COLORADO News

Poster's Note: We really don't have a topic that fits this post (perhaps we should). I thought I would place it here as it is a pretty good bet that this slimeball hasn't oozed too far away

DENVER - A Douglas County mother is sharing her story in hopes that it
helps catch the convicted sex offender who sexually assaulted her
daughter.

"I don't want another child in another family to have to go through what
we've gone through," the mother remarked.

She said the abuse started in 2005 when her fiance, Richard Heeringa,
moved to Colorado and grew very close to her 12-year-old daughter.

"She was excited to have a dad...somebody that paid attention to her,"
she said of her daughter's initial reaction.

She said she had no idea that Heeringa had already served time in a
Michigan prison for child sex assault.

"He was really good at this. He spent a lot of time grooming her. How I
didn't know makes me very angry. But he threatened her, spent a lot of
time grooming her, so she didn't tell me. There weren't any signs."



Richard Heeringa was finally arrested and, on April 15th of this year,
he was convicted. But he didn't show up for the verdict, and hasn't been
seen since.

The Fugitive Location and Apprehension Group (FLAG) is trying to track
down Heeringa.

"I am concerned he could do this to other kids," Deputy Mike Widmer asserted.
"I don't think he's out there re-offending right now, but
as soon as he feels comfortable, he'll go back into this pattern he's
shown several times before and groom another victim."

The victim and her mother are still waiting for justice.

"It's heartbreaking...a lot of anger, a lot of sadness. He took away her
innocence," the victim's mother said.

Anyone with information about Richard Heeringa's whereabouts is asked to
call the FLAG tip line at 720-748-5018.

Murders of prison inmates in Sterling, Colo., spur state review

Posted: 12/15/2011 01:00:00 AM MST
updated: 12/15/2011 09:55:15 AM MST

By Kirk Mitchell
The Denver Post

Cellhouse 1, Pod A, from ground level inside the Sterling Correctional Facility
which is located outside of Sterling, Colorado. 1999 Denver Post file
photo. (Lew Sherman, Special to The Post)



This is Cellhouse 1, Pod A, from the third level, inside the Sterling
Correctional Facility which is located outside of Sterling, Colorado
Thursday afternoon. 1999 Denver Post file photo.
(Lew Sherman, Special
to The Post)

Department of Corrections officials will meet in Sterling today to try to
understand why four inmates have been killed at the prison there in the
past two years.

DOC executive director Tom Clements said he is meeting with Sterling
Correctional Facility warden Kevin Milyard to be debriefed on each of
the cases.

"We're looking at cell assignment protocols," Clements said. "We want
to see if there are any common denominators. It's got my attention."

The focus is on Sterling because all other prisons in DOC have a total of just three murders in roughly the same time frame.

The most recent Sterling case was Lyle Brent White, a convicted child
killer who had told his sister he feared for his life before he was
beaten to death.

"He's been threatened ever since he's been in there," said White's sister Elizabeth. "This totally could have been prevented."

An inmate who beat White to death Dec. 1 at Sterling told
investigators the "cho-mo" — or child molester — got what he deserved,
his sister said.

White had not been convicted of a sex crime but was behind bars for the murder of an 11-year-old boy.

Five days earlier, convicted sex offender Mark Frederick Hanson, who
was serving a two-year prison term for repeatedly failing to register as
a sex offender, also was beaten to death at Sterling. Three of the four
inmates killed there in the past 21 months were behind bars for either
sex offenses or crimes against children.

The rash of prison murders is extraordinary in a county that will go
years without a single homicide, Logan County District Attorney Robert
Watson said.

Watson said that errors in prison classifications or placements may have contributed to the deaths.

DOC spokeswoman Kath erine Sanguinetti said Sterling has more than
2,500 convicted felons, or more than 10 percent of the state's
prisoners, and violent confrontations do occur.

"Unfortunately, no matter how hard we try to protect them, sometimes this kind of thing happens," she said.

White's sister said investigators contacted family members a day
after he was killed, asking whether he told them about any threats. He
had, she said, adding that he had repeatedly been taunted about being a
child killer.

White was convicted of killing 11-year-old Centennial Elementary
School fifth-grader Antonio Davalos, then throwing the boy's body into a
trash bin in Littleton.

Initially, DOC officials moved him out of state, including a stint in
Idaho, because his crime made him a target. But he was returned to
Colorado several years ago, White's sister said. Despite his repeated
reports to staff that he was threatened, White remained in
general-population cell blocks, where other inmates learned his
background.

Sanguinetti said DOC regularly takes measures to protect threatened
sex offenders or child abusers or killers, including segregating them
from the general population.

She said the inmates suspected of killing White and Hanson, who was
murdered Nov. 25, are in segregation. The two were held in different
sections of the prison, Sanguinetti said.

Hanson was in prison after three convictions for failing to register as a sex offender.

In another case, Jaime Rodriguez, 29, has been charged with
first-degree murder in the Jan. 13, 2010, beating death of David
Guerrero-Estrada in his cell. Guerrero-Estrada was convicted in 2007 of
attempted sexual assault of a child and sentenced to three years in
prison.

Rodriguez has been found mentally incompetent and is being evaluated
and treated at the Colorado Mental Health Institute at Pueblo.

Two Sterling inmates are suspected in the murder of habitual burglar
Cleveland Flood, 38, who was beaten to death in February 2010. Watson
said charges could be filed next month. He declined to name the
suspects.

http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_19550475

Can we send all the pedophiles, child abusers and murderers to Colorado?