Former Colorado Judge Joel Thompson, his girlfriend, and drugs

My former neighbors Jane Bennett and Kevin Bennett filed for a building permit in June 2000 for 701 Princeton Ave, which then adjoined my property at 750 Princeton, Steamboat Springs CO. I went to the building department to look at their permits and found that they were building a two story building with heating and plumbing and a guest house in addition to their existing house all on the same low density residential lot, which allowed one residential building with one sewer connection and a detached garage with up to 10% of the area of the primary residence in "accessory use" without a sewer. Then I heard that they were planning to turn the property into a bring your horse bed and breakfast tourist facility. Also, I found that the code required that all driveways have at least a 60 degree angle to the street. This allows someone to back out and straighten out on the street. But Bennetts converted the end of Princeton Ave., which they previously extorted from me, to a drive with no turn out provisions except into our driveway. I contacted the city but they told me that what the Bennetts were building was fine with them. I wrote a letter and asked if I could build something similar on my adjoining property but was told no. The code enforcement officer refused to meet with me and kept no log or records of Bennetts' construction.

I hired a long distance lawyer Ed Serr of Boulder CO and he advised me to file a motion for a court order in the Colorado 14th Judicial District. I did that and it was assigned to former judge Joel Thompson. The Colorado Supreme Court has ruled that adjoining neighbors have a right to intervene into zoning changes. See Roosevalt v. Beau Monde Company, Colorado Supreme Court, 1963 (“Property owners have the right to rely on existing zoning regulations… But where the enforcement of a public law also demands distinct safeguarding of private interests by giving them a formal status in the decree, the power to enforce rights thus sanctioned is not left to the public authorities nor put in the keeping of the district court's discretion”.)

Colorado court rules include Rule 57b Who May Obtain Declaration of Rights

		(b) Who May Obtain Declaration of Rights. Any person interested under a deed, will, written contract, or other writings constituting a contract, or whose rights, status, or other legal relations are affected by a statute, municipal ordinance, contract, or franchise, may have determined any question of construction or validity arising under the instrument, statute, ordinance, contract, or franchise and obtain a declaration of rights, status, or other legal relations thereunder. and (b) Who May Obtain Declaration of Rights. Any person interested under a deed, will, written contract, or other writings constituting a contract, or whose rights, status, or other legal relations are affected by a statute, municipal ordinance, contract, or franchise, may have determined any question of construction or validity arising under the instrument, statute, ordinance, contract, or franchise and obtain a declaration of rights, status, or other legal relations thereunder" and (b) Who May Obtain Declaration of Rights. Any person interested under a deed, will, written contract, or other writings constituting a contract, or whose rights, status, or other legal relations are affected by a statute, municipal ordinance, contract, or franchise, may have determined any question of construction or validity arising under the instrument, statute, ordinance, contract, or franchise and obtain a declaration of rights, status, or other legal relations thereunder and (b) Who May Obtain Declaration of Rights. Any person interested under a deed, will, written contract, or other writings constituting a contract, or whose rights, status, or other legal relations are affected by a statute, municipal ordinance, contract, or franchise, may have determined any question of construction or validity arising under the instrument, statute, ordinance, contract, or franchise and obtain a declaration of rights, status, or other legal relations thereunder and (j) Parties; Municipal Ordinances. When declaratory relief is sought, all persons shall be made parties who have or claim any interest which would be affected by the declaration, and no declaration shall prejudice the rights of persons not parties to the proceeding. " Nevertheless, even though we were adjoining neighbors, former judge Thompson ruled that we did not have a right to intervene in the city's choice to let the Bennetts build extra buildings and that only the city could enforce its own zoning. The next summer it was revealed that Judge Thompson's former fiance Billie Vreeman was arrested by the DEA. She supposedly introduced DEA special agent Donald Sperry to someone who sold him cocaine. The newspaper articles said that Charles Feldmann and other District Attorney's Office employees knew about the investigation before Vreeman was arrested, as did some police agents. Since Kevin Bennett has recently admitted that he pled guilty to conspiracy to sell hash and served time for that but did not tell the public that in the 8 years he was in public office and since I had heard that Bennett was a drug dealer when I lived across the street from him, my after the fact theory is that Bennett knew that Vreeman was under suspicion by the DEA and used that to blackmail Judge Joel Thompson. This is also supported by the fact that Bennetts' lawyers mentioned no laws and quoted no cases when they argued that the court did not have mandamus jurisdiction over decisions to allow politicians to ignore the same laws that were rigorously enforced on other people. http://www.steamboatpilot.com/news/2001/aug/29/dea_agent_says/ http://www.steamboatpilot.com/news/2001/aug/31/dea_agent_judge/ http://www.steamboatpilot.com/news/2001/aug/24/new_judge_in/ http://www.steamboatpilot.com/news/2007/sep/26/thomas_lee_johnsons_case_will_be_reheard_possibly_/ http://www.steamboatpilot.com/news/2001/aug/24/new_judge_in/?more_like_this