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1 9 - 1 0 - 2 0 0 5 Progress in death inquiry
By Rocky Mountain News The Pueblo County sheriff says progress is being made in the investigation of Barbara Yaklich's mysterious 1977 death. Sheriff Dan Corsentino said a task force has completed about one- third of the investigation. Barbara Yaklich's death at 35 was attributed to natural causes. She was married to Pueblo police officer Dennis Yaklich and died unexpectedly on Valentine's Day 1977. Autopsy results blamed her death on a reaction to a diet drug and attributed the two liters of blood found in her abdomen to her husband's "energetic resuscitative" efforts. The case was reopened last month when two coroners reviewed the autopsy and came to a different conclusion that points to foul play. Dennis Yaklich was ambushed and killed in 1985 by two teens his second wife, Donna Yaklich, hired to kill him. The team is reviewing the original 1977 police work; seeking outside help from a forensic pathologist; and conducting interviews with family and retired police officers, Corsentino said. Made for TV Donna Yaklich's story was made into a movie that aired on the Lifetime cable network in 1994. • Title: Cries Unheard: The Donna Yaklich Story. • Internet Movie Database summary: "Donna Yaklich meets Dennis the policeman and thinks she might have found a good relationship. But Dennis is obsessed with weightlifting and uses steroids, which make him aggressive and abusive. Getting out of the relationship isn't easy as Dennis isn't willing to let her go, and Donna's options are narrowed down to one remaining alternative." 2 1 - 1 0 - 2 0 0 5 Donna Yaklich To Be Released After 18-Year Prison Term
Woman Convicted Of Conspiracy In Police Husband's Death
October 20, 2005 ARAPAHOE COUNTY, Colo. -- The Pueblo woman convicted of hiring two teens to kill her police detective husband is heading to a halfway house after spending almost 18 years in prison.
Donna Yaklich, 50, was ordered released from the Colorado Women's Correctional Facility in Canon City in the next 10 days and will be moving to a halfway house in Arapahoe County. The decision was made Thursday afternoon by the Arapahoe County Community Corrections Board. Yaklich was not at the hearing and learned of the decision by phone. She was arrested after Dennis Yaklich was gunned down in the driveway of their home in 1985 and eventually convicted of conspiracy to commit murder in the death. She was sentenced to 40 years in prison. Two brothers, Charles and Edward Greenwell, were also arrested and sentenced to prison terms for killing Yaklich. Charles Greenwell, who was 16 at the time of the crime, received a 20-year prison sentence; Eddie, then 25, received 30 years. Donna Yaklich maintained she was abused by her husband, who was a weightlifter and took steroids. She said she was afraid he would kill her. A state task force has reopened the investigation into the 1977 death of Dennis Yaklich's first wife. The original investigation concluded that Barbara Yaklich died of a diet drug overdose. Donna Yaklich has said she thinks her husband was involved in the death. The story of Donna Yaklich and her conviction was used in a 1994 made-for-TV movie, starring Jaclyn Smith of "Charlie's Angels" fame. 1 5 - 0 5 - 2 0 0 6 Death Investigation Of Police Officer's Wife Inconclusive
Homicide Can't Be Ruled Out, Probe Determines
TheDenverChannel.com PUEBLO, Colo. -- Homicide cannot be ruled out in the 1977 death of the wife of a prominent police detective partly because an investigation at the time was incomplete, a cold case team announced Friday. "This case needed some good, basic and old-fashioned police work," said Steve Johnson of the Colorado Bureau of Investigation and head of the team. "In my opinion, I have seen better documented traffic accidents." The case was reopened eight months ago after discrepancies were found in Barbara Yaklich's autopsy report. Questions about the case have swirled since Donna Yaklich, Dennis Yaklich's second wife, claimed her husband abused her and implied he had a part in Barbara Yaklich's death and could make her death look like an accident, too. Dennis Yaklich was killed in 1985 by two teenagers hired by Donna Yaklich, which inspired a 1994 made-for-TV movie. Donna Yaklich served 18 years of a 40-year sentence before being released last year. She is now living the Denver metro area. Cold case team members, which included detectives from the Denver police department and Pueblo sheriff's office, found no evidence of a cover up or conclusive evidence to rule Yaklich's death a homicide. The original autopsy said Yaklich fainted from taking diet pills and suffered bleeding in the abdomen when her husband, who was also a bodybuilder, tried to "energetically" resuscitate her. However, Denver-area pathologist Michael Dobersen found that the coroner's conclusions were "very unusual" and the "entire scenario is simply not credible," he wrote in a 2005 letter to Johnson. More likely, Dobersen wrote, Yaklich's internal damage was caused by a blow to the abdomen. A second forensic pathologist agreed. The cold case investigation into Barbara Yaklich's death is complete, but the case remains open. Her death is now listed as suspicious with the cause of death as blunt force trauma. |
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[Definitie:] "An ergogenic aid is any substance or phenomenon that enhances performance."
(Wilmore and Costill) 
