Colorado

When it starts at 10,000 feet and slices through the mountains in the canyon that bears its name, the Cache la Poudre River is a shock of water in this dry land. But by the time it winds its way out to this laid-back college city of 120,000 people, most of its water has been grabbed by farmers and other cities that control the maze of canals and diversion dams that turn the river into a trickle.

Miranda Meza's biggest fear about going to the police was that the man she says molested her would lie. If he said he never touched her, how could she prove he did? But he'd made that part easy. He admitted to police that he had. Now they were both here, in the courthouse. She watched her grandfather across the lobby. He was nearly 80 years old, his hair white and sparse. He wore an oxygen tank strapped across his skinny chest. It had taken more than 16 years to get to this point.

Colorado health officials ordered the Defense Department to speed up its destruction of mustard gas at a chemical weapons depot, saying the military had ignored requests to do so. Health department spokeswoman Jeannine Natterman said Wednesday's order affecting the Pueblo Chemical Weapons Depot was mandatory. About 2,600 tons of the gas are stored at the site.

The precooked beef patties with the fake charcoal lines won't be on the menu at Castle View High School this fall. Instead, students will dine on freshly grilled hamburgers from grass-fed, hormone- and antibiotic-free cattle -- what is often described as natural or organic meat -- raised on the plains of eastern Colorado.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced that it would remove the Preble's meadow jumping mouse from the threatened-species list in Wyoming but keep the mouse on the list in Colorado. Officials said in Cheyenne, Wyo., that the creature's habitat was at risk in Colorado. Environmentalists said they would sue to restore its status in Wyoming.

The only thing LaVonne Watkins buys at a convenience store these days is a cold soda on a hot day. She doesn't touch the scratch-off instant lottery tickets, which she used to snap up weekly in the hope of winning $10,000. Watkins, 35, a home-care provider, stopped buying them years ago when she learned that she had purchased Luck of the Zodiac tickets two months after the top prizes were won -- meaning that while she forked over her money, her chance at the grand prize was zero.

The quaint historic district of this steel-mill town at the foot of the Rockies erupted in a thunderous roar Saturday when Michelle Obama introduced her husband to more than 15,000 people as the "next president of the United States." "The Rising," Bruce Springsteen's rock anthem, blasted from loudspeakers. The crowd chanted, "O-ba-ma! O-ba-ma!" and "Yes we can!"

Over the years, Ray C. Frost has found little reason to leave his tribe's reservation to hunt the deer and elk whose meat fills his freezer. Game is plentiful on the Southern Ute tribe's land in southwest Colorado and the hunting "fantastic," Frost said. But next year, the former tribal councilman and other Southern Ute hunters will venture off their land for a historic act: They will hunt on public lands, exercising long-dormant rights under a century-old treaty with the federal government.

When the largest church in Boulder County, Colo., wanted to double its size two years ago, county commissioners said no. Rocky Mountain Christian Church already dominated a rural corner of the county northwest of Denver. If it became any larger, commissioners said, it would destroy the area's country atmosphere. But the church didn't accept the decision quietly.