Victims of stalking become hyper-vigilant…they never know when or where their stalker will strike.  They know evil never rests – exhaustion from lack of sleep becomes the norm.  Wikipedia says, “Hypervigilance is an enhanced state of sensory sensitivity accompanied by an exaggerated intensity of behaviors whose purpose is to detect threats. Hyper-vigilance is also accompanied by a state of increased anxiety which can cause exhaustion.”

Morgan, Steve and I were all victims of stalking in Colorado – it was a gang stalking – it involved more than one person.  Morgan was killed during the active investigation into that felony stalking case.  Colorado understands how dangerous and pervasive stalking is – here is the Colorado Legislative declaration:

C.R.S. 18-3-601. [Formerly 18-9-111 (4) (a)] Legislative declaration. (2010)
(1)  The general assembly hereby finds and declares that:

 (a)  Stalking is a serious problem in this state and nationwide;

(b)  Although stalking often involves persons who have had an intimate relationship with one another, it can also involve persons who have little or no past relationship;

(c)  A stalker will often maintain strong, unshakable, and irrational emotional feelings for his or her victim, and may likewise believe that the victim either returns these feelings of affection or will do so if the stalker is persistent enough. Further, the stalker often maintains this belief, despite a trivial or nonexistent basis for it and despite rejection, lack of reciprocation, efforts to restrict or avoid the stalker, and other facts that conflict with this belief.

(d)  A stalker may also develop jealousy and animosity for persons who are in relationships with the victim, including family members, employers and co-workers, and friends, perceiving them as obstacles or as threats to the stalker’s own “relationship” with the victim;

(e)  Because stalking involves highly inappropriate intensity, persistence, and possessiveness, it entails great unpredictability and creates great stress and fear for the victim;

(f)  Stalking involves severe intrusions on the victim’s personal privacy and autonomy, with an immediate and long-lasting impact on quality of life as well as risks to security and safety of the victim and persons close to the victim, even in the absence of express threats of physical harm.

(2)  The general assembly hereby recognizes the seriousness posed by stalking and adopts the provisions of this part 6 with the goal of encouraging and authorizing effective intervention before stalking can escalate into behavior that has even more serious consequences.

Notice, Colorado encourages and authorizes effective intervention before stalking can escalate, as it did in our case.  From the very beginning of the stalking, until 4 months later when Morgan was murdered, the stalker(s) were continually ratcheting it up.  They “got off” watching the sheriffs show up with their flashlights to look on the ground – it caused the stalker(s) to set off more alarms, more motion lights, more impacts against the windows.  Morgan was murdered just 2 nights after Det. Glassmire told us he believed the stalking was going to “escalate” and he would be assigning more directed patrols of our home.  Our daughter ended up dead 2 nights later, and Garfield County Sheriff Lou Vallario has the nerve to go on camera, almost 9 months after her death, and say his officers were out at our house over 50 times, and never saw a stalker?  Seriously – does he think a “stalker(s)” will just sit on the front lawn and wait until the sheriffs get there?  Wow, does that happen often?  I think not. This is why so many victims of stalking no longer trust law enforcement.  This needs to change.  There needs to be more education, and the implementation of an more effective protocol.

And why, out of 4 months of calling law enforcement out to our home, almost twice as many times as the sheriff claims, keeping our own timeline like suggested, giving law enforcement photos, videos, statements, witnesses, etc. the sheriffs only produced ~ 6 investigating officer’s reports (which is what they are supposed to do EVERY time) – where are all the other reports of these stalking incidents?  And the felony stalking detective Rob Glassmire (the now current coroner of Garfield County) met with Morgan almost every week, he was called and emailed, and texted every time something happened, he was given details of events and where are all his reports?  When you take out the copies of what Morgan and I gave him and the “suspects” work hours there isn’t much left in his reports. Where are the details about what happened during all those horrific incidents?  Were those reports ever written?  Were those reports deleted intentionally out of the police reports many months after Morgan was murdered?

Here is the sheriff’s list of incident reports – or should I say the only ones they list.  Of the almost non-stop stalking incidents for 4 months straight, this is just a small fraction of the incidents that were called in, and responded to – how can that be?  We have all the dates and times dispatch was called.  We have the cards of the responding deputies.  We have video of the sheriffs looking around our home with flashlights and walking up and down our driveway.  if you read what they write, it’s crazy – during an active felony stalking case they list the events as Trespassing, Suspicious Events, Directed Patrols, Harassments and Follow Ups.  This is how the Garfield County Sheriff deals with felony stalking.  This has to change, or many more innocent people will die because of their stalkers, due to the lack of an untrained sheriff, and the absence of an effective stalking protocol.

Evil never rests, and to ignore evil and pretend it didn’t happen just allows it to keep damaging innocent families…this needs to stop now!