Colorado

Every time it rains here, Kris Holstrom knowingly breaks the law. Holstrom's violation is the fancifully painted 55-gallon buckets underneath the gutters of her farmhouse on a mesa 15 miles from the resort town of Telluride. The barrels catch rain and snowmelt, which Holstrom uses to irrigate the small vegetable garden she and her husband maintain. But according to the state of Colorado, the rain that falls on Holstrom's property is not hers to keep.

Locked in a visitation dispute with his former girlfriend over their young daughter, J.P. Weichel wanted to vent, court records say. Weichel, 40, allegedly posted comments about the woman on the Craigslist "rants and raves" forum, accusing her of child abuse and welfare fraud and making crude comments about her sex life. The woman said the postings were defamatory.

To her sister, Angie Zapata was a teenage girl in every sense but the biological one. She spent hours spraying her long hair into compliance with Aqua Net, painting her eyelashes with L'Oreal and her skin with Cover Girl. She combed discount stores for clothes that would emphasize her curves. The effect was stunning. When the 18-year-old visited the store where her older sister, Monica, worked, men would make excuses to hover.

Intent on dismantling affirmative action, activists in five states have launched a coordinated drive to cut off tax dollars for programs that offer preferential treatment based on race or gender. The campaign aims to put affirmative action bans on the November ballot in Arizona, Colorado, Missouri, Nebraska and Oklahoma. The effort is being organized by California consultant Ward Connerly, who has successfully promoted similar measures in California, Michigan and Washington.

Fourteen months after a 19-year-old hotel worker accused basketball superstar Kobe Bryant of rape, the charges against him were suddenly dropped Wednesday, just days before his trial was to begin. Eagle County Dist. Atty. Mark Hurlbert said the prosecution could not proceed because the woman "has indicated her unwillingness to go forward."

Like many folks in this tranquil town, Patty Liberty has no problem living just down the road from some of the world's most notorious terrorists. Zacarias Moussaoui, known as "the 20th hijacker" for his attempts to join in the Sept. 11 attacks, resides at the supermax prison just outside the city limits. So do would-be shoe bomber Richard Reid and Ramzi Yousef, who tried to blow up the World Trade Center in 1993. Unabomber Theodore Kaczynski lives there too.

Halfway through the trial, prison expert James E. Aiken looked straight at jurors and told them what Zacarias Moussaoui could expect if they sent him away for the rest of his life. "I have seen them rot," he said. "They rot." Aiken was describing what happens to the nation's highest-risk prisoners after they settle in at the federal government's maximum-security prison in Florence, Colo., known as Supermax.

In Colorado, judges don't simply have the power to send people to prison. In rare circumstances, they can also decide whether a person should be charged as a criminal -- a rarely invoked authority upon which two cases now hinge. Under a 19th century state law, obscure until recently, two judges have been asked to decide whether four men should be tried in rape and murder cases.

In rural Chaffee County, Colo., one of the world's largest beverage companies has discovered water it deems fit for a bottle: clean and crisp, with the mountain spring flavor people are willing to pay for. Nestle Waters North America wants to tap an aquifer feeding a pair of springs near Salida, southwest of Colorado Springs, and draw 65 million gallons of water per year to bottle and sell under its Arrowhead brand. But many mountain residents say Nestle should go bottle someone else's water.

The passage of 11 anti-illegal immigrant measures by a special session of the Colorado Legislature this week is just the latest sign that momentum in the volatile debate is on the side of hard-liners. Earlier this year, immigrant-rights groups were encouraged when the Democratic-controlled Legislature rejected several bills that party leaders characterized as extremist.