Prom nightmare

Aspen Daily News Staff Report
As the hour inched toward midnight at Belly Up Aspen’s campy “’80s Prom Night” Saturday, not everyone was making out and slow dancing to Poison’s “Every Rose Has Its Thorn” on the club’s sunken dance floor.

Police say that owner Michael Goldberg and patron Daniel Wettstein had taken it outside and were in a “heated argument” on Galena Street when they arrived. When police told Wettstein, 23, to step away from the fight, he allegedly clenched his fists and charged toward an Aspen police officer. He was arrested and cited for disorderly conduct.

Deputies respond to suicide

Aspen Daily News Staff Report
Pitkin County sheriff’s deputies responded to an apparent suicide in Crystal River Estates south of Carbondale on Thursday night.

Pitkin County Patrol Director Mario Strobl said dispatch received a call at 6:56 p.m. that a 56-year-old man had apparently killed himself. The man was pronounced dead at the scene.

Update: Basalt crash injures three, kills dog

Aspen Daily News Staff Report

Accident one of two on Two Rivers Road in 24-hour period

A two-vehicle collision late Thursday night seriously injured three people and temporarily shut down the western leg of Two Rivers Road in Basalt.

When police arrived, they found a Latino man lying on the ground and a white man and woman trapped inside a mangled black Jeep Cherokee, which was allegedly hit head-on by the Latino man in the Chevy Blazer.

UPDATE: Plane crash kills C’dale pilot

by Lynn Burton and Catherine Lutz

Carbondale resident Barry Maggert died piloting his single-engine plane after it crashed near Black Hawk on Thursday afternoon.

The Gilpin County Sheriff’s Office reported the fatality and an injured passenger as a result of the crash, which occurred in a mountainous, wooded area at approximately 10,300 feet.

The 1965 Cessna 182 is co-owned by Maggert and Carroll Winkler of Glenwood Springs, who said that Maggert was piloting the plane and was on his way to his son’s college graduation in Boulder.

Winkler said Maggert had been a pilot for “a fair amount of time,” and was instrument rated and “a good pilot.”

Subcontractor at Residences at Little Nell sued for alleged trafficking

by Catherine Lutz, Aspen Daily News Staff Writer

 A Texas company accused of human trafficking in a federal lawsuit has been working as a subcontractor on the Residences at Little Nell construction project in Aspen.

Leno and Company, which is registered as an LLC in Denton, Texas, has been operating as a labor broker at several construction sites in Colorado, according to a carpenters’ union representative, despite the fact that it is not registered to do business in the state of Colorado.

Frommer buys time, lawyer

by Andrew Travers, Aspen Daily News Staff Writer

Less than three weeks before the start of his Aspen trial on 30 fraud-related charges, alleged scam artist Peter Frommer has gotten some breathing room — and, he says, a new lawyer.

At an all-day hearing yesterday, Judge James Boyd agreed to postpone Frommer’s May 27 trial date. Frommer’s current lawyer, public defender Garth McCarty, said Frommer had reached an agreement with a private defense lawyer who would represent him only if given enough time to prepare for the trial. That means no trial on May 27, no trial this summer, and probably no trial until October or November.

Surf legend appears in Carbondale for film fest

by Brent Gardner-Smith, Aspen Daily News Staff Writer

Mr. Pipeline is dropping into Carbondale.

Gerry Lopez, who dominated the premiere surf break on Oahu’s North Shore in the 1970s with his elegant tube riding, will appear in the Roaring Fork Valley for the first time during the Five Point Film Festival, which started yesterday in Carbondale.

A Picture’s Worth

by Damien Williamson, Time Out Staff Writer

It is quite peculiar that a place like the Roaring Fork Valley — which serves as a playground for some of the most extreme sports and world-class athletes, from World Cup ski racing to X Games, intrepid mountain biking terrain to über-technical rock climbing, envied Gold Medal-water fishing and even unparalleled hiking trails — would lack a film festival specifically designed to showcase such talent.

At least that’s the way it seemed to Carbondale’s 5Point Film Festival Founder Julie Kennedy.

Flash of the Titans

by Jason Hood, Time Out Music Columnist

Like some beguiling, Bronx-bred and wind-driven Ponce de Leon, he set sail into uncharted territory. The land he stumbled upon was dingy and rank with the sweat of the restless. It was at once beautiful and decadent. It was bursting at its ripe underbelly with energy and soul. It was the Garden of Eden and the Book of Revelations. It was an unnamed oasis soon to be christened Hip-Hop.

This virgin continent needed a worthy leader. Indeed, it needed a King, a Pharaoh, a President. It needed a Grandmaster. This land called Hip-Hop needed Grandmaster Flash. The renegade explorer had finally found his ground.

Cleaning Out Your Closets

by Giovanna Dirusso, Time Out Fashion Columnist
Now that is May, and though it doesn’t quite feel like the middle of spring given the continuous cold temperatures and intermittent blizzard conditions, it is time to think about cleaning out your wardrobe, and purge it of those clothes clinging to the recesses of your closets, as they whisper, “I’ll be back.”

If you are anything like me, I’m always afraid that a few months after giving away that vintage Anne Klein suit, Ralph Lauren skirt or whatever, I’m going to bolt up in the middle of the night in a hot sweat (no, not menopause), and whimper, “Say it isn’t so! Don’t tell me I really gave away that classic camel hair coat dress now that it is in perfect style!”

Wine n' dine: Steak and Asparagus

by Dava Parr, Time Out Chef-at-Large
Spring weather! What a treat, huh? Snow, rain, sun, wind, hmmmm. I guess we had better hold off on planting up that vegetable bed for another week or so. I am still contemplating a quick trip to perma-warm Mexico, so it is just as well I can’t don those kneepads and rubber boots just yet.

It is a little difficult planning spring menus in the Rocky Mountains. The safest bet right now, vegetable-wise, is asparagus. Those hearty little rhizomes will grow out of any condition when spring tells them to rise. We have been eating them fresh from the picking for a couple of weeks now and we should see them well into June with luck.

‘Speed Racer’ Just Spinning its Wheels

by Christy Lemire, AP Movie Critic
★

The Wachowski brothers have tumbled into a matrix of their own with “Speed Racer,” one which has rendered them completely out of touch with the outside world.

Four Stories and a Beautiful, Quiet Wine Life in the West Elks

by Drew Stofflet, Time Out Wine Critic

On a shimmering, sunny day earlier this week I traveled west over McClure Pass toward Paonia, to the North Fork Valley, for a meeting with West Elk area winemakers to tour their vineyards and wineries, to taste their wines and to hear their stories.

Through my assistance at the Woody Creek Winery for the past few seasons, and through tasting some of the area’s wines, I already had a lay of the land and a sense of things. I’ve heard that before the Great Depression, the North Fork Valley had the highest concentration of grapevines in the world. And I have heard that there are 135-year-old Portuguese vines growing on hillsides somewhere. But this tour put things into a much clearer picture. I was able to see the continuity and community that the area winemakers share. They all have an attachment to storied properties with stunning views. It is quiet. And they have small, modern wineries that produce wines to match that spirit.

Book review: ‘Spycraft: The Secret History of the CIA’s Spytechs From Communism to Al-Qaeda’

Aspen Daily News Staff Report

by Robert Wallace, H. Keith Melton, Henry R. Schlesinger

Review By CARL HARTMAN, AP Book Critic

Editor’s Pick: One Last Kiss

Aspen Daily News Staff Report

How to fake a green thumb

by Kristine Crandall, Aspen Daily News Columnist
Official ski season has come to a close, meaning it is now time to put the finely woven designer parka and pants in storage, along with the cutesy-named shaped skis embossed with orange flames. Image is as embroidered into Aspen’s culture as the glittering gold on the parka. Sometimes image matches ability on the slopes, or it may serve primarily for après-ski success, or both. But now that the oh-so-important cell-phone conversations on the mountain to arrange social encounters have dried up, what’s one to do?

One obvious alternative is to get tricked out in Jackson Pollock-inspired lycra for the coast down to the Woody Creek Tavern on the newest carbon fiber bike. Another is displaying ounces of jewelry while walking up Smuggler with several designer dogs in tow, absorbed in iPod-land (the jewelry and music must somehow enhance the experience of walking uphill in the outdoors, I’m just not sure how).

The U.S. war on journalists

by Amy Goodman
Sami al-Haj is a free man today, after having been imprisoned by the U.S. military for more than six years. His crime: Journalism.

Targeting journalists, the Bush administration has engaged in direct assault, intimidation, imprisonment and information blackouts to limit the ability of journalists to do their jobs. The principal target these past seven years has been Al-Jazeera, the Arabic television network based in Doha, Qatar.

Throttle down in town

Aspen Daily News Staff Report
Editor:

In Response to the article “Aspen set to approve motorcycle noise campaign” (April 25): Located in Glenwood Springs, Aspen Valley Harley-Davidson is the local Harley-Davidson dealership for all of the Roaring Fork Valley.

Cutting taxes increases revenues

Aspen Daily News Staff Report
Editor:

I agree with Andrew Davis (his article on reducing taxes) that government spending must also be reduced. However, if McCain is elected president and reduces taxes, history has shown that such a move actually increases tax revenue dollars. Even President Kennedy had that figured out in the early 1960s.

Fox News distorts

Aspen Daily News Staff Report
Editor:

Fox (lying) News and its right-wing reporters, starting with Bill O’Reilly and ending with hate and distortions, commends McCain and trashes the Democrats. They have the gall to call their reporting “fair and balanced.”

Wright’s right on

Aspen Daily News Staff Report
Editor:

It has been interesting to watch the unfolding story of Barack Obama and his pastor of 20 years, Jeremiah Wright. Here are two men doing their jobs and demonstrating that we are far from “one nation under God.”