Christmas murders, from the infamous to the unknown and going back all the way to the 1890's. This is the final episode of the year and I want to thank everyone for a wonderful year getting my podcast up and running! Music from Free Music Archive by: Lee Rosevere and Dee Yan Key 

Al Kite answered his door in Aurora, Colorado in 2004, to let in a prospective renter who he had met before. He had just finished talking with his girlfriend on the phone and it was the last time anyone Al knew would speak with him. He was found two days later, tortured and murdered in his basement. The killer would live in his house for the weekend, sleep in his bed, wear his clothes and drive his car to the ATM to get cash from Al's account. To top it all off, the killer has never been caught. Music from Free Music Archive: Kevin MacLeod, Sunhillow, Blue Dot Sessions

Bernice Abeyta put her son to sleep in his crib then woke up on July 5, 1986 to find the crib empty. The family has their own theory and the police aren't as keen to entertain it. It seemed like hope was lost until only a few months ago, a man came forward claiming that he might be Christopher. But he's the fourth person to ever do so and everyone is still left wondering, where is Christopher?And, I'm changing it up and adding some music! I'd like to thank Free Music Archive for their wonderful selection of music.

Today I tell the story as told on the Denver Orbit Podcast about Colorado Cannibal Alfred Packer. Alfred wandered into the woods with 5 men in the winter of 1874 and he was the only one to walk out alive. He was spending money from multiple men's wallets and telling conflicting stories about what happened to the 5 other men. Rumors began to spread about how Ute women saw him toss a human arm into the river at a campsite, how he looked well fed and healthy when he wandered out of the woods and how he enjoyed dining on human flesh as a hobby. However, exactly what happened in those mountains that winter will never be known.

On October 13, 1970, Kara Lee Knoche and her friend Marianne Weaver were  brutally murdered in Kara's apartment in what is now the Valentine Suite of the Lumber Baron Inn. Their murder remains unsolved to this day. Reports of the spirits of the young women in the Lumber Baron Inn's Valentine Suite are a common occurrence. Can you spend a night in the Valentine Suite?