Kirk Mitchell relished making sense of a mystery.
It’s no secret how the longtime Denver Post reporter earned himself the nickname Kirk “Cold Case” Mitchell following years of dedicated coverage of unsolved criminal investigations across Colorado, along with writing about the state’s most sensational murders and other mayhem.
Mitchell, who retired from The Post in 2020 after 22 years at the newspaper, died this week in Pennsylvania after battling prostate cancer since 2016. He was 64.
His byline can be found on stories about subjects ranging from the Aurora theater shooting to therapy dogs in prisons to the drug kingpin “El Chapo.”
Oldest son Vance Mitchell said his father was never afraid to meet with convicted killers or interview someone from any walk of life.
“He seemed like he approached it as helping people tell their story in their own words,” Vance Mitchell said.
Friends, former coworkers and family members were eager to return the favor, sharing Kirk Mitchell’s story in the pages his byline once graced.
Kirk’s story
Kirk Vance Mitchell Sr. was born in Peru, Indiana, where his father was stationed with the U.S. Air Force. After moving around with the service, the Mitchells settled in Keene, New York, where Kirk’s parents, who were accomplished painters, moved the family into a bed and breakfast they had bought.
The young Mitchell played football, basketball and soccer at Keene Central School, from which he graduated in 1977. Throughout his professional career, Mitchell’s resume boasted that he graduated in the Top 10 in his senior class. There were only nine students, daughter-in-law Debbie Mitchell said.
“He literally put that on all of his resumes,” she said.
After high school, Mitchell served two years in Quito, Ecuador, on his mission with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. After returning, Mitchell earned his journalism degree from Brigham Young University.
Mitchell began his journalism career at the Associated Press in Salt Lake City, then worked at newspapers in Twin Falls, Idaho, and Mesa, Arizona, before joining The Post in 1998.
At The Post, Mitchell spent years as a crime reporter, covering some of the most notorious murders in Colorado, including the 2013 assassination of Colorado Department of Corrections executive director Tom Clements by a parolee who was a member of a white supremacist gang in the prison system.
Mitchell was most proud of his contributions to two of the Pulitzer Prizes won by The Post’s newsroom — the 2000 and 2013 awards in the breaking news category for coverage of the Columbine High School and Aurora movie theater massacres, respectively.
“He was a dogged reporter,” said Vikki Migoya, a former Post editor who now works as a public affairs specialist with the FBI. “He would get hold of something and dig and dig.”
Migoya noted Mitchell, who she edited while she worked at the paper, never turned down a story and would give it his all whether a short crime item, a holiday feature or a special investigation.
“He could find people that nobody else could find,” Migoya said. “If we were trying to locate someone — the subject of a lawsuit or a relative of someone we needed on the phone — Kirk was the one who would dig in and be able to find that person.”
For years, Mitchell wrote The Post’s cold case blog, which garnered some of the highest readership on the newspaper’s website. His fascination with unsolved crimes earned him the nickname “Cold Case” from his colleagues on the paper’s city desk.
“A person who spent so many years writing about crime could become hardened and cynical but that didn’t happen to Kirk,” said Lee Ann Colacioppo, The Post’s executive editor. “There was an optimism to him that you could actually see in the way his eyes twinkled and a desire for justice that found its voice in his devotion to writing about cold cases. He was a diligent and sensitive reporter and a proud and devoted father. The newsroom just felt right when he was hunched over his computer.”
Sometimes his blog posts would generate tips that would help detectives solve the crime, Vance Mitchell said.
“The thing he was most passionate about was trying to solve the mystery,” he said.
While covering so much tragedy, Kirk Mitchell was also riveted by finding the light in people.
Post photographer R.J. Sangosti recalled Mitchell repeatedly writing stories about people in prison training therapy dogs behind bars and finding joy in watching them interact with the animals.
“He was enthralled by how someone could be a cold-hearted criminal at one point of their life and, at a different point, they could share their bunk with a dog and teach it to love and care for a child with severe autism,” Sangosti said. “Kirk saw people at their worst, but somehow he always was able to find the best in that person and included that in his stories.”
Kirk Mitchell was a voracious reader, enjoying — you guessed it — mystery novels.
He authored a nonfiction book, “The Spin Doctor,” about the 2002 death of Nancy Sonnenfeld, explaining how her husband Kurt Sonnenfeld became the primary suspect before escaping to Argentina and fighting extradition back to Denver.
The Sonnenfeld case was one of many in which Mitchell was called to appear on true-crime television shows to talk about his coverage. He continued to appear on those shows even into his retirement.
Despite the sometimes difficult subject matter, Mitchell had a sense of humor about his work.
“Often we’d ask him, ‘How was work?’ And he would say, ‘Well, I was in prison,'” Vance Mitchell said. “He thought it was funny to tell people he went to prison.”
A family man
Loved ones described Mitchell as a family man, epitomized by his close companionship with his son Jonathon Mitchell, who has Down syndrome.
The two enjoyed superhero movies and Kirk Mitchell sometimes volunteered at an ARC Thrift Store in Aurora where Jonathon worked so the two could spend time together.
“Kirk was so involved with him and so proud of him,” Migoya said. “It always touched me, the relationship he had and the fact that he was so supportive of his son.”
Mitchell was diagnosed with stage 4 prostate cancer in 2016 and fought it until his death.
He died Monday at his home in Lititz, Pennsylvania, where he lived with his wife Robin Ritchey. They married in 2022.
After retirement, Mitchell enjoyed traveling around the United States to visit his large family. He attended concerts and sporting events that his grandchildren participated in, Debbie Mitchell said.
Kirk Mitchell is survived by his wife and five children: Kirk Vance Mitchell, Jr., Jonathon James Mitchell, Jennifer Noelle Marler, Stacy Ann Amador and Michael Jensen Mitchell. He had eight grandchildren.
A memorial service will be held Saturday in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. The family asks that memorial donations be made to the Rocky Mountain Down Syndrome Association or the Utah Down Syndrome Foundation.
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