Article on Auman slams police

Jeff Kass, Rocky Mountain News

Wednesday, May 5, 2004

Denver is "a cowboy town with cowboy rules and cowboy justice."

And Lisl Auman was wrongly convicted for her role in the 1997 killing of a Denver police officer.

Those are among the messages in a 10-page Vanity Fair article that hits New York newsstands today. The June issue, with Brad Pitt on the cover, will be distributed nationwide - and then worldwide - beginning May 11.

The piece is co-authored by Woody Creek writer Hunter S. Thompson, known for his anti-establishment sentiments and jackhammer prose.

Thompson, who has long sided with Auman's cause, is true to form in the magazine piece titled "Prisoner of Denver" that levels its harshest criticism at the city's police.

The article refers to Denver officers as "thugs," and "a dangerous gang of vengeful, half-bright cowboys with a vicious reputation for brutality."

Thompson does not stop there in blaming police for Auman's conviction through what a Vanity Fair spokeswoman called a "figurative" rape.

"It is not in my nature to be polite to people who want to hurt me," Thompson wrote, "or to turn my back on a woman who is being brutally raped right in front of my eyes, especially when the rapists are wearing big guns and Denver Police Department badges."

Denver Police Chief Gerry Whitman, who was a captain at the time of officer Bruce VanderJagt's shooting, also is singled out.

Whitman called the story a "smear campaign."

"Thompson is not letting the facts stand in the way of a sensational attempt at journalism," he said, later adding, "Through some manipulation of reality, he's trying to draw attention to the case to get a favorable disposition."

Whitman said he is confident the tactic would not work.

Auman was handcuffed and in a police car when a skinhead she met the night before shot and killed VanderJagt. Skinhead Matthaus Jaehnig then killed himself with VanderJagt's gun.

A jury found Auman guilty of felony murder because she participated in the underlying felony - a burglary - that led to VanderJagt's death. She is serving a sentence of life without parole at the Colorado Women's Correctional Facility in Cañon City.

Auman supporters have been critical of two Denver officers who added to their original statements to indicate Auman may have aided Jaehnig with the murder weapon at the Denver condominium complex where the shooting deaths occurred.

One of those officers is Marc Bennett, who Vanity Fair reported has since retired from the force.

"There is no conspiracy here. I'm not Dirty Harry," Bennett reportedly told the magazine, referring to the movie about an officer who shirks the rules, but gets results.

"I couldn't put a 21-year-old girl in jail for the rest of her life if I didn't see what I saw," Bennett added.

The 7,000-word article alternates Thompson's depth-charges with a more standard retelling of the shooting and its aftermath - a part mostly undertaken by co-writer Mark Seal.

There do not appear to be any bombshells of new information in the piece, although it notes that the young Auman had been briefly married and involved in two drug busts as a juvenile.

The story also says VanderJagt's autopsy indicates the officer was hit with bullets from different guns.

But Denver District Attorney Bill Ritter, who prosecuted the original case, believes VanderJagt was hit with two police bullets - one in each leg - after Jaehnig fired the fatal shots.

Auman's appeal currently is being considered by the Colorado Supreme Court.

The only thing that all sides seem to agree on is the sadness of VanderJagt's death; he was a 47-year-old, decorated officer studying to get his doctorate who left behind a wife and young daughter.

"It was a tragedy that has affected both of our families," VanderJagt's widow, Anna, told the magazine. "However, I still feel strongly, as I did back in '98 when she \[Auman\] was convicted, that a person has to deal with the consequences of their behavior, which, in Colorado, means life without parole."