The Colorado Independent

Crime and Punishment

Colorado ‘Treatment’ Facility Held Mentally Disabled Teen in Solitary for 25 Days

By | 05.09.13 | 12:31 pm

Fourteen-year-old Kiondre Davison had a habit of acting up in school and running away from home. Social services officials stepped in to help. They sent him to El Pueblo Boys and Girls Ranch, a teen treatment center that touts its “environment of safety and loving care.”

Clements Murder Suspect Ebel Was Anxious about Walking Free, Documents Show

By | 04.26.13 | 3:17 pm

Evan Ebel, suspected murderer of Prisons Chief Tom Clements, filed a series of grievances with the Department of Corrections shortly before his release from prison that document his concerns about transitioning directly from years in solitary confinement to the free world.

Pueblo Treatment Center Draws Scrutiny for Alleged Teen Solitary Policies

By | 04.19.13 | 2:33 pm

A residential teen treatment center in Pueblo, Colorado, is under fire for housing children in prolonged solitary confinement.

Ebel Friend: Suicide Note Shows Parolee ‘Ruined’ by Solitary, Bent on Revenge

By | 04.11.13 | 10:12 am

About two weeks before his death, Evan Ebel — suspect in last month’s murders of pizza delivery man Nate Leon and Colorado corrections chief Tom Clements — wrote a suicide note to a longtime friend who says Ebel was unhinged by his abrupt release from solitary confinement and seeking revenge for years of humiliation and torture behind bars.

TCI Editor Greene on Democracy Now Talks Evan Ebel, Solitary Confinement, Indy Media

By | 04.05.13 | 11:04 am

Colorado Independent Editor Susan Greene appeared Friday morning on Democracy Now with hosts Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzalez, who are in Denver this weekend for the National Conference on Media Reform and broadcasting from Denver’s public-access Open Media Foundation studio. The three discussed the Colorado gun violence that has regularly made national headlines over the last few years and months, including the recent shooting of Tom Clements, head of the state’s department of corrections.

‘He Was Freaking’: Friend Says Clements Suspect Flailed from Years of Isolation

By | 03.26.13 | 10:08 am

DENVER– In the weeks before his death, Evan Ebel, suspected killer of Colorado Department of Corrections Director Tom Clements, had broken ties with white supremacist prison gang 211 Crew and was debilitated by the transition from prolonged isolation to social contact, according to a friend and former fellow inmate.

Colorado Muslims Disgusted with Biased Clements Murder Coverage

By | 03.22.13 | 10:11 am

News surrounding the murder Tuesday of Colorado Department of Corrections Chief Tom Clements centers now on white supremacist suspect Evan Ebel, who was captured clinically dead yesterday afternoon in a hail of bullets after a 100 mile-per-hour car chase ended in a wreck near Fort Worth, Texas.

Slain Colorado Corrections Chief Clements No Friend to Prison Culture Inertia

By | 03.21.13 | 9:21 am

Prison work is an insular occupation. Corrections officials tend to inhabit a culture unto themselves– tight-lipped, low profile and tough as nails. Tom Clements was an exception.

Colorado Death Penalty Repeal Testimony: ‘Flashbacks Still Haunt Me Today’

By | 03.20.13 | 2:49 pm

DENVER— Lawmakers considering a bill that would end capital punishment in Colorado heard 10 hours of emotional testimony here Tuesday, including statements by a former state prisons chief and a former district court judge. The men said the death penalty…

Denver Drug Court Second Chance: From Addict to Magistrate

By | 03.19.13 | 12:52 pm

Alby Zweig knows what it’s like to need a heroin fix so badly you’re willing to pawn your parents’ stereo to score it. He gets what it means to be so strung out on cocaine you’re convinced police are hiding under your house.