The Denver medical examiner’s office has identified a woman found dead inside her home on Sunday.
Clarissa Wilkens, 30, was pronounced dead at an apartment building at the 1500 block of South Albion Street.
Wilkens’ husband, Cain Wilkens, 43, was arrested on Monday on suspicion of first-degree murder.
According to an arrest affidavit obtained by Denver7, officers responded to the home at about 3:30 am Sunday after receiving a report of a suicide attempt. The caller said a man had come into the building manager’s unit saying his wife had just shot herself.
The responding officers and paramedics found Clarissa Wilkens unresponsive in a bedroom of the apartment.
Detectives searched the apartment and found evidence of a scuffle, including a broken picture frame and items that were tipped over, according to the affidavit. A witness also reported hearing a woman screaming “no” repeatedly and a man yelling, “Get back here.”
DENVER — A shooting that left two dead in southwest Denver Saturday evening appears to be a murder-suicide following a domestic violence dispute, according to a Denver Police Department spokesman.
The DPD tweeted officers were on scene of a possible shooting in the area of South Knox Court and West Colorado Avenue Saturday at around 8 pm
#Alert Update: Two people confirmed deceased in 1800 block S. Knox Ct. Death investigation is underground. pic.twitter.com/atj9un2u3x
— Denver Police Dept. (@DenverPolice) July 31, 2016
The victims in this shooting were identified as a man and a woman by an official with the DPD on Sunday. “One of the deceased shot the other before taking their own life,” said Doug Schepman, with the Denver Police Department.
The search for suspects was immediately called off by officials.
This is still an ongoing investigation.
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China’s national health officials said Friday the nation is continuing to battle the country’s worst COVID-19 outbreak of the pandemic, with more than 56,000 new cases counted since March 1.
The officials said told a news briefing in Beijing that more than half of those cases have been recorded in northeastern Jilin province and include asymptomatic cases.
At the same briefing in Beijing, the infectious disease expert for the China Center for Disease Control, Wu Zunyou, said officials contend the so-called “zero-COVID” strategy remains “the most economical and most effective prevention strategy against COVID-19.”
The strategy relies on lockdowns and mass testing, with close contacts often being quarantined at home or in a central government facility. The health officials said they are rolling out rapid antigen testing to supplement the current mass-testing strategy.
The strategy is being applied in the nation’s largest city, Shanghai, which this week posted record-high case counts in a surge of the highly transmissible omicron variant of the coronavirus that causes COVID-19.
Meanwhile, nearby South Korea is also facing its worst COVID-19 outbreak of the pandemic, with nearly 9 million cases reported since early February.
The Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency ((KDCA)) reported 339,514 new cases Friday, down from 395,597 Thursday and 490,881 Wednesday, which was the second-highest daily caseload of the pandemic. The nation set its all-time high for daily cases the previous Thursday, with 621,205.
Officials say Friday’s new infections raise South Korea’s total caseload to 11,162,232, for the pandemic.
Meanwhile, The European Union’s drug regulator, the European Medicines Agency ((EMA)) announced Thursday it was recommending an antibody medication developed by the British-Swedish pharmaceutical firm AstraZeneca be authorized for use to prevent COVID-19 in adults and adolescents 12 and older.
In a statement, the EMA advised the new drug, marketed as Evusheld, be administered to people before they have been exposed to COVID-19, to prevent future infections. The agency cited data from a study showing the drug to be 77 percent effective at preventing infections, though they say it may be less so against the omicron variant.
The EU’s executive arm, the European Commission, will consider the drug for authorization. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration cleared Evusheld in December for people with serious health problems or allergies, who cannot get adequate protection from vaccination, while Britain authorized its use last week.
Some information for this report was provided by the `, Reuters and Agence France-Presse.
The Adams County Sheriff’s Office has made an arrest in shooting death at the Venture Inn motel on March 15, 2022.
On March 15th, 2022 at approximately 3:35 p.m., deputies responded to a room at the Venture Inn motel located at 7333 Pecos Street for a report deceased adult male. Upon arrival, deputies observed an adult male deceased in the doorway of a room and notified detectives. Further investigation at the scene revealed the decedent to have a gunshot wound to the torso. The Adams County Sheriff’s Office Laboratory and Crime Scene Team responded to the location to process the scene. Detectives were able to identify a suspect in the case, Hayden Allen Banks, 31, of Aurora.
On March 18th, 2022 Adams County Sheriff’s office detectives, along with the assistance of the R.A.V.E.N. task force and the FBI Safe Streets task force located Hayden Banks in a motel room at the Valli Hi Motel at 7320 North Pecos Street. At approximately 1:00 p.m., Adams County Sheriff’s Office SWAT conducted a tactical operation at the location and took Hayden Banks into custody without incident. The defendant is charged with the following:
Hayden Allen Banks, 31, of Aurora
Murder 1st degree
Possession of a Weapon by a Previous Offender
The defendant is held in the Adams County Detention facility pending further court proceedings.
A study released Thursday by the U.S. Census Bureau suggests COVID-19 played a role in lowering the population in more than 73% of U.S. counties last year.
The bureau’s Vintage 2021 estimates of population and components said the population drop — reported in nearly 3,000 U.S. counties — was what they call a “natural decrease,” caused by more deaths than births in a population over a given time period.
In a news release, the bureau said the study indicates a drop in births, an aging population and increased mortality intensified by the COVID-19 pandemic led to a rise in the natural decrease.
The study showed that some counties also experienced population declines attributable to both international and domestic migration. The census showed counties with net international migration loss — more people moving out of the country from the state rather than into the country — were most frequently found in California, Oregon and Mississippi.
The study showed states with the highest percentages of counties with net domestic migration loss — people moving within the United States — were Alaska, Louisiana and Illinois.
The study showed that more than 65% of U.S. counties experienced positive domestic migration overall from 2020 to 2021. Arizona’s Maricopa County gained the most residents from domestic migration, followed by Riverside County, California, and Collin County, Texas. Los Angeles County, California, experienced the greatest net domestic migration loss, followed by New York County, New York.
Christine Hartley, assistant chief of estimates and projections at the bureau, said 2021 saw a shift in domestic migration patterns. She said even with the natural decrease in population and international migration overall because of domestic migration, more counties gained population than lost.
The bureau said the statistics released Thursday include population estimates and components of change for the nation’s 384 metropolitan statistical areas, 543 micropolitan statistical areas and 3,143 counties.
Some information for this report was provided by The `.
DENVER – A 60-year-old homeless man wanted for murdering a man in Denver in 1978 was arrested Friday evening. However, this was not the first time Shawn Winkler was placed into police custody in connection with the cold case murder in the past two weeks.
Winkler was briefly in custody earlier this week, but a misunderstanding involving the court and district attorney’s office put him back on the street. Details of Friday’s arrest were not released.
On Thursday, the Denver Police Department issued a Crime Stoppers alert for Winkler, saying they needed help finding him in connection with the cold case. He was taken into custody in the past two weeks, but while prosecutors were working to file an extension for the case, a miscommunication about the filing time led to his release.
According to Maro Casparian with the Denver District Attorney’s Office, prosecutors believed they had to file their intent to file charges motion by Monday at 1 pm Prosecutors did so, but the court argued that instead, prosecutors had been directed to file the case by 1 pm
Since the case hadn’t been filed, the court released Winkler, Casparian said. He added that the case is now filed.
“When Winkler is apprehended, which we are confident will occur quickly, the case will be ready to proceed,” Casparian said.
According to DPD, Winkler is still at large. He can often be found in downtown Denver and along South Broadway, and is homeless, police added. He was last seen wearing a gray hoodie, and typically walks with a cane.
Court records show the warrant for his arrest carries charges of first-degree murder after deliberation, felony murder, two counts of violent crime causing death and one sentence enhancer.
Winkler is accused of killing 28-year-old Van Rogers in January 1978 behind an apartment complex near the intersection of 12th Avenue and Ogden Street on Capitol Hill.
He had special needs as a child, but was living on his own at the time. His autopsy showed he’d been beaten to death, according to DPD cold case records.
new delhi —
The company behind a COVID-19 vaccine touted as a key tool for the developing world has sent tens of millions of doses to wealthy nations but provided none yet to the U.N.-backed effort to supply poorer countries, a sign that inequity persists in the global response to the pandemic.
A quarter-million doses from the company were supposed to be available to the vaccine-sharing initiative, called COVAX, by March. But the U.N. agency in charge of deliveries says the first shipments now likely won’t be made until April or May.
It wasn’t supposed to be this way. The company, Novavax, got $388 million from one of the organizations leading COVAX to fast-track the vaccine’s development and help make the shot available in poorer countries.
The investment guaranteed COVAX the “right of first refusal” to the first Novavax doses, but the deal applied only to factories in the Czech Republic, South Korea and Spain, said Bjorg Dystvold Nilsson, spokesman for COVAX co-founder CEPI.
There are other factories that aren’t part of the deal — and their shots are going elsewhere.
FILE – A researcher checks a vial at Novavax labs in Gaithersburg, Md., March 20, 2020, one of the labs developing coronavirus vaccines.
The Serum Institute of India, the world’s largest vaccine maker, has manufactured millions of Novavax doses. According to India’s Ministry of External Affairs and the institute, more than 28.9 million of those doses were sent to the Netherlands in January and February, while Australia received about 6 million doses. Indonesia also received about 9 million doses in December.
Thousands of other Novavax doses were also shipped from a Netherlands factory to other EU countries.
“Whatever the reason, a vaccine that was believed to be highly suitable for poor countries is now in large part going to rich countries,” said Zain Rizvi, a drug policy expert at the U.S. advocacy group Public Citizen. “It’s tragic that in year three of the pandemic, we still cannot get the resources, attention and political will to solve vaccine inequity.”
The delay is the latest setback for COVAX, which has been repeatedly hit by supply problems and has missed numerous targets to share doses.
Last year, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus decried the chasm in vaccine supplies between rich and poor countries as a “catastrophic moral failure.”
Problems linger
Vaccine availability has been improving in poorer regions recently, but logistical problems persist.
According to data from Oxford University, only about 14% of people in low-income countries have received at least one dose of COVID-19 vaccine. More than 680 million doses of COVAX-provided vaccines remain unused or have expired, according to government data.
Even with vaccine supplies improving, some officials were eagerly awaiting the Novavax vaccine in particular because it is easier to transport and store than some other coronavirus shots. They also hoped it might be more enticing to people skeptical of the AstraZeneca vaccine, which suffered through a botched rollout in Europe.
Countries including Zimbabwe, the Central African Republic and Kiribati were among those in line to be offered Novavax doses by March from COVAX.
Before the pandemic, Novavax was a small American company that had never brought any vaccine to market. Its shots have proven highly effective, but it is relying heavily on other companies to make them.
The company, struggling to scale up production, also has delayed delivery to other countries, including some in the European Union. COVAX is supposed to receive more than 1 billion Novavax doses.
FILE – A pharmacist fills a syringe from a vial of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine in Antwerp, Belgium, April 14, 2021. Moderna and vaccine promoter Gavi announced last May that the company would provide up to 500 million coronavirus vaccine doses for the U.N.-backed program for needy people in low- and middle-income countries by the end of 2022.
In a statement, the Gaithersburg, Maryland, company acknowledged that it had yet to share any shots with Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, which fronts the COVAX effort, but said it stands ready to do so.
“We continue to work with Gavi to reach our shared goal of ensuring global access to our protein-based vaccine where it is needed most,” Novavax said.
Gavi suggested part of the delay is that the Novavax vaccine wasn’t authorized by WHO until December. Gavi said it planned to allocate Novavax in the future and was “in close touch with the manufacturer and expects the supply to be available for delivery when countries need it.”
Less urgency
Health officials also worry that the urgency to vaccinate people everywhere against COVID-19 has disappeared — especially as many countries roll back precautions and the world’s attention is diverted.
“Rich countries have moved on from COVID, and everyone is fixated on the war in Ukraine, but COVID-19 remains an acute crisis for most people in the world,” said Ritu Sharma, a vice president at the charity CARE.
She said COVAX was still desperately short of vaccines and that based on the current pace of vaccination, the world was still “years and years” away from immunizing enough people to stop future COVID-19 waves.
Other experts said it was incumbent on public health agencies to ensure their investments in vaccines would benefit poor countries and to be more transparent about what went wrong.
“Whatever the explanation is, it’s unsatisfactory,” said Brook Baker, an access-to-medicines specialist at Northeastern University. “The bottom line is that there are still a lot of unvaccinated people in poor countries, and once again, they are at the back of the line.”
