Denver Santas Try to Salvage Yule Spirit

Seated forlornly in a police station roll-call room on Thursday, a Santa Claus took stock of the gloomy surroundings: scuffed linoleum floors and dingy white walls hung with most-wanted posters.

“This definitely does not have the pizazz and flair of a mall,” muttered John Rader, 47, a taxidermist who normally moonlights this time of year at shopping centers for a rent-a-Santa company.

A long silence ended with the arrival of three children who clamored for a robot, a doll and football cards. What they got were candy canes and police department-issued coloring books on gun safety.

So goes Christmas in Denver for Santa Claus this year.

Dozens of Santas yanked from Mile High City malls in the wake of letters threatening to kill them sought shelter Thursday in police and fire stations to hear children’s Yuletide wishes.

Some of the Santas are police officers in disguise, packing pistols in stations devoid of splashy holiday ornaments, frothy fake snow or toy stores around the corner where parents could make their toddlers’ dreams come true.

“Given the escalating levels of violence in Denver, as well as the nation, you can’t take this threat as idle. . . . Poor Santa’s got to be protected,” said Kirk Williams, assistant director of the University of Colorado’s Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence.

“The only thing I’ve ever heard about Santa is cookies and milk. But in today’s world, if he came down the chimney, he’d probably get shot.”

The threats came in a series of letters and postcards delivered to local malls by an anonymous writer who vowed to shoot in-store Santas between the eyes.

The letters were peppered with obscenities and began arriving on Dec. 14. They apparently were sent by someone angered by the commercialism of the Christmas holiday and the “mockery” Santas make of the birth of Jesus.

“I mean it! You don’t know the horrible things I am capable of,” read one of the letters, signed Terminator XX. “If you ignore this warning and don’t get rid of this impostor, you will pay an extremely high price for this . . . stupidity.”

Taking no chances, Denver merchants and law enforcement authorities banded together to provide heavily guarded havens for Santas--and to keep the sender from robbing the unquestioning belief of children.

Hundreds of parents took advantage of the offer Thursday and took their children to more than a dozen police and fire stations across the metropolitan region.

Some malls had armed guards standing within 10 feet of Santas. Others posted signs near empty seats saying Santa had returned to the North Pole for urgent business. A sign at one mall said Santa was “out to lunch.”

“The sender got his wish for Christmas--he had Santas yanked from malls and caused turmoil in Denver,” Detective Edward Thomas said. “Our response is to provide safe places for Santa to see children.”

The threats, which are being investigated by police, the FBI and the U.S. Postal Service, come at a time when Denver is struggling to deal with growing bloodshed and street crime.

A week ago, four people--three of them teen-agers--were shot to death at a Chuck E Cheese’s Pizza parlor in nearby Aurora. A 19-year-old suspect has been arrested in that case.

“Chuck E Cheese was nothing compared to this,” one of the letters warned. “Time is running out on that fatso. By Thursday, he will be history along with anybody that gets in my way.”

Jeanne O’Shaughnessy, 39, was delighted that Santa showed up at all on Thursday. Not about to let her three children miss out on a highlight of the season, she bundled them up against the frigid morning air and told them: “We’re going to see Santa.”

“Mommy, what are we doing at the police station?” asked her 6-year-old daughter, Sadie, as they pulled into the parking lot of a substation on the southeast side of town. “We’re going to see Santa; sometimes he comes here,” O’Shaughnessy answered.

Later, as her children showered Santa with holiday wishes, O’Shaughnessy told a visitor, “This is a really great community service.

“The kids don’t really care as long as they see Santa Claus,” she said. “Next year, we may go to a mall, or a police station, but we’ll find him. He always comes to Denver.”

Robert Pelc, a Denver forensic psychologist, figured it was a good idea to take Santas out of the malls, but worried whether the threat could scar the minds of innocent believers.

“It’s an infringement upon children’s sense of security having Santa Claus disappear,” Pelc said. “Younger and younger children are experiencing this threat to our security; they are growing up in an increasingly anxious world, and this will only further contribute to that anxiety.”

Susan Mesco, owner of a Santa rental company, agreed. “Children don’t have much left these days with the dangers of trick-or-treating at Halloween, fears of AIDS and concerns over whether they will have clean air or water.

“Now, parents are desperate that their children see a professional Santa in an environment that’s not dangerous,” said Mesco, who pulled her 25 Santas out of malls and began dispatching them to private homes for a fee of $50 for each 30-minute visit.

Lisa Herzlich, marketing director for the Cherry Creek Shopping Center, discontinued her Santa operation on Monday out of concern for people’s safety, “given the threats we’ve had.”

“I’m not going to put a bulletproof vest on Santa and let a kid sit on his lap--that doesn’t make sense,” Herzlich said. “It’s a sad, sad time.”