CO CO - Denise Davenport, 20, Greeley, 24 Feb 1985

[PommyMommy]

Denise Davenport

Case Details
Case Type: Homicide
Height: Unknown
Case Status: OPEN
Weight: Unknown
Aliases:
Identifying Marks:
Incident Date: 04/20/1985
Occupation:
Agency: Weld County Sheriff's Office
City: Greeley
Date of Birth: Unknown
County: Weld
Date of Death: Unknown
Agency Case #: WC85-0420053
Age: Unknown
Judicial District: 19th Judicial District
Gender: Female
Year Solved:
Race: Caucasian
NamUs Case #: Unknown
Eyes: Unknown
NCMEC Case #: Unknown
Hair: Brown

About this Case:
In February 1985, Denise Davenport was reported as a missing person to the Greeley Police Department. Ms. Davenport was last seen leaving work at the Greeley Mall. The vehicle Ms. Davenport was driving was discovered a few days later on 9th Avenue near Frazer Hall, located on the University of Northern Colorado Campus. In April of 1985, the remains of Ms. Davenport were located by kayakers in the South Platte River, 1 mile east of Highway 34 between 18th Street and Highway 34. Anyone with information regarding this case, is asked to please contact the Weld County Sheriff's Office.

If you have any information about this case, please contact:
Weld County Sheriff's Office, Greeley CO

Colorado Cold Case Files - Case Detail: Denise Davenport

 

[PommyMommy]

FEB 22, 2009
A new lead in old homicide?
[...]

Jerome Santiago thinks he might know who killed Denise Davenport, who died in 1985 when she was a junior at the University of Northern Colorado. She was last seen in south Greeley, by a car wash, and then she was gone for two months ” until her body was found in the South Platte River, just east of Greeley.

Law enforcement officials knew she had been killed, although because of the decomposition of the body, the coroner couldn’t find a cause of death. “Homicidal violence of undetermined type,” he wrote on the death certificate.

[...]

He remembers his mother’s new boyfriend, Max, and the night in early 1985 when Max “came crawling through the cornfield … drugged and deranged … and he and my mother had one of their worst fights ever.” Santiago still remembers his mother and Max screaming at each other in the days after the killing, and the name “Denise Davenport” flying back and forth.

[...]

Then, after leaving her job at the Greeley Mall on the night of Feb. 24, Denise Davenport disappeared. The searches began again, hundreds of people searching the fields, checking abandoned buildings, walking the riverbanks.

[...]

On April 20, two men floating a canoe down the South Platte River saw something caught in some tree branches about a mile east of Greeley. It was a body. Within a day they identified Davenport.

There have been suspects since then:

» Davenport’s boyfriend. She was driving his car the night she disappeared, and the car was found parked near Frasier Hall on the UNC campus. When found, the driver’s door was open and there was mud on the seat. Police questioned the boyfriend but found no evidence that he was involved.

» Career criminal Larry Blehm was accused of the killing by then-Larimer County Sheriff Jim Black. Black also accused Blehm of three other Weld County killings, although nothing happened in the cases because of lack of evidence. But there was a possible connection to the Davenport case ” the car wash where Davenport was last seen alive was across the street from Blehm’s plant shop. Now in a Colorado prison, Blehm won’t be eligible for parole until 2045. Blehm was convicted in Larimer County in 1977 on kidnapping and possession of cocaine. He served his sentence, then was arrested on burglary charges. He was then convicted as a habitual criminal, which sent him to prison for what amounts to a life sentence.

[...]

 

[PommyMommy]

DEC 16, 2011
Sheriff could open up clues to cold case
[...]

Davenport had been dabbling a bit in the Greeley drug world during a time when bad drugs were on the streets.

Flash forward a quarter century to the arrest of Patrick Sullivan, 68, the former and longtime Arapahoe County Sheriff ” the namesake for the Arapahoe County Jail and even said to be responsible for bringing Pope John Paul II to Denver for World Youth Day in 1993 ” now accused of offering young men methamphetamine for sex.

[...]

Davenport, whose unsolved murder had been on Weld County’s cold case list for 26 years, was the Sullivans’ babysitter before she went off to college.

[...]

The connection in the cases grows even more bizarre, now that a man named Sean Moss comes into play. After Sullivan retired from law, he moved on to become a security chief at the Cherry Creek School District. Sullivan in 2007 hired Moss, 27, who was reported to be a former gay star. In January of this year, Moss’ body was found floating in the South Platte River in the Denver area.

[...]

Shortly after Davenport’s body was found on April 20, 1985, Sullivan showed up at the Weld County Centennial Center to inquire about the young woman’s death.

“Pat came in and was concerned about her body being found,” said retired Weld Sheriff Cmdr. Tom Johnston. “He and Ed (Jordan) were friends at the time. I think it was on a Saturday. He stopped in and wondered what was going on, and he told me that Denise was a personal friend of the family.

[...]

Sullivan, said family members, would walk Davenport home after babysitting in the early ’80s. He was picky in who he had watch his children, just as the Davenports were picky in where their daughter would babysit, Hal Davenport said.

[...]

Davenport’s mother, Carrie Davenport, died in 2004, her sister said.

[...]

Sullivan has been charged with felonies that could put him in jail for the remainder of his life for allegations of distribution of methamphetamine, possession and misdemeanor prostitution-soliciting. He is set to appear at a preliminary hearing on Jan. 31, at which time a judge will determine if there’s enough evidence to take the case to trial.

According to Associated Press reports, authorities also are looking into what Sullivan may have known about Moss. His body was found Jan. 26 in the South Platte River near Coors Field in downtown Denver. Sullivan, according to the AP report, had bailed Moss out of jail just 12 days prior to the man’s death. Meth was found in his system, as well as a common date rape drug, the AP reported.

Davenport’s body also was found in the South Platte, just east of Greeley, about 50 miles north of Denver. But because of her body’s decomposition, it was impossible to determine whether drugs were in her system.

[...]

“It sounds like she came to Greeley and developed a drug habit,” Johnston said. “There was a lot of bad dope in Greeley at the time, a lot of bad meth. People were shooting up and dying with needles in their arms.”

[...]

Likewise, Weld County Sheriff’s Cmdr. Donald Patch said he reviewed the Davenport case last week and found nothing that stuck out to reopen the case.

[...]

Authorities had followed up for years on potential leads in the Davenport homicide, and they had at one point suspected her boyfriend at the time, DK, but there was no evidence. Also at that time, then Larimer District Attorney Jim Black accused career criminal Larry Blehm, now 67, but again there was no evidence that could stick. Hal Davenport to this day believes his daughter’s killer is behind bars. He said law enforcement had much circumstantial evidence connecting his daughter to Blehm, including some connections between them with hair and clothing fibers.

[...]

Blehm is serving a prison sentence at the Arkansas Valley Correctional Facility, and he will not be eligible for parole until 2045. He’ll be 100 years old.

[...]

 

[PommyMommy]

SEP 26, 2019
Colorado Cold Case (Beth Miller, Denise Davenport, Jonelle Matthews, Vicki Carpenter

 

[PayrollNerd]

I wonder if those hair and clothing fibers are still available and would hold any DNA. Seems like it would be worth pursuing to give this family peace.


“Authorities had followed up for years on potential leads in the Davenport homicide, and they had at one point suspected her boyfriend at the time, Doug Kandel, but there was no evidence. Also at that time, then Larimer District Attorney Jim Black accused career criminal Larry Blehm, now 67, but again there was no evidence that could stick. Hal Davenport to this day believes his daughter’s killer is behind bars. He said law enforcement had much circumstantial evidence connecting his daughter to Blehm, including some connections between them with hair and clothing fibers.

“I know they only chose to prosecute Blehm on charges they could make stick, because there’s no statute of limitations on murder,” Davenport said, “and I applaud that.”

“I still hope that sometime there will be proof positive that Larry Blehm is responsible and I can put it to rest,” Davenport said.”

 

[CastlesBurning]

Weld County Sheriff's Office hires on first cold-case detective, on a mission to bring justice

 

[amberkay]

I hope the detective solves all those clod cases. It doesn’t sound like he has a shortage of suspects on this one.

 

[Fede]

At least it seems that her case is top priority: Murder case of University of Northern Colorado student Denise Davenport remains a priority for Weld County Sheriff’s Office

 

[CastlesBurning]

Who Murdered Colorado College Student Denise Davenport? ~ True Crime Diva

 

[TootsieFootsie]

Cold case: 37 years this week since Denise Davenport was found dead - The Longmont Leader

The Weld County Sheriff's Office is still investigating the murder of Denise Davenport from 1985.

Denise Davenport was found dead 37 years ago this week. Officials are still searching for answers.

This week is the anniversary of when the Weld County Sheriff’s Office, or WCSO, opened the case to look into Davenport’s death. Her body was found in the South Platte River near Greeley.

 

[PommyMommy]

MAY 5, 2022

Cold Case: Who killed Denise Davenport 37 years ago?

There are hundreds of unsolved homicide cases, long-term missing person cases, and unidentified remains cases in Colorado where at least three years have passed since the crime happened.

kdvr.com

Who killed Denise Davenport?​

The Weld County Sheriff’s Office said Denise Davenport was last seen on Feb. 24, 1985 when she left work at the Greeley Mall. She was reported missing to the Greeley Police Department.

Police said a few days later, the car Davenport was driving, her boyfriend’s blue Mazda RX-7, was found in a University of Northern Colorado parking lot near Frazer Hall.

Davenport was a student at UNC.

A few months later, on April 20, the sheriff’s office said Davenport’s body was found in the South Platte River between 18th Street and U.S. 34 near Greeley.

 

[CastlesBurning]

7 Haunting Colorado Cold Cases With Anniversaries This Month

The CBI notes that Denise Davenport had been missing for two months when kayakers found her body in the South Platte River near Highway 34 on April 20, 1985.

Officers say she was last seen alive at the Greeley Mall but located her car at the University of Northern Colorado. Contact the Weld County Sheriff's Office with information.

 

[dotr]

Antonia Velez February 24, 2024

Denise Davenport was last seen alive in 1985 — 39 years later, her death remains unsolved

Denise Davenport was last seen leaving work at the Greeley Mall on Feb. 24, 1985.

www.9news.com

 

[Rainycm]

I personally know the men who found her body! They want nothing more than to see her case solved!

 

[dotr]

by: Heather Willard Posted: Feb 25, 2025

https://kdvr.com/news/colorado-cold-cases/police-search-for-leads-in-1985-cold-case-of-missing-unc-student-found-in-river/

'On April 20, 1985, kayakers found Davenport’s remains in the South Platte River between 18th Street and Highway 34, east of Greeley. Police said foul play is suspected and her death is being investigated as a homicide.'

''The Weld County Sheriff’s Office shared details published in the county’s newspaper, where friends said Davenport “always had a smile on her face,” and that “everything was precious to her, life was precious to her.” The paper reported that detectives had interviewed over 100 friends, acquaintances and potential witnesses, and had also investigated over 70 tips.''