By: Colleen Slevin
DENVER (AP) — More than a year before police say Anderson Lee Aldrich killed five people and wounded 17 others at a gay night club in Colorado Springs, Aldrich was arrested on allegations of making a bomb threat that led to the evacuation of about 10 homes.
Aldrich, who uses the pronoun they and is nonbinary according to their attorneys, threatened to harm their own family with a homemade bomb, ammunition and multiple weapons, authorities said at the time. They were booked into jail on suspicion of felony menacing and kidnapping, but the case was later sealed and it’s unclear what became of the charges. There are no public indications that the case led to a conviction.
Officials refuse to speak about what happened, citing the sealing law, which was passed three years ago to help prevent people from having their lives ruined if cases are dismissed and never prosecuted. It was passed as part of a nationwide movement aimed at addressing the “collateral consequences” from people’s run-ins with law enforcement that often make it difficult for them to get jobs or housing.
Amid a flurry of questions about the incident after Aldrich was identified as the suspect in the Nov. 19 shooting at Club Q, District Attorney Michael Allen said during a Nov. 21 news conference that he “hoped at some point in the near future” to share more about the incident, raising expectations that he wanted the information to be made public.
But 11 days later, Allen still hasn’t shed light on the incident and the documents remain sealed despite a petition to make them public submitted by a coalition of media organizations including The Associated Press.
Here is a closer look at what is known about the incident, the records and what is being done to make them public as a grieving community clamors for more information.
https://nationalpost.com/pmn/news-pmn/explainer-what-do-we-know-about-the-colorado-bomb-threat