Denver Homeless In Danger?
Denver police have identified one of two bodies found Wednesday near the city's main train station. They are withholding the name until relatives can be notified.
The decapitated bodies of the apparently homeless men were found less than a week after arrests were made in five recent beating deaths of transients. CBS News' Chris Schauble, of TV Station KCNC in Denver reports.
The bodies were found after a homeless person spotted one of the corpses in a weed-covered field behind Union Station, Denver's main railroad station.
The recent rash of murders is sending chills through lower downtown, and has the homeless being ordered indoors. A hotline is being set up to protect them.
Police have yet to find the murder weapon or any clues - not even the victims' heads.
Mayor Wellington Webb has asked the F.B.I. to help find whoever is responsible for the attacks, and the police have set up a major crimes unit devoted to the investigation.
U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno says she'll do what she can to help in the investigation.
Meanwhile, members of Denver's homeless community have been arming themselves with knives and railroad spikes.
Drastic steps are also being taken to protect the homeless. Warnings in both English and Spanish are being handed out to the homeless.
"Shelters are relaxing their standards tonight, even if you're drunk, have no I.D., or have no tuberculosis card," the warnings say. "You will still be admitted."
Starting Saturday night, Denver area shelters will start rescue pick-ups - a practice normally reserved for extremely cold nights during the winter.
Denver's homeless have been going to the rescue mission in massive numbers, because it's one of the few places they now feel safe.
"I got a brother in-law down here, and a cousin down here," said Johnny Alba. "You know we're kind of watching each other and stuff like that. Hopefully they'll find the guy that's been doing this stuff and the madness will be over."
Webb said he thought the killings would stop after several youths were arrested in the beating death of a transient.
"We were really taken aback when the other two bodies were found," Webb said.
He said some investigators theorize the killings resulted from a turf war between a group of "mall rats" - homeless young people along the downtown 16th Street Pedestrian Mall - and older transients who have been the targets.
Police Sgt. Tony Lombard said the latest deaths "certainly appear to be similar" to those of five homeless men in the downtown area since September.
But he said police cannot begin investigating the cases as connected until the most recent are ruled homicides. Autopsies were expected to take a few days.