right?”
“Yes, Ma’am. Just past there. Is the Ranger Station manned all the time?”
“I don’t have that information. The female, do you have a name for her?”
“I think she said her name is Denise. I just talked to her briefly this morning. Would it help if I ....”
“Just a minute.”
“Would it help if I met someone at the Divide Road? I’m not that close to it. I probably need to drive five or six miles to get to it.”
“Sir, I’m going to run the vehicle. And is the lady still there?”
“She’s with the body right now.”
“When did this happen? Do you know?”
“Sometime around daylight as far as I know.”
“Daylight this morning?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“So he is dead and we don’t need to worry about getting an ambulance?” The operator seemed unsure of the situation.
“As far as I can tell. I could feel no pulse. His face was blue and all I could see was a couple of contractions of his jaw.”
“Okay, and the plates are Edward George Victor 0-8-2?”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
“Okay, Dodson?”
“I don’t know their name.”
“Okay, okay. Right now, what we’re trying to do is find out where you’re located at. Can you tell me exactly how you got there?”
“We came in from Delta on 50 toward Grand Junction. We turned south on 141 at Whitewater. We came down 141 in Unaweep Canyon and turned on Divide Road forest service access. And that bisects the Uncompahgre Plateau.”
“So do you happen to know if you’re in Mesa County or Delta County?”
“No, ma’am.”
The sound of crinkling paper came through the cell phone earpiece. The Delta County 911 operator was obviously flipping through a book of maps trying to find the hunters’ location. Several minutes passed.
“Okay, sir. We think we’ve confirmed that you are in Mesa County. I’m going to go ahead and notify Grand Junction. Let me put you on hold.”
More time passed while the disappointment of the two men at the delay grew.
The Delta County operator next called State Patrol Dispatch in Grand Junction. They told her this was not a State-Patrol-type situation since it was not a traffic accident. So, she hung up and called the Mesa County Sheriff’s Department main line and they put her through to Mesa County Dispatch.
“This is Mesa County Dispatch. May I help you?”
The Delta County 911 operator still seemed confused. “I have a couple of reports of a man who shot himself. I guess it’s going to be in Mesa County, just past the Coal Springs forest station.”
“Cold Springs ranger station?”
“I guess it’s Coal, C-O-A-L, like a coal mine.”
“Okay.”
“Have you guys heard of this?”
“Not that I’m aware of. We’re not aware of it here.”
“Apparently, a man has shot himself this morning. He is dead. Don’t know how it happened ... if he committed suicide or what. I have the two guys on hold on the other line now. The vehicle comes back to John Bruce Dodson out of Cedaredge. This is apparently the guy who shot himself.”
Do not ask how the 911 operator determined from these conversations that the death was a suicide. In addition, it was “Cold Springs” Ranger Station, not “Coal Springs.” At any rate, she spoke again to Captain Branchwater on George Wright’s cell phone. Captain Branchwater once again offered to meet the responding police officers out on Divide Road. In what seemed a very long delay to the two men trying to do their duties and report a crime, an officer finally came.
Deputy Kevin Patrick, a fit, handsome man in his mid-forties who has an adventurous streak and races stock cars in his spare time, walked up to the two men. Patrick followed Branchwater back to the camps. Once things settled down a bit, Deputy Patrick asked him a few questions, then a few more later and even more later.
Deputy Patrick followed Captain Branchwater in Bruce Dodson’s Bronco to the death scene, where he found a young man with the woman Branchwater called Denise, who appeared to be lending her comfort and support. After enough backup officers arrived so that someone could look after the victim’s wife, Deputy Patrick had the opportunity to take a statement from the genial twenty-five year old whose name was Larry Coller.
Larry told Deputy Patrick that he and his younger brother were visiting from Wisconsin. They had been hunting up on Snipe Mountain that morning and, on their way back to camp after an unsuccessful hunt, they saw a woman heading up a hill toward them. Their truck was headed west and was just up the road about two hundred yards from the turnoff to the campsite when they saw her. When they got closer, they could see that she was out of breath. Her sandals had slipped off her feet and were hanging around her ankles as if she had run right out of them. Larry said, “The lady was hysterical, waving her arms and yelling, ‘My husband’s been shot! My husband’s been shot!’” They stopped, put her into the truck and she showed them the way. After driving a short distance farther west, the distraught woman gestured to a track off the road to the north towards the camps. As they traversed the rough trail and the crest of a small hill, Larry could see the body in the distance. They drove down to get a bit closer.
Larry told the deputy, “The woman and I got out of the truck and my younger brother, Fred, left to find a man who had been talking on a cell phone in a red and white Bronco we had passed down the road.” Larry went on, “When I got to the victim the man was lying kind of on his right side, but face down with his right arm underneath him.” He paused and shook his head. “I felt his wrist and couldn’t find a pulse. The man’s cheeks were white and his ears and forehead were somewhat blue. The eyes were open and the pupils dilated.” Larry said that after he’d finished he just attempted to keep the woman calm, because he knew the man was dead. He tried to make small talk with her to get her mind off her husband. She told him her name was Janice and that she and her husband had separated while hunting that morning. He was hunting the ridge and she was hunting the valley. They had agreed to meet back in camp at 9:30 for breakfast. When she returned to camp and was not joined by her husband, she went looking for him. According to Janice, they had been married for three months and today was their anniversary. Moreover, this was her husband’s first time deer hunting. Larry went on, “I rolled the body over onto its back while checking for a pulse.” He saw Janice replace her husband’s right glove, which was rolled inside out and was right next to the body. He noticed a rifle about four feet from the body that looked as though it were placed there, rather than being dropped. The bolt was open and resting on the ground. There were three spent shell casings in a pile near the rifle. He also noticed a blaze orange vest and hat.
Larry recalled that it was exactly ten on the clock in his truck when he saw the man by the
