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evidence in the case—he had been with John Ramsey when JonBenét’s body was found—but they did not want to make the same trade they’d granted the Ramseys the previous April. Some of the detectives were doubtful that White had even opened the wine cellar door when he made his first trip to the basement early that morning. For his part, White couldn’t understand why Hunter had fought for the Ramseys’ right to see their police statements while now Hunter was denying him the same privilege. He was also upset that in April, Hunter had softened the wording of Koby’s statement intended to exonerate him of involvement in JonBenét’s murder. The Whites felt they were being slighted by Hunter.

On December 19, the couple had met with Colorado governor Roy Romer and his chief of staff, Meg Porfido, in Denver. At the meeting, White leveled some charges against Hunter, saying he ran a timid office, wasn’t aggressive enough, had problems with the police, and was hampering the police investigation. White asked the governor to assign a special prosecutor to take over the Ramsey case.

The governor called Bob Grant and Denver district attorney Bill Ritter for their opinions. Grant told Romer that Hunter was handling the case properly and explained that Hunter was restricted until he was presented with the case by the Boulder PD, which was still completing a to-do list. Only then would the law allow for removing or replacing him for improper behavior. However, in his opinion, Grant said, Hunter’s past actions had no bearing on his handling of the Ramsey case.

Koby told Hunter that the governor had called him in December too. He’d told Romer that there was no basis for the Whites’ request. He confirmed what Bob Grant had said—the case was still with the Boulder PD.

Meg Porfido called White and told him that the governor wouldn’t intervene at this time and didn’t see a need for a special prosecutor. Afterward, the Whites wrote to Romer again, repeating what they’d said at their meeting. The same day that Koby and Hunter were meeting at the Foundry, the Whites went to see the state attorney general, Gale Norton, to repeat what they had told the governor. Norton told them she had no jurisdiction over the matter, since Alex Hunter had not said he wasn’t going to press charges. No one could move against Hunter until the Boulder PD had finished its investigation and handed over the case.

On Monday, January 12, 1998, this writer’s article, “Justice Boulder Style,” was published in The New Yorker. It updated readers on the status of the case and explained why Hunter had not indicted JonBenét’s parents for her murder. The story discussed the Ramseys’ presumption of innocence and explored Hunter’s views on the case.

Pete Hofstrom told Bill Wise that the article gave the police ammunition for their case that Hunter was the source of media leaks. Hofstrom reminded Wise that to protect the flow of information from the police, he had agreed to Beckner’s condition that he withhold from Hunter some evidence the police were developing. Hofstrom also told this to Hunter, and the DA accepted it. When one deputy DA heard about the condition Hofstrom had accepted, he remarked: “Pete hasn’t thrown his boss under the bus; he’s crawled under it willingly. Luckily for Alex, the bus wasn’t moving forward.”

The most extreme reaction to The New Yorker article came from Fleet and Priscilla White. They wrote a letter to the editor of The Denver Post and on January 14 delivered it personally. Because the Whites refused to allow it to be edited for length, the paper rejected it. That same afternoon, the Daily Camera agreed to publish it unedited.

On January 15, a reporter from the Daily Camera called Alex Hunter for his comments on the as yet unpublished letter. The DA, on his way to the newspaper’s office to meet with Tom Koby and senior editor Barrie Hartman on an unrelated matter, told the reporter he would address the issue later in the day. At the Camera offices, Hunter told Koby about the Whites’ letter, in which they asked the governor to appoint a special prosecutor.