AVIGNON, France — They are, on the face of it, the most ordinary of men. Yet they’re all on trial charged with rape. Fathers, grandfathers, husbands, workers and retirees — 50 in all — accused of taking turns on the drugged and inert body of Gisèle Pelicot while her husband recorded the horror for his swelling private video library.
Among the nearly two dozen defendants who testified during the trial’s first seven weeks was Ahmed T. — French defendants’ full last names are generally withheld until conviction. The married plumber with three kids and five grandchildren said he wasn’t particularly alarmed that Pelicot wasn’t moving when he visited her and her now-ex-husband’s house in the small Provence town of Mazan in 2019.
It reminded him of porn he had watched featuring women who “pretend to be asleep and don’t react,” he said.
Like him, many other defendants told the court that they couldn’t have imagined that Dominique Pelicot was drugging his wife, and that they were told she was a willing participant acting out a kinky fantasy. Dominique Pelicot denied this, telling the court his co-defendants knew exactly what the situation was.
Céline Piques, a spokesperson of the feminist group Osez le Féminisme!, or Dare Feminism! said she’s convinced that many of the men on trial were inspired or perverted by porn, including videos found on popular websites. Although some sites have started cracking down on search terms such as “unconscious,” hundreds of videos of men having sex with seemingly passed out women can be found online, she said.
Piques was particularly struck by the testimony of a tech expert at the trial who had found the search terms “asleep porn” on Dominique Pelicot’s computer.
Last year, French authorities registered 114,000 victims of sexual violence, including more than 25,000 reported rapes. But experts say most rapes go unreported due to a lack of tangible evidence: About 80% of women don’t press charges, and 80% of the ones who do see their case dropped before it is investigated.
In stark contrast, the trial of Dominique Pelicot and his 50 co-defendants has been unique in its scope, nature and openness to the public at the victim’s insistence.
After a store security guard caught Pelicot shooting video up unsuspecting women’s skirts in 2020, police searched his home and found thousands of pornographic photos and videos on his phone, laptop and USB stick. Dominique Pelicot later said he had recorded and stored the sexual encounters of each of his guests, and neatly organized them in separate files.
Among those he had over was Mahdi D., who testified that when he left home on the night of Oct. 5, 2018, he didn’t intend to rape anyone.
“I thought she was asleep,” the 36-year-old transportation worker told the panel of five judges, referring to Gisèle Pelicot, who has attended nearly every day of the trial and has become a hero to many sexual abuse victims for insisting that it be public.
“I grant you that you did not leave with the intention of raping anyone,” the prosecutor told him. “But there in the room, it was you.”
Like a few of the other men accused of raping Pelicot between 2011 and 2020, Mahdi D. acknowledged almost all of the facts presented against him. And he expressed remorse, telling the judges, “She is a victim. We can’t imagine what she went through. She was destroyed.”
But he wouldn’t call it rape, even if admitting that it was might get him a lighter sentence. That led prosecutors to ask the court to screen the graphic videos of Mahdi D.’s visit to the Pelicot home.
In June, authorities took down the chatroom where they say Dominique Pelicot and his co-defendants met. Since the trial started on Sept. 2, it has resonated far beyond the Avignon courtroom’s walls, sparking protests in French cities big and small and inspiring a steady flow of opinion pieces and open letters penned by journalists, philosophers and activists.
It has also drawn curious visitors to the city in southeastern France, such as Florence Nack, her husband and 23-year-old daughter, who made the trip from Switzerland to witness the “historical trial.”
Nack, who noted that she, too, was a victim of sexual violence, said she was disturbed by the testimony of 43-year-old trucker Cyprien C., a defendant who spoke that day in court.
Asked by the head judge, Roger Arata, whether he recognized the facts, Cyprien C. answered that he “did not contest the sexual act.”
“And the rape?” Arata pressed. The defendant stood silently before eventually responding, “I can’t answer.”
Arata then began to describe what was on the videos implicating him. They are only shown as a last resource and on a case-by-case basis. But for many in the courtroom, such detailed descriptions can last several minutes and be just as heavy as watching them. Gisèle Pelicot, who is in her early 70s, has chosen to remain in the courtroom while the videos are shown. Unable to watch, she usually closes her eyes, stares at the floor, or buries her face in her hands.
Experts and groups working to combat sexual violence say the defendants’ unwillingness or inability to admit to rape speaks loudly to taboos and stereotypes that persist in French society.
For Magali Lafourcade, a judge and general secretary of the National Consultative Commission of Human Rights who isn’t involved in the trial, popular culture has given people the wrong idea about what rapists look like and how they operate.
“It’s the idea of a hooded man with a knife whom you don’t know and is waiting for you in a place that is not a private place,” she said, noting that this “is miles away from the sociological, criminological reality of rape.”
Two-thirds of rapes take place at private homes, and in a vast majority of cases, victims know their rapists, Lafourcade said.
It can be difficult at times to reconcile the facts with the personalities of the accused — described by loved ones as loving, generous and considerate companions, brothers and fathers.
Cyril B.’s tearful older sister told the court: “It’s my brother, I love him. He’s not a mean person.” His partner described him as “kind, his heart on his sleeve and full of attention.” She insisted that he isn’t “macho” and that he had never forced her to do anything sexually that she wasn’t comfortable with.
Although Lafourcade does not believe “all men are rapists,” as some have concluded the trial shows, she said that unlike the #MeToo accusations that have ensnared French celebrities, the Pelicot case “makes us understand that in fact rapists could be everyone.”
“For once, they’re not monsters — they’re not serial killers on the margin of society. They are men who resemble those we love,” she said. “In this sense, there is something revolutionary.”
Colorado’s 7th Congressional District, centered on suburban Jefferson County, hasn’t had a Republican in the seat since Bob Beauprez left Congress nearly 20 years ago.
But Sergei Matveyuk, an antiques repairman from Golden and the GOP contender for the seat in the Nov. 5 election, urges voters not to count him out in his battle with incumbent Brittany Pettersen. The first-term Democratic congresswoman is seeking reelection.
“People are hurting economically,” Matveyuk, 57, told The Denver Post. “They want someone who feels the pain.”
He’s running in a once-battleground district that has turned decidedly blue in the last decade or so, with Democratic former Rep. Ed Perlmutter winning election eight times running, until his retirement announcement in 2022 ushered in an open race.
Pettersen, 42, a former state lawmaker from Lakewood, won the 2022 election by 16 percentage points over Republican Army veteran Erik Aadland. The bulk of the district’s electorate calls left-leaning Jefferson and Broomfield counties home, while redder areas in the district — such as Teller, Custer and Fremont counties — simply don’t have the populations to give Matveyuk a sizable boost.
As of Sept. 30, Pettersen had raised more than $2.2 million this cycle, compared to about $35,000 collected by Matveyuk, according to campaign finance filings. There are two minor party candidates on the ballot this time: Former state lawmaker Ron Tupa is running on the Unity Party of Colorado ticket, while Patrick Bohan is running as the Libertarian candidate.
Matveyuk, a political neophyte, said that as a small business owner, the historically high inflation of the last two years has hurt those like him who are particularly sensitive to escalating prices. But it’s his personal story that he thinks will resonate with voters in the current political climate, in which border policy has taken center stage. Matveyuk, who is of Polish descent, and his family left the Soviet Bloc in the late 1980s after experiencing life under communist rule and immigrated to the United States.
“As an immigrant myself, I know how hard it is to start a new life — but it has to be legal,” he said.
Matveyuk doesn’t echo former President Donald Trump’s calls for mass deportations but says migrants who “are hurting our people and committing crimes need to be deported, for sure.”
“We need immigration reform — 40 years ago we had a regulated border and now we have a porous border,” he said.
According to U.S. Customs and Border Protection data through August, there have been more than 8.6 million migrant “encounters” at the southern U.S. border since President Joe Biden took office in 2021. That influx has prompted many big city mayors across the country, including Denver Mayor Mike Johnston, to cut city services to pay for migrant housing and plead for help from the federal government.
Pettersen acknowledged that the U.S. asylum system is “absolutely outdated.” But many of the arriving migrants are filling jobs that businesses in the district, like nursing homes, are desperate to staff, she said.
Making people wait years before getting work permits is an unworkable policy, Pettersen said.
“We don’t have the people in the U.S. to meet our economic needs,” she said. “We need legal pathways based on economic need.”
Though Pettersen is in the minority party in the U.S. House, a bill she sponsored was recently signed into law by Biden. It directs the federal government to study and report on illicit financing associated with synthetic drug trafficking.
Last month, she introduced a bill that seeks to incentivize more states to offer substance use treatment through Medicaid, six years after she sponsored a bill in the state House requiring Colorado to provide that care. Pettersen has often spoken publicly of the struggles her mother faced battling opioid addiction.
If reelected, she said in The Denver Post’s candidate questionnaire that she would work to protect abortion rights and to address the opioid epidemic. Her top priority would be “modernizing our tax code to rebuild the middle class.”
“We need to lower costs by reinvesting in access to affordable housing, childcare, health care, and higher education,” she wrote.
JERUSALEM — A year after Hamas’ fateful attack on southern Israel, the Middle East is embroiled in a war that shows no signs of ending and seems to be getting worse.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive was initially centered on the Gaza Strip. But the focus has shifted in recent weeks to Lebanon, where airstrikes have given way to a fast-expanding ground incursion against Hezbollah militants who have fired rockets into Israel since the Gaza war began.
Next in Israel’s crosshairs is archenemy Iran, which supports Hamas, Hezbollah and other anti-Israel militants in the region. After withstanding a massive barrage of missiles from Iran last week, Israel has promised to respond. The escalating conflict risks drawing deeper involvement by the U.S., as well as Iran-backed militants in Syria, Iraq and Yemen.
When Hamas launched its attack on Oct. 7, 2023, it called on the Arab world to join it in a concerted campaign against Israel. While the fighting has indeed spread, Hamas and its allies have paid a heavy price.
The group’s army has been decimated, its Gaza stronghold has been reduced to a cauldron of death, destruction and misery and the top leaders of Hamas and Hezbollah have been killed in audacious attacks.
Although Israel appears to be gaining the edge militarily, the war has been problematic for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, too.
Dozens of Israeli hostages are languishing in Hamas captivity, and a year after Netanyahu pledged to crush the group in “total victory,” remnants of the militant group are still battling in pockets of Gaza. The offensive in Lebanon, initially described as “limited,” grows by the day. A full-on collision with Iran is a possibility.
At home, Netanyahu faces mass protests over his inability to bring home the hostages, and to many, he will be remembered as the man who led Israel into its darkest moment. Relations with the U.S. and other allies are strained. The economy is deteriorating.
Here are five takeaways from a yearlong war that has upended longstanding assumptions and turned conventional wisdom on its head.
A region is torn apart by unthinkable death and destruction
A long list of previously unthinkable events have occurred in mind-boggling fashion.
The Oct. 7 attack was the bloodiest in Israel’s history. Young partygoers were gunned down. Cowering families were killed in their homes. In all, about 1,200 people died and 250 were taken hostage. Some Israelis were raped or sexually assaulted.
The ensuing war in Gaza has been the longest, deadliest and most destructive in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Gaza health authorities say nearly 42,000 people have been killed — roughly 2% of the territory’s entire population. Although they do not give a breakdown between civilians and combatants, more than half of the dead have been women and children. Numerous top Hamas officials have been killed.
The damage and displacement in Gaza have reached unseen levels. Hospitals, schools and mosques – once thought to be insulated from violence – have repeatedly been targeted by Israel or caught in the crossfire. Scores of journalists and health workers have been killed, many of them while working in the line of duty.
Months of simmering tensions along Israel’s northern border recently boiled over into war.
A growing list of Hezbollah officials – including the group’s longtime leader — have been killed by Israel. Hundreds of Hezbollah members were killed or maimed in explosions of pagers and walkie-talkies. Israel’s ground offensive is its first in Lebanon since a monthlong war in 2006.
Fighting between Israel and Hezbollah has displaced tens of thousands of Israelis and over 1 million Lebanese. Israel promises to keep pounding Hezbollah until its residents can return to homes near the Lebanese border; Hezbollah says it will keep firing rockets into Israel until there is a cease-fire in Gaza.
The leaders of Hamas and Israel appear in no rush for a cease-fire
When the war erupted, the days appeared to be numbered for both Netanyahu and Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar.
Netanyahu’s public standing plummeted as he faced calls to step aside. Sinwar fled into Gaza’s labyrinth of tunnels as Israel declared him a “dead man walking.”
Yet both men — facing war crimes charges in international courts — remain firmly in charge, and neither appears to be in a rush for a cease-fire.
The end of the war could mean the end of Netanyahu’s government, which is dominated by hard-line partners opposed to a cease-fire. That would mean early elections, potentially pushing him into the opposition while he stands trial on corruption charges. Also looming is the prospect of an unflattering official inquiry into his government’s failures before and during the Oct. 7 attack.
Fearing that, his coalition has hung together even through mass protests and repeated disagreements with top security officials pushing for a deal to bring home the hostages. After a brief period of post-Oct. 7 national unity, Israel has returned to its divided self — torn between Netanyahu’s religious, conservative, nationalist right-wing base and his more secular, middle-class opposition.
Sinwar, believed to be hiding in Gaza’s tunnels, continues to drive a hard bargain in hopes of declaring some sort of victory. His demands for a full Israeli withdrawal, a lasting cease-fire and the release of a large number of Palestinian prisoners in exchange for scores of hostages have been rejected by Israel — even as much of the international community has embraced them.
With cease-fire efforts deadlocked and Netanyahu’s far-right coalition firmly intact, the war could go on for some time. An estimated 1.9 million Palestinians remain displaced in Gaza while an estimated 68 hostages remain captive in Gaza, in addition to the bodies of 33 others held by Hamas.
Bitter enemies experience the limits of force
Early in the war, Netanyahu promised to destroy Hamas’ military and governing abilities.
Those goals have been achieved in many ways. Israel says it has dismantled Hamas’ military structure, and its rocket barrages have been diminished to a trickle. With Israeli troops stationed indefinitely in Gaza, it is difficult to see how the group could return to governing the territory or pose a serious threat.
But in other ways, total victory is impossible. Despite Israel’s overwhelming force, Hamas units have repeatedly regrouped to stage guerrilla-style ambushes from areas where Israel has withdrawn.
Across the Middle East, bitter enemies are witnessing the limits of force and deterrence.
Israel’s deepening invasion of Lebanon and repeated strikes on Hezbollah have failed to halt the rockets and missiles. Missile and drone attacks by Iran and its allies have only deepened Israel’s resolve. Israel is vowing to strike Iran hard after its latest missile barrage, raising the likelihood of a broader, regionwide war.
Without diplomatic solutions, the fighting is likely to persist.
Israel and Gaza will never be the same
Israel is still deeply traumatized as people try to come to terms with the worst day in its history.
The Oct. 7 killings and kidnappings had an outsized impact on a tiny country founded in the aftermath of the Holocaust. Israelis’ sense of security was shattered, and their faith in the military was tested like never before.
Photos of Israeli hostages are everywhere, and mass demonstrations are held each week calling on the government to reach a deal to bring them home. The prospect of ongoing war looms over families and workplaces as reserve soldiers brace for repeated tours of duty.
The trauma is far more acute in Gaza – where an estimated 90% of the population remains displaced, many of them living in squalid tent camps.
The scenes have drawn comparisons to what the Palestinian call the Nakba, or catastrophe – the mass displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians during the war surrounding Israel’s creation in 1948. The Palestinians now find themselves looking at a tragedy of even greater scale.
It remains unclear when displaced Palestinians in Gaza will be able to return home and whether there will be anything to return to. The territory has suffered immense destruction and is littered with unexploded bombs. Children are missing a second consecutive school year, virtually every family has lost a relative in the fighting and basic needs like food and health care are lacking.
After a hellish year, the Palestinians of Gaza have no clear path forward, and it could take generations to recover.
Old formulas for pursuing Mideast peace no longer work
The international community’s response to this bloodiest of wars has been tepid and ineffective.
Repeated cease-fire calls have been ignored, and a U.S.-led plan to reinstate the Palestinian Authority in postwar Gaza has been rejected by Israel. It remains unclear who will run the territory in the future or who will pay for a cleanup and reconstruction effort that could take decades.
One thing that seems clear is that old formulas will no longer work. The international community’s preferred peace formula – the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel – seems hopelessly unrealistic.
Israel’s hard-line government opposes Palestinian statehood, says its troops will remain in Gaza for years to come and has further cemented its undeclared annexation of the West Bank. The internationally recognized Palestinian Authority has been pushed to the brink of irrelevance.
For decades, the United States has acted as the key mediator and power broker in the region – calling for a two-state solution but showing little political will to promote that vision. Instead, it has often turned to conflict management, preventing any side from doing anything too extreme to destabilize the region.
This approach went up in smoke on Oct. 7. Since then, the U.S. has responded with a muddled message of criticizing Israel’s wartime tactics as too harsh while arming the Israeli military and protecting Israel against diplomatic criticism. The result: The Biden administration has managed to antagonize both Israel and the Arab world while cease-fire efforts repeatedly sputter.
This approach has also alienated the progressive wing of the Democratic Party, complicating Kamala Harris’ presidential aspirations. The warring sides appear to have given up on the Biden administration and are waiting for the Nov. 5 U.S. presidential election before deciding their next moves.
Whoever wins the race will almost certainly have to find a new formula and recalibrate decades of American policy if they want to end the war.
Lawyers for Washington state will have past grocery chain mergers – and their negative consequences – in mind when they go to court to block a proposed merger between Albertsons and Kroger.
The case is one of three challenging the $24.6 billion deal, which was announced nearly two years ago. The Federal Trade Commission is currently fighting the merger in federal court in Oregon, where closing arguments are expected Tuesday. Colorado has also sued to block the merger.
But if the merger goes through, Washington residents would feel the impact more than the people of any other state. Albertsons and Kroger own more than 300 grocery stores in the state and control more than half of grocery sales there.
Under a plan to ease regulators’ concerns, Kroger and Albertsons would sell 579 overlapping stores, 124 of them in Washington, if the merger goes through. That’s the highest number among the 19 states with stores on the list. The state attorney general’s office says the proposed buyer, C&S Wholesale Grocers, has little experience running stores or pharmacies.
Washington seeks to avoid the situation it found itself in a decade ago, when Albertsons bought the Safeway chain. To satisfy regulators concerned about that deal’s potential impact on supermarket competition and consumers, Albertsons sold 146 stores to Haggen, a small grocery chain based in Bellingham, Washington.
But Haggen struggled with the expansion. Within six months, it had closed 127 stores — including 14 in Washington — and laid off thousands of workers. Haggen sold its remaining stores to Albertsons in 2016. Now, 10 Haggen stores in Washington are on the list to be sold if the merger happens.
“It’s pretty terrifying,” said Tina McKim, a founding member of Birchwood Food Desert Fighters, a group that sprang up in 2016 after Albertsons closed a store in Bellingham’s Birchwood neighborhood.
Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson, a Democrat who is running for governor, wants to block the merger not just in the state but nationwide. In its complaint, filed in King County Superior Court in Seattle, Washington says eliminating the “robust competition” that exists between Albertsons and Kroger would lead to higher prices, lower quality and, most likely, store closures.
Albertsons and Kroger say the merger would help them better compete with growing rivals like Walmart and Costco. They are trying to get the case dismissed, arguing a state court isn’t the proper venue to consider a nationwide ban.
“Under our federalist system, Washington cannot wield its antitrust law to dictate merger policy for the rest of the country,” Albertsons and Kroger said in a court filing.
Brad Weber, a Dallas-based partner with the law firm Locke Lord who specializes in antitrust issues, said the Superior Court judge could decide to halt the merger nationwide or limit his ruling to Washington. Judge Marshall Ferguson might also order the companies to make changes to their plans to divest stores to preserve competition.
Ferguson may also decide to delay the case until there’s a ruling from the U.S. District Court in Oregon. Weber said. In that case, the Federal Trade Commission has asked a judge to temporarily block the merger until it is considered by an in-house judge at the FTC.
Albertsons and Kroger insist that their plan, including the sale of stores to C&S, will lower grocery prices and preserve competition. But Washington residents like McKim remain skeptical.
In 2016, Albertsons acquired a Haggen supermarket and then promptly closed an Albertsons store about a mile away in Birchwood. When it sold its former store two years later, Albertsons included a restriction: for the next 20 years, no grocery store could open in the Birchwood shopping plaza.
Albertsons says these types of restrictions — occasionally used when there is a store in close proximity to the store that’s closing — can help grocery companies stay competitive.
But it was a huge blow to the community, McKim said. For 35 years, the Birchwood store had served older adults, students, people with disabilities and lower-income residents who suddenly had no easy access to fresh food.
“We were all really shocked by that. How is it possible to deny food access to a neighborhood?” McKim said. “It made it really hard for anyone without a car to be able to go to another grocery store.”
McKim’s group tries to fill the void by collecting food donations and bringing in produce from local farms, but “it’s nowhere near the level of access people need,” she said.
This summer, after an investigation by Washington’s attorney general, Albertsons removed the restriction on the shopping plaza. A Big Lots that moved into the former grocery store is closing soon, McKim said, and she hopes the space will attract another supermarket. But even if it does, the community may never get back the unionized jobs it lost when Albertsons shut its doors, she said.
McKim said her area does have a Walmart, but it’s even further away from Birchwood than the Albertsons-run Haggen store, which is on the list of stores that would be sold to C&S. She’s also not convinced Kroger and Albertsons need to merge to compete with Walmart.
“This city is growing so quickly, the need for food is absolutely critical everywhere,” McKim said. “When you see other stores succeed, it’s because they curate to the neighborhood’s needs.”
Wisconsin health officials initiated a recall of eggs following an outbreak of salmonella infections among 65 people in nine states — including Colorado — that originated on a Wisconsin farm.
The Wisconsin Department of Health Services said in a statement Friday that among those infected by salmonella are 42 people in Wisconsin, where the eggs are believed to have been sold.
“The eggs were distributed in Wisconsin, Illinois and Michigan through retail stores and food service distributors,” the department said. “The recall includes all egg types such as conventional cage-free, organic, and non-GMO, carton sizes, and expiration dates in containers labeled with ‘Milo’s Poultry Farms’ or ‘Tony’s Fresh Market.’”
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed in a statement on its website that 65 people in nine states were infected by a strain of salmonella, with 24 hospitalizations and no deaths as of Friday. The states include Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, Iowa, Virginia, Colorado, Utah and California, the agency said.
One case has been reported in Colorado to date, according to the CDC.
The egg recall was undertaken by Milo’s Poultry Farms LLC of Bonduel, Wisconsin, the CDC said.
“Anyone who purchased the recalled eggs is advised to not eat them or cook with them and to throw them away. Restaurants should not sell or serve recalled eggs,” the Wisconsin health department said.
The department advised anyone who ate the eggs and is experiencing symptoms to contact a health care provider. Symptoms include diarrhea, abdominal pain, fever and vomiting lasting for several days, the statement said.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture in July announced new measures to limit salmonella in poultry products. The proposed directive included requiring poultry companies to keep salmonella levels under a certain threshold and test for the presence of six particularly sickening forms of the bacteria, three found in turkey and three in chicken.
Bacteria exceeding the proposed standard and identification of any of the strains would prevent poultry sales and leave the products subject to recall.
The CDC estimates salmonella causes 1.35 million infections annually, most through food, and about 420 deaths. The Agriculture Department estimates there are 125,000 infections from chicken and 43,000 from turkey each year.
Thornton police officers shot and injured an armed man allegedly resisting arrest Tuesday night.
Around 8 p.m. Tuesday, Thornton officers approached a man with a warrant in a parking lot in the 200 block of East 120th Avenue — just west of Interstate 25 near Webster Lake — according to a news release from the police department.
Officers told the man he was under arrest, but he refused to listen to officers and attempted to walk away, the news release stated.
The police department said officers fired a taser at the man, but it was “ineffective.” When the man allegedly pulled out a handgun in response, multiple officers shot him.
Paramedics transported the man to a hospital with “serious injuries,” police said in the release. An update on his condition was not available Wednesday morning.
The 17th Judicial District Critical Incident Response Team will investigate the shooting and the officers’ use of force.
None of the officers were injured, and all have been placed on administrative leave during the investigation, police said. The number of officers involved in the shooting was not available Wednesday.
Editor’s note: An untold number of unheralded artists live in Colorado, those creators who can’t (or don’t want to) get into galleries and rely on word of mouth, luck or social media to make a living. You’ve likely seen them on Instagram, at festivals or at small-town art fairs. This occasional series, Through the Lens, will introduce you to some of these artists.
The last time you saw a concert at Red Rocks Amphitheatre, there’s a good chance that live-music artist Keith “Scramble” Campbell was there, painting a 3-by-4-foot abstract acrylic artwork of the very band you came to see.
A fixture at the venue, Campbell has created more than 630 live paintings since his debut there in 2000, when he painted the band Widespread Panic. Immersed in the rhythm of the music, the artist moves with the beat, using his paintbrush like an instrument to capture the vibrant spirit and energy of the performance onto his canvas.
Inspired from a young age by New York graffiti artists Keith Haring and Jean-Michel Basquiat, as well as the Spanish surrealist Salvador Dalí, he found his calling in emulating American speed painter Denny Dent, known for creating large-scale, 8-foot canvases of musicians in just 10 minutes, often at the Cherry Creek Arts Festival. Discovering live music painting, he says, transformed his life and solidified his path as an artist.
“It seems easier to tell you which artists I haven’t painted versus the ones that I have,” he said recently. “I’ve painted over 1,000 live shows and 4,000 canvases in my career. It is a lifetime of going to shows all over the world. It isn’t just Red Rocks. If it’s live music, I will paint it.”
Q: Where does your name come from?
A: I was a speed roller skater in the 1970s and ’80s. I had a friend who called me Scramble because of the way I scrambled around the rink. Early on, I was heavily influenced by artists Andy Warhol, Bob Ross, LeRoy Neiman and Dalí. When I decided to make art my career, I felt like all of the influences from these artists were like an alphabet soup of names, a scramble of influences on me. I decided that Scramble would be a fitting name for me. (I also felt that it sounded a lot more creative than Keith and it rhymed with Campbell.)
Q: Could you give us a brief history of how you became an artist?
A: When I was in the seventh grade, I wanted to quit school because I knew I wanted to be an artist. My mother luckily convinced me it was wise to stay in school.
In the late ’80s, New York City was deep in the rave culture and the graffiti scene with rising artists like Haring, Warhol and Basquiat. They showed their work through nightclubs and public art. They were doing paintings on walls, in the subways and on the streets directly bringing art to the people. I was entranced by their work.
In 1991, I answered an ad looking for a visual artist to paint live during a music festival. The man who placed the ad was Perry Farrell, of Jane’s Addiction. The music festival was Lollapalooza.
When I got the job, it felt like the beginning of my career. I had had so many rejections over the years of trying to get into galleries and art shows. It was when I made the crossover from the art world into the music world that I really discovered my path as an artist.
Live-music painter Keith “Scramble” Campbell looks through some of his archives in his studio at his home in Wheat Ridge on July 24, 2024. (Photo by Helen H. Richardson/The Denver Post)
Throughout the ’90s, I did music festivals such as the New Orleans Jazz Festival, Lollapalooza, the HOARD festival, Bonnaroo, Woodstock ’94, the Lilith Fair and even the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta. I have painted Widespread Panic 170 times.
Q: What kind of artist are you?
A: At heart, I am really a musician with a paintbrush. My instruments are my canvases, paintbrushes and paints.
Acrylic paints are the medium of choice for live-music artist Keith “Scramble” Campbell. Here, he paints during a Tedeschi Trucks Band show at Red Rocks in Morrison on July 26, 2024. (Photo by Helen H. Richardson/The Denver Post)
I like to think of myself as a conduit of music, transcribing their energy and their music into a dance on canvas.
As a live artist, my paintings reflect the concert. I let the music and the environment dictate how I paint. If it’s windy and the music is hardcore, my paintings will reflect that. I’ll paint fast and furiously, the work looking abstract and impressionistic. I dance and move with the music as I paint. If there is a slower song in between, that is the time I take to fill in the details. The musicians, the weather, the people all play a role in the painting I create. I am trying to tell a story of that night. If it rains or is windy, I add that in my paintings. If there is a rainbow I will put that in there. I am capturing the entire night into one canvas.
Q: What kind of music do you like to paint to, and do you specifically stay within a specific genre?
A: I don’t stick to any one genre. I have painted over 1,000 different bands and 4,000 canvases that include jam bands like Widespread Panic and Leftover Salmon to up-and-coming Christian rock bands. Next month, I’ll be painting King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, an Australian rock band. I’ve had the opportunity to paint jazz legends Fats Domino, B.B. King, Chuck Berry, Little Richard and Jerry Lee Lewis. I’ve painted Pete Seeger, Bob Dylan, Prince and other legends like Diana Ross, Melissa Etheridge, Carlos Santana, Blues Traveler, Lady Gaga with Tony Bennett, Johnny Winter and Tom Petty.
It seems easier to tell you which artists I haven’t painted versus the ones that I have.
Live music artist Keith “Scramble” Campbell, right, gets inundated with requests for selfies with fans while he paints during a recent Tedeschi Trucks Band show at Red Rocks in Morrison on July 26, 2024. (Photo by Helen H. Richardson/The Denver Post)
Q: How did you end up becoming what seems like the artist-in-residence at Red Rocks?
A: After a show in Florida, Todd Nance, the drummer for Widespread Panic, traded a summer tour pass for a painting I had done of the band. I ended up at my first Red Rocks show where the band played in June 2000. It was love at first sight when I did that show.
Since then, I have done over 630 paintings at Red Rocks. I buy my own tickets and pay for every single concert that I go to. Red Rocks does not pay me to be there but they do allow me the space in which to paint.
Live music artist Keith “Scramble” Campbell starts painting Margo Price, the warm-up act to Tedeschi Trucks Band at Red Rocks in Morrison on July 26, 2024. (Photo by Helen H. Richardson/The Denver Post)
Q: Do you remember the first piece of art you ever got paid for?
A: It was 1987 at one of my first group shows at a shopping mall where I sold a drawing of Joey Ramone. It was a studio piece before I was a live-music artist. I guess I have always been a music artist. even from the start.
Live music artist Keith “Scramble” Campbell paints musician Margo Price, the warm-up act to Tedeschi Trucks Band, as she performs at Red Rocks in Morrison on July 26, 2024. (Photo by Helen H. Richardson/The Denver Post)
Q: Where can we see your art?
A: On my website (scramblecampbell.com), but I invite people to come see me live at Row 23 at Red Rocks. I also have small paintings, postcards, magnets and other items for sale at the Red Rocks Trading Post.
Q: Do you have a favorite art piece?
A: I did a painting of Lou Reed in 1998 in Bethel, N.Y., on the original Woodstock grounds for the 29th anniversary of the original Woodstock. I got to talk to him and meet him afterwards and he signed the back of my painting. There are also paintings I’ve done of legendary musicians, like B.B. King and Fats Domino, who have since died. All of these paintings I love and will never sell.
Q: What memorable responses have you had to your work?
A: I showed David Crosby a painting I had just done of him and he said, “Not bad for speed painting.” Another time when I showed my painting to James Brown, he said, “Son, I’d like to thank you for coming out and painting my portrait.” He signed the entire back of the painting and said “I feel good. James Brown.”
Live music artist Keith “Scramble” Campbell paints during the Tedeschi Trucks Band performance at Red Rocks in Morrison on July 26, 2024. (Photo by Helen H. Richardson/The Denver Post)Live music artist Keith “Scramble” Campbell paints during the Tedeschi Trucks Band show at Red Rocks in Morrison on July 26, 2024. (Photo by Helen H. Richardson/The Denver Post)
Q: What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever been given?
A: In my mid-20s, I wrote a letter to well-known graffiti artist Keith Haring asking for advice. He was a big influence for me back then. He actually wrote me back and said: “I’m not good at giving advice. All I can say is do what you want to do and find a way to do it as much as you want to. There is no ’answer’ that is the same for everyone. You have to find your own direction.” I’ve followed that advice ever since.
Q: What advice would you offer to beginning artists?
A: Try to make your own way and make your own art. Don’t do art for somebody else, do it for yourself.
Q: Describe your dream project.
A: Next season is my 25th at Red Rocks. I’d really like to do a book that talks more about my experiences at the hundreds of concerts and of the thousands of artists I have painted. I feel like I already have the book illustrated with my paintings. It just hasn’t been written down yet. There are so many stories that go along with the artists that I have painted. I want to be able to tell those stories. It’s 25 years of jazz fest, 25 years of Red Rocks, 35 years of live painting. I’d like to tell those stories.
Denver International Airport is gearing up for a record number of Memorial Day weekend passengers, meaning travelers can expect a busy trip and long waits, airport officials said Tuesday.
Between Thursday and Tuesday, airport officials expect nearly 450,000 passengers to pass through Transportation Security Administration checkpoints, according to a news release from DIA. This is a 9% increase from the same holiday travel period last year.
Thursday and Friday alone will each see more than 80,000 travelers moving through TSA screening areas, with additional foot traffic coming in from flight connections inside the airport, DIA officials said.
Airport officials said holiday travelers should arrive inside the airport at least two hours before their scheduled boarding time and should have plans for parking and making it through security checkpoints.
Those committed to parking on-site should avoid the Pike Peaks lot due to construction and park at the Landslide parking lot — 6975 Valley Head Street.
The Pikes Peak and Longs Peak shuttle parking lots will close on Friday at 3 a.m. and re-open by 5 p.m., according to Tuesday’s release. The Landslide lot will be open for overflow parking at 3 a.m. Friday and will remain open until full.
Regular shuttle service will be available from all parking lots to and from the airport terminal.
TSA Security Checkpoints
DIA’s South Security Checkpoint — located on level five at the south end of the terminal — is open from 3 a.m. to 1 a.m. the next morning and is the primary checkpoint for travelers who need standard screening.
South Security has four TSA PreCheck lanes open from 4 a.m. to 7:45 p.m., but PreCheck passengers traveling after 8 p.m. may use South Security and receive a form of expedited screening, officials said Tuesday.
One CLEAR lane is available for standard screening at the South Security Checkpoint, but passengers with both PreCheck and CLEAR must use the dual-service lane at West Security.
The West Security Checkpoint — located on level six at the northwest corner of the terminal — is open from 4 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. and is the primary checkpoint for TSA PreCheck travelers.
Passengers with standard screening at this checkpoint should enter through West Security 1, and passengers with reservations for DEN RESERVE should enter at West Security 2.
Finally, A-Bridge Security is open for standard screening between 4:30 a.m. and 5:45 p.m., officials said Tuesday.
The bridge has a limited number of lanes dedicated for travelers requiring standard screening and is not available for TSA PreCheck.
Real-time security wait times and parking availability can be found online at FlyDenver.com.
The body of a 3-year-old boy with special needs who was reported missing Saturday morning from Rocky Ford was found in a canal, according to the Colorado Bureau of Investigation.
Officials searched the Catlin irrigation canal, which runs directly behind the child’s home, on foot. Amari’s body was found in the canal several miles downstream from his home around 5 p.m. Sunday, according to an update.
Warm, sunny weather will shine over Denver Thursday as the last of Wednesday’s storm rolls out, according to the National Weather Service.
Denver residents should enjoy time outdoors with plenty of sunshine and light wind Thursday and Friday before a new set of thunderstorms hits the city this weekend, NWS forecasters said.
Temperatures in the metro area will reach the upper-70s Thursday before dipping down to 50 degrees overnight, forecasters said. Friday could bring highs around 85 degrees.
Calm winds between 5 mph and 8 mph will drift through the metro area in the afternoon, according to NWS forecasters.
Starting Saturday afternoon, a new wave of rain showers and thunderstorms could pour over Denver, with the largest chance of weekend rain falling between noon and midnight Saturday, forecasters said.
Thunderstorms and rain showers could roll through the metro area through early next week. The NWS forecasters project chances of afternoon and evening storms Monday through Wednesday.
Starting Friday, elevated fire weather conditions could spark red flag warnings for the eastern plains due to warm temperatures, low relative humidity and increased winds in the area, according to a NWS hazardous weather outlook.
Monday will be mostly sunny across northeast and north central Colorado with isolated and scattered showers and thunderstorms in the foothills and mountains later in the day.
Yesterday’s rain may continue in the Denver metro area this afternoon with a 20% chance of showers and thunderstorms after 3 p.m. and a high of 72 degrees. Tonight will be mostly cloudy with a low of 49 degrees.
Showers and thunderstorms are expected to return after noon on Tuesday with a 40% chance of precipitation and a high of 77 degrees. Rain may continue Tuesday night, mainly before midnight.
Chance of precipitation on Wednesday rises to 70% with showers and thunderstorms possible in the morning and afternoon and a 40% chance of precipitation before midnight Wednesday night.
Rain and thunderstorms may continue in the Denver metro area throughout the week and into the weekend, according to the NWS.
One of only two Byzantine Catholic congregations in Denver is looking to upgrade.
Holy Protection of the Mother of God has listed its existing church building at 1201 S. Elizabeth St. with an asking price of $1.1 million.
That’s $435 a square foot for the 2,600-square-foot structure, which listing agent Matt Harper said a buyer could use as a day care or residence.
“It’s a very interesting architectural building,” Harper said. “It’s surrounded by nothing but residential. It’s a really unique area.”
Harper, of Madison Commercial Properties, is also helping Holy Protection find a new home. He said the congregation has grown in recent years and would like to get something in the range of 6,000 to 10,000 square feet.
“It’s a tough project to do sometimes,” Harper said. “There’s not a whole lot of inventory of churches on the market, and if there are, they are really large or small. It’s tough to find.”
The church’s existing three-story building sits on the edge of the Belacro and Cory-Merrill neighborhoods and includes three office-like rooms, two bathrooms, a main hall where services are held and a small mezzanine on the third floor. The building dates to 1943, per the listing.
Harper said he’s already toured other faith-based groups and someone looking to convert the space into a yoga studio.
Byzantine Catholics have the same beliefs as other Catholics, but follow the traditions of the Eastern Catholic Church instead of the Western Catholic Church, which most American congregations align with. For example, Eastern Catholic services tend to be longer and involve repetition in prayers, and churches usually have many icons, or pictures, throughout.
Holy Protection is a parish under the Arizona-based Byzantine Catholic Eparchy of Phoenix, according to its website. It was established in Denver in the 1970s and has operated at its current site since at least the early 2000s.
Holy Protection is one of two Byzantine Catholic churches in Denver, according to the Archdiocese of Denver.
This story was reported by our partner BusinessDen.
NEW YORK (AP) — As Donald Trump’s social media company begins trading publicly Tuesday, would-be investors might ask themselves if the stock is too pricey and potentially too volatile.
Trump Media & Technology Group Corp. was acquired Monday by a blank-check company called Digital World Acquisition Corp. Trump Media, which runs the social media platform Truth Social, now takes Digital World’s place on the Nasdaq stock exchange.
Trump Media debuts with a stock price near $50 and a market value of about $6.8 billion, and will begin trading under the ticker symbol “DJT.” Many of Digital World’s investors were small-time investors either trying to support Trump or aiming to cash in on the mania, instead of big institutional and professional investors. Those shareholders helped the stock more than double this year in anticipation of the merger going through.
They’re betting on a company that has yet to turn a profit. Trump Media lost $49 million in the first nine months of last year, when it brought in just $3.4 million in revenue and had to pay $37.7 million in interest expenses. In a recent regulatory filing, the company cited the high rate of failure for new social media platforms, as well as the company’s expectation that it will lose money on its operations “for the foreseeable future” as risks for investors.
Truth Social launched in February 2022, one year after Trump was banned from major social platforms including Facebook and X, formerly Twitter, following the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. He’s since been reinstated to both but has stuck with Truth Social.
On Monday, Trump appeared in court in New York at hearing for a criminal case involving hush money payments made to cover up claims of marital infidelity. Afterwards, Trump told reporters that “Truth Social is doing very well. It’s hot as a pistol and doing great.”
However, Trump Media has yet to disclose Truth Social’s user numbers — although that should change now that the company is public. Research firm Similarweb estimates that Truth Social had roughly 5 million active mobile and web users in February. That’s far below TikTok’s more than 2 billion and Facebook’s 3 billion — but still higher than other “alt-tech” rivals like Parler, which has been offline for nearly a year but is planning a comeback, or Gettr, which had less than 2 million visitors in February.
Besides competition in the social media field, Trump Media faces other risks — including to some degree Trump, who will have a nearly 60% ownership stake in the company.
Trump Media, which is based in Palm Beach, Florida, said in a regulatory filing that it “is highly dependent on the popularity and presence of President Trump.” If the former president were to limit or discontinue his relationship with the company for any reason, including due to his campaign to regain the presidency, the company “would be significantly disadvantaged.”
Acknowledging Trump’s involvement in numerous legal proceedings, the company noted that “an adverse outcome in one or more” of the cases could negatively affect Trump Media and Truth Social.
Another risk, the company said, was that as a controlling stockholder, Trump would be entitled to vote his shares in his own interest, which may not always be in the interests of all the shareholders generally.
If recent trading activity is any indication, investors could be in for a bumpy ride. Digital World shares more than doubled this year ahead of a shareholder vote on the merger with Trump Media. After the vote Friday, shares dropped almost 14%, but Monday they rebounded strongly with a gain of 35%.
GREENSBORO, N.C. — He’s argued his four criminal indictments and mug shot bolstered his support among Black voters who see him as a victim of discrimination just like them.
He’s compared himself to Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who died in an Arctic prison imprisoned by Vladimir Putin, and suggested that he is a political dissident, too.
And in nearly every public appearance, he repeats falsehoods about the election he lost.
Candidates on the verge of winning their parties’ nominations generally massage their messaging and moderate positions that may energize hardcore primary voters but are less appealing to a broader audience. In political terms, they “pivot.”
Not Donald Trump. The former president is instead doubling down on often-incendiary rhetoric that offends wide swaths of voters, seeming to be doing little to rein in his most irascible and oftentimes self-defeating instincts. That’s even as some of his most loyal allies have suggested he shift his focus and tone down rhetoric that risks offending independent voters and people outside his base.
“Donald Trump is Donald Trump. That’s not going to change,” said senior campaign adviser Chris LaCivita. “Our job is not to remake Donald Trump.”
LaCivita and other top campaign officials instead say their role is to provide the organization “to amplify and to force project” Trump’s message.
The campaign, he said, had already assumed a general election posture before voting began, running ads attacking President Joe Biden before the Iowa caucuses. So while Trump is now talking less about his last remaining GOP rival, former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, his campaign is focused on building out a general election infrastructure as it turns its focus from early voting states to November battlegrounds.
That includes efforts to take over the Republican National Committee, with plans to consolidate the party’s and campaign’s fundraising, political operations, communications and research operations. LaCivita is in line to become the RNC’s chief operating officer while retaining his role on the campaign.
“The campaign’s pivot,” LaCivita said, “is just a realization that we’ve already secured what we need to win. That manifests itself in not only the messaging but the mechanics.” He said to expect “more of the same” after Trump clinches the nomination, which is expected later this month.
Trump’s hardest edges, no matter how familiar to Americans nine years after he first ran for president, produce welcome fodder for Biden’s reelection team, which wants to motivate disaffected Democrats and independent voters by warning about a second Trump term.
Trump’s speeches at rallies can stretch for two hours as he meanders between policy proposals, personal stories and jokes, attacks on his opponents and complaints that he is being persecuted by the courts, and dire warnings about the country’s future. Trump often adds asides that were not in his prepared remarks. But some of his most divisive comments are part of his script.
He has bragged about nominating three Supreme Court justices who voted to end a national right to abortion, even as he urges Republicans not to be too extreme on an issue Democrats have credited for several victories. In promising to carry out the largest deportation operation in U.S. history, he has talked about immigrants “poisoning the blood of our country,” echoing Adolf Hitler. And he once described his enemies as “vermin,” language opponents deride as authoritarian.
At one rally this past weekend, Trump went so far as to cast Biden’s handling of the border as “a conspiracy to overthrow the United States of America.”
“Donald Trump is still Donald Trump — the same extreme, dangerous candidate voters rejected in 2020, and they’ll reject him again this November regardless of the team he has around him,” said Biden spokesman Kevin Munoz.
Trump’s advisers have at times encouraged him to speak less about grievance and retribution and more about his vision for a second term. But after three campaigns for the White House and four years in office, Trump is set in his ways. Former aides learned long ago that trying to pressure Trump to rein in his impulses often only led him to dig in deeper. And his campaign team seems to respect and trust the former president’s political instincts, pointing to his sweep of the GOP primaries so far.
Trump spokesman Steven Cheung said Trump would not change. Americans “deserve a president who will not sugarcoat what’s happening in the world,” he said.
Interviews with Republicans, including Trump supporters and those still backing Haley’s beleaguered bid, reflect concerns that Trump risks fumbling a clear opportunity against Biden, who faces low approval ratings and widespread voter questions about his age and readiness for a second term.
“At some point (Trump) needs to take the spotlight off himself,” said Tom Davis, a former Virginia congressman who backs Haley. Davis noted improving economic indicators but said Biden remains burdened by concerns about inflation and “has been bad on the border” and “terrible on the deficit.”
Even Trump voters seem to recognize the problem: According to AP VoteCast data, about half of Republicans in conservative South Carolina — including about a quarter of Trump’s own supporters — are concerned he is too extreme to win the general election. While Trump dominates among conservative voters, those voters represented just 37% of the electorate in the November 2020 presidential election.
Trump held rallies Saturday in North Carolina and Virginia, two states that hold primaries on Super Tuesday but are also potential swing states in November’s general election.
Both states highlight Trump’s potential problems in November: He dominates among conservatives, especially in rural and small-town America, but struggles with more moderate voters in more urban settings.
North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper, a Democrat who was re-elected in 2020 even as Trump won his state, said he welcomes the contrast between Trump and Biden.
“Do you want a president who wakes up every morning thinking about the American people?” he asked in an interview. “Or do you want a president who wakes up every morning thinking about himself?”
Biden won Virginia in 2020. A year later, Virginians elected Republican Glenn Youngkin as governor. Youngkin emphasized education and economic policy, and attracted urban and suburban moderates who rejected Trump. Some of the states’ suburban and exurban congressional districts have become more favorable to Democrats in the Trump era.
Notably, Youngkin has not endorsed Trump. He declined an interview request through aides.
Former Speaker Newt Gingrich, a Trump ally who sometimes speaks to the former president, compared 2024 to 1980, when Republican Ronald Reagan won a landslide over Democratic incumbent Jimmy Carter, who was saddled with inflation, high unemployment and international conflict. Reagan, dubbed “the happy warrior,” won 44 states and a new Republican Senate with “a positive vision,” Gingrich said, that was about more than Carter’s record.
“When you have the kind of numbers Biden has, what people need is about 70% positive, 30% anti-Biden,” Gingrich said, insisting Trump could usher in a Republican wave like when he beat Hillary Clinton in 2016.
Just as possible, however, is a repeat of 2018, when Republicans lost the House majority, or 2020, when Trump lost and Democrats reclaimed Senate control, or 2022, when Republicans lost winnable Senate races and failed to flip the chamber.
South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham suggests Trump and his campaign should “just keep doing what they’re doing.”
But Graham himself has pivoted. After he ran for president in 2016, Graham vowed that “if we nominate Trump, we will get destroyed.” Now, he is a Trump confidant.
“Everybody that wants to give him advice, he beat like a drum,” Graham said at Trump’s South Carolina victory party.
It can be hard enough for skiers and snowboarders in Colorado to avoid trees, other downhillers, poles, mystery bumps and mashed-potato snow — without also having to worry about running into a moose. But that’s not always possible, as several recent social media videos have shown.
Since the 2023-24 ski season began, there have been at least three major viral moose sightings at Winter Park, one at Steamboat and one at Breckenridge. But that doesn’t include other sightings, and there have been several, that didn’t make it onto Instagram, YouTube, Facebook or TikTok.
Still, representatives of these resorts say the encounters aren’t rising in number.
“I am not aware of any recent moose sightings or encounters at the resort for Breck or Keystone this season,” said Sara Lococo, a spokesperson for Keystone and Breckenridge. “Since we do share the mountains with a variety of local wildlife, including moose, it is always possible that they are around though. It is important for our communities and our visitors to remember that, be aware of their surroundings, and to respect and give space to local wildlife if/when encountered. In the event of a sighting or encounter, we encourage guests to call and report this to ski patrol.”
Maren Franciosi, of Steamboat, said: “Steamboat Resort shares the land with many native species including moose. It is common to see wildlife on the resort and we do frequently see moose during operating hours. We work closely with the USFS and CPW, our ski patrol will close/detour ski trails if needed for moose activity and to limit interactions with guests. It does not seem more than usual this year. We have had some sightings in our new terrain, which was expected.”
Jen Miller, of Winter Park, said: “Feels like normal moose activity. We have several sightings every winter season … Winter Park has had several confirmed moose sightings on its slopes during the past few weeks. Moose call Winter Park home, and they occasionally wander onto open ski trails. We remind guests that moose are wild animals, and guests should keep their distance. If necessary, Winter Park ski patrol will close trails and lifts to help protect both the animals and people.”