GJ Police Killings: The First 100 years

Grand Junction was just a couple years old when, in 1883, Town Marshal Tim Crowley shot and killed George Lewis, an African-American who the paper painted as a “bad character, drunken and disorderly.”

Crowely’s story and the story of a number of eye-witnesses didn’t match up, according to the August 11th, 1883 Grand Junction News:

“Two colored women, who saw the shooting, testified that the deceased made no resistance, but said he would go with him to jail, but wanted time to make a cigarette; that the officer objected and struck him over the head with his club; that the officer Mr. Crowley, pushed him out of the door, and then began to shoot at him; that Lewis said, “don’t kill me, Tim., I’ll go with you.”

The town was rife with “all kinds of rumors….to the effect that the negro had no weapon…and the marshal shot him to even up an old score.”

Another witness verified much of the two women’s testimony, and still Crowely was cleared of any wrong-doing by the ‘coroner jury.’

In October 1907, Officer Frank Mahaney shot to death Wade Johnson, an African American, in the train yards. Many in town questioned if it was justified. The Daily Sentinel reported that several switchman employed in the train yards threatened that “not a wheel shall turn in the yard until he is discharged.”

Many had good reason not to trust Officer Mahaney. Six years prior, Mahaney while working as a Game Warden, shot and killed W.A Womack for fishing on private property. Mahaney avoided a lynching by an angry mob and was sentenced to eight years in the penitentiary. (The shooting and the Grand Mesa Riot it sparked, will be its own story.) After an early release from prison for murder, he was hired as an Officer in Grand Junction at the Union Station.

Two days after the killing of Wade Johnson, Frank Mahaney was arrested and charged with murder (again). “This morning T. P. Langdon, well-known local colored man, swore out a warrant against Frank D. Mahaney…charging…malicious and willful murder of Johnson. But a few weeks later Judge Sweeny dismisses for lack of evidence and Frank went back to work policing the Union Station, and the rail yards.

In 1925, Grand Junction was gripped by a KKK power grab that saw Klan influence extend from the Governor right down to the chief of the Grand Junction police department. At the time it was said that one had to be a member of the KKK to even apply. August 2nd,1925, a newly hired (read Klansman) police officer W.C. Hardin, shot and killed Manuel Cordova, 28, a long-time resident of Grand Junction, and father of four. The Klan dominated the police and local government and had friends if not members on the bench. Just two days later Hardin was cleared of any wrong-doing.

In 1980, GJPD shot and killed Jimmy Flores in Hawthorn Park. The Sentinel incorrectly reports this as the first police killing in Grand Junction history, but 55 years is a long time. Flores and another man had robbed a 7-11 (yes, GJ use to have a 7-11, why do I feel this is going to be the take-away), and a liquor store. Police contacted the two men in Hawthorn Park. It is disputed what happened next, but the outcome was Jimmy Flores was dead with eight bullets in him. The Sentinel in poor taste put a photo of Jimmy Flores’s dead body on the front page of the paper. Later, and in continuing bad taste the Sentinel ran a story titled “Press-wood box final resting place for shooting victim.” The paper seemed to gloat, that Flores was given a pauper’s burial in the “dry area” of the cemetery.

The Chicano community organized for justice. Phil Lujan at a meeting at the Chicano community center, El Centro in Fruita, said “We already know what the inquest is going to bring out. They’re going to find the two police persons innocent…As far as I am concerned that shooting incident was an outright murder by the police.” Many hard questions were asked at the meeting.

Dave Schumacher, one of the officers involved in shooting Jimmy Flores, had his house repeatedly vandalized. One night people painted his front door blood red. The next night a dead cat was stuffed in his mailbox, and a few days later “Die Killer Pigs” was spray-painted on the wall of his bedroom and the house ransacked.

Schumacher and the other officer were cleared of any and all wrong-doing.