JANUARY 28, 1997

The Editor
The Rocky Mountain News
Denver, Colorado

To the Editor:

Private investigators can’t avoid the foolish stereotypes – a romantic ex-cop in a trench coat and fedora, a nasty.45 in his belt, with a sappy weakness for a pretty woman in distress; or the unethical ex-cop with a drudge, a camera, and a thriving but sleazy divorce practice, with a sideline in blackmail… and now an amoral, greedy ex-cop with the sense of an ice cube and the sensibility of a hungry hyena.

Caught selling a child’s death-scene photographs to the dark exploiters who’ve turned “news” into a four-letter word, he cries crocodile tears and begs for forgiveness, leaving his accomplice to bear the brunt of the charges meted out by the Boulder Sheriff’s Department.

Brett Sawyer calls himself a private investigator. I’m a private investigator and former investigator for the Denver and Jefferson district attorneys offices. Whatever this guy really is, he’s an insult to even the worst of the stereotypes.

Frankly, if he really believed that The Globe didn’t intend to print the photographs, as he now professes, I’d have to wonder if he’s even smart enough to spell “private investigator.”

And then there is his pal at the photo lab for whom $200 apparently seemed the right price for a bit of work that any normal person would have to believe could only further defile the public perception of this outrageous murder and might even be illegal.

He supposedly thought that Sawyer was working for the family. If that’s true, what does that make of Sawyer’s motives and claims of remorse?

Then there is this: Why is the Boulder coroner’s office sending sensitive, probably critically important crime scene slides to a private lab for reproduction? Because it never had a problem before? Like the community never had a child murdered like this before? And like the police department never had a family of possible suspects hiring lawyers, private investigators, and publicists before? When it comes to law enforcement agencies, lack of imagination ought to be a crime. Actually, given its success in obtaining evidence, maybe The Globe ought to take over the investigation. I understand that they at least have their own photo lab.

Rick Johnson
Rick Johnson & Associates of Colorado, Inc.
303-296-2200
rick@denverpi.com