Cold case unit needs more cash

MONTROSE — With only a few death penalty prosecutions in decades, the push is on to redirect state money into working cold cases.

Members of the organization Families of Homicide Victims and Missing Persons made their case in Montrose Tuesday.

They told members of law enforcement and legislative candidates the $3 million spent on the Colorado attorney general's division that helps local district attorneys prosecute death penalty cases could be better spent trying to close unsolved homicide and missing persons cases.

The state recently funded the Colorado Bureau of Investigation for a cold case unit; however, this consists of one agent, and FOHVAMP envisions an eight-person unit, with expanded lab facilities, to address the 1,300 or so cold cases on the books since 1970.

"The local (police) just don't have the time," Mona Blee told the Daily Press Tuesday.

Blee's daughter, Marie, disappeared from Routt County in 1979 at the age of 15 after attending a dance the day before Thanksgiving. Blee and her husband, Paul, woke up Thanksgiving Day to find Marie hadn't come home. They had a glimmer of hope in 1995, when investigators received a tip. Though it was pursued for two years, it did not lead to Marie.

Now Grand Junction residents, the Blees are members of FOHVAMP and support beefing up the CBI's cold case unit.

"Our case is 28 years old," Blee said. "They're not going to spend all their time working on that. I understand that."

Families of Homicide Victims and Missing Persons unveiled survey results Tuesday, showing an even split among voters as to the punishments for murder. Of 500 voters interviewed, 45 percent favored life without parole and 45 percent favored the death penalty, Prabha Unnithan, sociology professor at Colorado State University, said.

The remaining 10 percent of respondents had no opinion.

Those interviewed for the survey were also asked whether they supported spending $3 million to prosecute death penalty cases, after being told there's been only one execution in Colorado in 30 years.

Forty-eight percent of respondents opposed spending the money on such prosecutions. When asked whether they favored or opposed having $3 million to track down and prosecute suspects in unsolved homicides, 70 percent were in support. Sixty-three percent favored using money saved in death penalty prosecutions for unsolved cold cases.

"I would like to see life without parole, because the money (saved on prosecutions) would go for educating the cold case task force," Paul Blee said, when Montrose Police Chief Tom Chinn asked how victims' families felt about the options.

Blee said the money could also improve the training of all police forces via a "trickle-down" effect, and he wanted to see the task force get the $3 million.

Dr. Thomas Canfield, Montrose county coroner, said it sounded as though the money would be taken from district attorneys' offices. That, he said, was "an interesting political move."

Unnithan said the $3 million in question was money given to the Colorado attorney general's office to assist district attorneys in prosecuting death penalty cases, and would not be taken directly from a DA's budget.

Chinn was concerned about giving victims' families false hopes. "Redirection really sounds good, but we're raising expectations. They will solve some cases, but there will be some cases they do not," he said.

Unnithan said the expanded cold case unit would, like any other agency, have to prioritize cases, but having a dedicated unit would assure cold cases more attention.

Just knowing someone is working the case can bring comfort, an unidentified attendee, whose daughter was murdered in 1985, said.

"I've always believed in the death penalty since then, because she didn't have a choice," the woman said. "But just to know that they're doing something...at least they're trying."

She was not the only victim's family member to support the death penalty, yet be in favor of more resources for cold cases.

"Far as I'm concerned, it's eye for an eye," Bill Hardy said.

Hardy's grandfather, George Andrew Hardy, was shot to death in his Thornton, Colo. home after two men broke in, in 1977. George's wife and a granddaughter, then 5, were present.

Bill Hardy said notorious serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer, who eventually was killed by another inmate, had opened his eyes — it wasn't fair, Hardy said, that his victims' families had in effect paid to feed and shelter Dahmer.

"I don't believe I could've done that. Those old boys who killed my grandpa, I'd hate to give them a home in state prison. But they (cold case unit) need more funding. I guess it's a good thing," he said.

Hardy wants to see the killers caught before his father dies. And he wants justice for George.

"He was quite a character. He'd never hurt a soul. It was quite a loss," Hardy said.

"Maybe with any luck at all, we'll catch the individuals who did it. I sure would like to see the day."

Montrose's missing

Ben Gray, missing from Montrose since 1978

Tracy Bastion, missing from Montrose since 1994

Kenneth "Tony" Chacon, missing from Montrose since 2005

Dale Williams, missing from the Nucla area since 1999

Unsolved homicide

Gerardo Garcia-Miranda, found dead in drained irrigation canal near Olathe on Christmas Eve, 2004.

Anyone with information about Garcia-Miranda or Williams should call the Montrose County Sheriff's Office at 252-4010.

Anyone with information about Gray, Bastion or Chacon can call the Montrose Police Department at 252-5200 (business hours) or 252-4010 after hours.