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By John C. Ensslin
Denver Rocky Mountain News Staff Writer
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| Three crosses stand along the South Platte River downtown. The crosses bear the names of three homeless men who were beaten to death: Kenneth Rapp Jr., Melvin Washington and Milo Harris. |
Harris. Washington. Rapp. The crosses bear the names of three homeless men murdered in September, some not far from this makeshift memorial.
The cross maker stopped at three. The killers kept on going. Now seven men are dead.
The murders have added an extra layer of fear to the lives of Denver's homeless people, especially the 150 or so who refuse to use any of the shelters.
During the last three weeks, the Denver Rocky Mountain News has talked to some of the people who choose -- despite all the hardships and danger -- to sleep on steam grates and wood pallets, forgoing even the rough comforts of a shelter overflow cot.
For many of them, mental illness or addiction, usually to alcohol, are the controlling factors in their choice to be homeless, said John Parvensky of the Colorado Coalition for the Homeless.
"If you're hearing voices, being in a room with 200 other people is just intolerable," Parvensky says. "It's hard to call it a real choice when they're listening to voices or trying to escape personal demons."
So they choose to live in fear.
Some, like Don Gonzales, have grown defiant about their choice.
Gonzales wants nothing of the $100,000 reward offered for the killers' conviction. The 40-year-old homeless man with the thick brush moustache pauses from pushing his shopping cart along Larimer Street.
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| Don Gonzalez, 40, takes a break from pushing his grocery cart along Larimer Street, trying to sell a shovel he found. He has lived on the streets for six years. |
With a sly grin, he opens his wallet to reveal a dollar bill with "$100,000" taped over the corners.
"I don't want the money," Gonzales says. "I want his head."
His shopping cart contains all his possessions: a boom box, some New Age compact discs and a shovel.
He'll sell you the shovel for $3. But he's not sure if he should let it go.
"I'd rather keep it because if this guy is still out there, I'll have to use it on him," he says. "I don't want to hurt somebody, but if he keeps killing people, I'll have to do it."
November 28, 1999
