The scenario is deeply irritating to Miguel Lopez, who considers Gorman a mentor; he even has a portion of the late advocate’s stays in his possession. Annually, Lopez considers it his unhappy accountability to contact the DPD across the date of Gorman’s homicide and inquire as to the standing of what’s formally thought-about a chilly case — and as soon as once more, he says, the detective with whom he spoke mentioned the scenario stays unchanged.
A Denver police spokesperson pushes again on this assertion: “To say ‘no progress has been made’ is inaccurate. Due to the case being open, we’re restricted in what will be launched, however we are able to say that whereas there has not been an arrest, DPD continues to research the murder of Mr. Gorman.”
As William Breathes reported in a Westword story published five years after the slaying, Gorman was a Denver native who grew to become lively within the marijuana group throughout the early Nineties. He overtly marketed for marijuana on Westword‘s again web page and recurrently staged political occasions on the State Capitol — a convention that fellow hashish activists continued in his honor after he was killed.
“Gorman helped pioneer the caregiver system after voters authorised medical marijuana in Colorado in 2000,” Breathes famous. “A caregiver himself, Gorman was recognized for his devotion to medical marijuana and serving to sufferers. However he by no means overlooked full legalization for everybody.”
Then got here the occasions of 2007, detailed in a feature article by onetime Westword contributor J. David McSwane. Gorman’s residence, on the 1000 block of South Decatur Avenue, had already been robbed a number of occasions — crimes that grew to become the main focus of a CBS4 investigation — when unknown people broke in once more on February 17. Though Gorman had bought a shotgun to guard himself, he could not get to the weapon in time. The intruders shot him to demise and cut up, forsaking few clues and loads of questions. As an illustration, in the event that they supposed to steal from Gorman but once more, why did they go away behind stacks of money and baggage of hashish?
The detective who spoke with Lopez this week touted a $500,000 grant announced by the Denver District Lawyer’s Workplace in October 2019; on the time, the funds have been mentioned to “allow the Denver Police Division, its Crime Lab and the Denver District Lawyer’s Workplace to advance work in direction of fixing 72 violent crime chilly instances.”
Just like the standing of the case, the way forward for Denver 420’s rally is unsure. After Gorman’s passing, Lopez ran the event through 2017, when a controversy over cleanup led the town to grant a permit to another group. Then the COVID-19 pandemic prevented the rally from happening in 2020 and 2021. Final 12 months, Lopez talked to Westword about possibly bringing the gathering back to its grassroots beginnings, however he lately confirmed that no concrete plans are in place.
In the meantime, the web site for the Flyhi 420 Festival lists an April 20, 2022, occasion at Civic Middle Park; we have reached out to the organizers for particulars. There’s additionally what’s dubbed the Official 420 Rally website, which presently boasts a banner dated 2022. In any other case, the positioning’s content material is years outdated — together with a history section that nods to Gorman. It reads: “The 420 Rally seeks to hold on the custom set by Governor Pothead Ken Gorman. When you embrace the early years when he started what’s now the biggest gathering and most prolific gathering of people who smoke on the earth, the Denver 420 Rally has been main the march for hashish freedom for over twenty years. Ken was fatally attacked in his residence in February 2007, and the case stays unsolved to at the present time. We is not going to neglect his braveness or his sacrifice. Thanks Ken, we march on to teach and unfold the phrase of hashish evolution worldwide!”
If in case you have any details about the homicide of Ken Gorman, contact Metro Denver Crime Stoppers at 720-913-STOP (7867). Click on to see the Ken Gorman page on the Denver Police Division’s online cold-case section, and study extra about Gorman on the kengorman.org tribute website.
