NOTE: In Fall 1996, HST became entangled once again with
local authorities after he was stopped for allegedly drunk driving and crossing the
boundary by six inches (personally, it might have been due to old age rather than drunkeness!)
In the end, after yet another bizarre round of hearings, HST and the police department
made an agreement that was posted on the AspenOnline site as
"The Sharp Necklace". Other Aspen Times stories about the trial can also be read at AspenOnline.
John Burstein
Aspen Daily News
June 5, 1996
Gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson observed
Tuesday that new delays in his misdemeanor trial are
"ike getting a small form of cancer."
Blaming the postponements on Aspen police
officers' reluctance to turn over police communication
tapes from the night of his arrest, the long time Woody
Creeker said he wishes his trial for a driving while
impaired by alcohol charge would just be over.
Thompson's trial was pushed back Friday from
July 12 to Nov. 2 1, more than a year after his arrest in
the early morning hours of Election Day 1995. A
pretrial hearing scheduled for June 6 was continued
until Aug. 29.
"The delays aren't at my request, but because
they won't yield the tapes," Thompson said. "It's been
like pulling teeth. It didn't seem to be the way the
wheels of justice should grind. I know that for the
wheels of justice to grind exceedingly fine, they must
also grind exceedingly slow, but this is frustrating."
Thompson has maintained the tapes are crucial
in proving that rogue police officers orchestrated his
Nov. 7 arrest following a political rally against the
airport runway referendum.
Police have so far given Thompson's defense
team tapes of only three of the more than 40 police
channels, forcing his attorneys to ask for
continuances, he said.
Lawson Wills, Pitkin County's deputy district
attorney, said he objected to the delays, but County
Court Judge Tam Scott pushed back the trial's date due
to a number of scheduling conflicts of some of the
major players involved.
Thompson said the main reason for the delay in
the pretrial hearing is that Sgt. Leon Murray, one of
the officers involved in his arrest, will be out of town.
Murray will be working as a security officer at the
Olympics in Atlanta.
The author of "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas"
argues that the veteran police officer has the most to
lose with the trial because he's in charge of the tapes.
"Nixon admitted later that maybe he should
have burned the (Watergate) tapes," Thompson said.
"Maybe he (Murray) could take the tapes to Atlanta
and put them in the torch."
The Aspen Police Department has declined to comment on the Thompson case, maintaining
its side will come out in court.
Hunter Tangles with Don Johnson
Don Johnson's new CBS tellevision series Nash Bridges
sprang first from teh frequently chemically enhanced mind of journalist and author Hunter S. Thompson.
The famed gonzo journalist wrote a fictional story about a Mark Fuhrman-type cop who gets involved
with a mobster's widow, who is also an alcoholic with Tourette's syndrome. Simple plot, but apparently not
simple enough for TV. Thompson says that Johnson "took a liking to what I had written, and so, to my horror,
did CBS..." The alchoholism and Tourette's syndrome were quickly deleted from teh storyline.
reported in The Philadelphia Inquirer July 9, 1996.
Quick Hits...
You'll find HST on page 103 of the July 1996 issue of GQ. The magazine notes that HST is
57 years old on July 18. It quotes the doctor as saying,
"You're Charlie Manson! Get out of my sunlight." Supposedly, HST made that remark to a
journalist following the consumption of a fifth of Chivas...Author and essayist Nicholson Baker credits
HST with coining the slang phrase "Big Spit". You'll find Baker's reference to HST on page
104 of The Size of Thoughts, Baker's new book of very weird essays...As we go to press, we learn of
plans for HST to publish a book later this year. The book will reportedly be a compilation of letters between
HST and his fans. Stay tuned! NOTE: The Proud Highway was released in Spring, 1997 and is a
collection of gonzo letters!
