8 JUNE 11-17, 2026 westword.com WESTWORD | MUSIC | CAFE | CULTURE | NIGHT+DAY | NEWS | LETTERS | CONTENTS | Turachak, 35, was found dead in her apartment in October 1996, killed by stran- gulation and blunt-force trauma to her head. In March, 65-year-old Ricky Dawson was sentenced to life in prison for the murder after his DNA was matched to the crime scene. New DNA technology also linked Dawson to three other murders in California, Florida and Washington. This is just one of over 130 cases solved by the Denver Integrated Cold Case Project since it launched in 1999. The closed cases in- clude rapes and homicides dating as far back as the 1970s. But the Father’s Day Massacre will not join these success stories. Denver police concluded their investi- gation into the deadly robbery in 1991 with King’s arrest. They have never reexamined the case, according to the DPD. “While the jury ultimately determined the case had not been proven beyond a reasonable doubt, the investigators and prosecutors involved believed the correct individual was prosecuted,” DPD says in a statement. “A case would only be reopened following a not guilty verdict if additional evidence indicated another person was re- sponsible for the crimes. This case was not reopened after the trial, and will not be reviewed by the DPD Cold Case Unit.” The FBI continued its investigation into King after his acquittal, monitoring him for years and offering a $100,000 reward for information about the case in 1993. Federal prosecutors could have charged King with civil rights violations to get around the issue of double jeopardy. However, the FBI’s case was ultimately unfruitful and presumably ended with King’s death. The Colorado Bureau of Investigation has its own cold case unit, but the state would only take up the case if the DPD requested its as- sistance, explains CBI spokesperson Rob Low. Even if a law enforcement agency did re- examine the case, there would be little to go on. Most recent cold case solves are thanks to advancements in DNA testing technology, allowing investigators to retest evidence collected at the crime scene. No such evi- dence exists here. As King’s defense attorney Scott Robinson described it, “There was no hair, there was no fi ber, there was no DNA at all.” “The crime will never be solved,” Robinson said in a 2021 interview marking the 30th anniversary of the massacre. “I don’t think it will ever be solved unless we have a deathbed con- fession from someone yet unidentifi ed.” Lead prosecutor William Buckley offered a different perspective in an interview that same year: “I believe and will believe until my dy- ing breath that James King killed those four guards.” Poetic justice Epstein’s true crime books cover contract killing, spousal murder and mysterious disappear- ance. But the Father’s Day Massacre at the center of “Deadly Heist” is uniquely disturb- ing to the North Carolina-based lawyer. “This is the only book I’ve written that did not have the satisfactory end of justice being delivered,” Epstein says. “It’s a disturbing, unsatisfying result in our criminal justice system, but it is a better result than an in- nocent man being convicted for a crime he did not commit. The jurors in this case were grappling with that very question: Should a guilty man walk free, if in fact James King is guilty, or should we convict a potentially innocent man ... to have him die in the execu- tion chamber? “They decided that it was better to set a possibly guilty man free.” Epstein spent a year researching and writing “Deadly Heist.” He watched gavel- to-gavel video footage of the trial, tracked down paper records, read every published article and gathered fi rst-hand accounts from involved parties, including law enforce- ment investigators, jurors and attorneys on both sides of the case. He believes King is guilty, less because of the evidence and more because of King’s own stories. At the time of the crime, King claimed to have driven to a community center seeking to play chess and returned home when no one was there — but King hadn’t played chess at the center in seven years and the chess club no longer met at that location. King claimed to have trashed his gun in August 1990, long before the crime, because it was damaged — but he said he discovered the damage in June, meaning he would have carried it on the job for months in a dangerous condition. King said he got the bigger safe deposit box to store fl oppy disks containing a book he was writing — but police found no fl oppy disks in- side when they searched the box. Epstein’s book criti- cizes investigators for their over-reliance on eyewitness identifica- tions, and prosecutors for failing to emphasize King’s potential motives. He questions the rush to make an arrest without employing tactics like surveilling King or wire- tapping his phone. “When I talked to folks involved in law en- forcement, they can re- member, to this day, the amount of community and media pressure there was to arrest somebody, to set the community at ease,” Epstein says. “I empathize with that ... but the shortcuts to get there haunted their ability to successfully prosecute him.” The result is four families left without justice and one city left without closure, even 35 years later. Though it wasn’t a happy ending for King, either. For Epstein’s book, 9News reporter Paula Woodward shared never- before-released notes of her interviews with King after his acquittal. King lamented that he could not get a job because of his infamy. He lived a meager lifestyle in the same house he’d owned before the robbery; if he had stolen the $200,000, he hadn’t spent it. He knew he was being monitored by the FBI, complaining, “I can’t even go into my own backyard without feel- ing I’m being watched.” King spent the remainder of his life liv- ing as a recluse and was treated as a pariah whenever he ventured out of the house. “Ironically, he even had iron bars installed behind every window,” the book notes. A prison of his own making. Email the author at hannah.metzger@westword. com. The Coldest Case continued from page 6 The base of the United Bank Tower at 1700 Lincoln St., now called the Wells Fargo Center. The bullet paths that killed the four guards, displayed by prosecutors during King’s trial. United Bank was the largest bank in Denver at the time of the heist. DENVER PUBLIC LIBRARY SPECIAL COLLECTIONS, WH2129 DENVER PUBLIC LIBRARY SPECIAL COLLECTIONS, WH2129 DENVER PUBLIC LIBRARY SPECIAL COLLECTIONS, WH2129
