Dora Vellutino Piccoli, who died Sunday at age 87, was a lifelong Republican and chaired the state’s Anti-Discrimination Commission when allegations of Denver police brutality made headlines in the 1960s.
In May 1964, Piccoli led a hearing in which 17 Latinos and three African-Americans listed incidents during which Denver police officers mistreated them, sometimes without provocation.
The 20 witnesses came forward as a Denver County grand jury was investigating charges of corruption and savagery within the Denver Police Department. The inquiry resulted in a massive housecleaning that shook the department, leaving a residual resentment that still lingers.
Born Dec. 20, 1917, in Deferiat, N.Y., she grew up in Albany, where she met Joseph Piccoli, her future husband, a Navy serviceman stationed nearby. After living in Albany for a few years, the Piccolis moved to Durango, where their second child was born.
Dora Piccoli became a working mom, beginning her career as a legal secretary for a Durango law firm.
She left to join a company that became Marathon Oil. Then Getty Oil hired Piccoli as its legal land secretary and took her along when Getty relocated to Houston in the late 1960s.
Shortly after transferring to Texas, Piccoli suffered a cerebral hemorrhage, and after recuperating she decided to return to Colorado, where she and her husband found a home in Denver.
In Colorado’s political circles, Piccoli established a reputation as a steadfast Republican whose ideology nonetheless appealed to powerful Democrats. In 1961, then- governor Stephen McNichols appointed Piccoli to the Colorado Anti-Discrimination Commission.
She also chaired the state Republican Party and helped propel the successful 1962 gubernatorial campaign of relatively unknown Republican moderate John Love, who reappointed her to the Anti- Discrimination Commission.
Piccoli’s work on the commission included supporting the state’s fair-housing law, despite opposition from some home owners who disputed that law.
One 1966 letter to the editor mocked Piccoli, commenting: “It is nearly incredible that people can become so misinformed (brainwashed) that they will actually applaud the erosion of our basic rights.”
She withstood the insults and continued as chairwoman until Gerald Quait replaced her on the renamed Civil Rights Commission that year.
Piccoli remained active in politics. Among her posts was serving on a personnel commission in Wheat Ridge.
Survivors include her daughter, Dale Csatlos of Arvada; son Bob Piccoli of Durango; sister Olga Lassonde of Albany; brothers Frank Vellutino of Albany and Renato Vellutino of Westchester, N.Y.; five grandchildren; and a great-grandchild. Her husband and one grandchild preceded her in death.
Staff writer Claire Martin can be reached at 303-820-1477 or cmartin@denverpost.com.
