Aurora – Police searched Saturday for a 2-year-old boy who has third-degree burns on his chest after being burned by an iron, but whose mother refused to seek medical treatment.
“It is not looking good,” Ciarra Ann Elem, 21, wrote about the injury in a letter to her boyfriend, who is in the Arapahoe County jail.
Authorities opened and read the letter and then contacted Denver detectives Friday, said Shannon Lucy, Aurora police spokeswoman. Denver then contacted Aurora police. The boy, named Sahfonie, had not been found by Saturday, Detective Dave Hell mer said.
In the letter postmarked May 14, Elem tells her boyfriend that she did not take the boy to the hospital because she was afraid officials would take the child away from her, Lucy said.
Elem wrote that she was attempting to treat the child herself, but it was not going well.
Anyone with any information on the whereabouts of Sahfonie or Ciarra Elem is asked to contact Hellmer at 303-489-6246.
MESA COUNTY
Man missing in river after raft capsizes
Rescuers searched the Colorado River for a 29-year-old man Saturday evening after his raft capsized near Palisade, authorities said.
Ricky Creuse, a woman and two children were in two rafts when both capsized about 5:30 p.m. near a diversion dam where the water was choppy, said Norma Mestas, spokeswoman for the Mesa County Sheriff’s Office.
She said she did not know whether the rafters were related to one another.
The woman and the two children made it safely to shore, but the man was still clinging to a raft when the woman went to a nearby house to seek help, Mestas said.
The raft was discovered downriver near Palisade High School but the man had not yet been found, she said.
BOULDER
Creek’s flow makes tubing hazardous
The volume of water in Boulder Creek increased five-fold in just the past 10 days, and Boulder officials are urging people to postpone tubing trips until spring runoff is over.
Water started running over the spillway at Barker Dam in Nederland at 7:30 a.m. Friday, and by Saturday afternoon Boulder Creek was running at 320 cubic feet per second at Orodell, said Craig Skeie, water source facilities manager for Boulder.
Skeie said there is nothing unusual about the spillover at Barker, which happens every spring.
“This is the time of year when a lot of people like to start tubing Boulder Creek,” said emergency management coordinator Jerry Tate. “But the high flows pose a real hazard for injury or drowning. We encourage recreational users to wait until July to tube or swim in the creek.”
ASPEN
Independence Pass set to open Thursday
The scenic mountain road over Independence Pass is scheduled to reopen for the summer on Thursday, according to the Colorado Department of Transportation.
Colorado 82, which runs between Twin Lakes and Aspen over the 12,095-foot pass, is closed each winter because of the harsh conditions.
Highway officials anticipate opening the gates Thursday afternoon, in time for the Memorial Day holiday weekend, but they advise that bad weather may force additional closures.
ASPEN
Gas prices set record all over Colorado
Drivers might want to take a trip to the Internet before going out to buy gasoline these days.
Some bigger cities have websites with the latest prices.
Headed to Aspen? You definitely should consider filling up before hitting the resort town.
On Friday, stations in Aspen had prices from $4.07 to $4.09 a gallon for unleaded, a record.
“Every city in Colorado that we surveyed set an all-time record (Friday) for regular unleaded gasoline,” AAA Colorado spokesman Eric Escudero told the Aspen Daily News. “The only exception was Glenwood Springs, which set its all-time high on Thursday.”
Nationally, the price also set a record, $3.129 per gallon, according to the Oil Price Information Service.
DENVER
Probation services adding positions
The Colorado Judicial Branch says it is expanding its probation-services department by about 13 percent with the addition of probation supervisors, officers and administrative staff.
The department expects to add 81 probation officers, 12 probation supervisors and 18 support positions by the end of the summer.
Information about applying for the jobs can be found in the employment section of the judicial branch’s website: www.courts.state.co.us.
MORRISON
Killers at Red Rocks reset for Sept. 4
A concert at Red Rocks Amphitheatre by The Killers has been rescheduled for Sept. 4, promoter Don Strasburg of AEG Live said Friday, a day after frontman Brandon Flowers lost his voice and left the stage after two songs.
A statement from Universal Music Group, parent company of the group’s record label, said Flowers was recovering from bronchitis and took to the stage against the advice of his personal doctor.
