COLORADO TOWN ADOPTS FUGITIVE AS FOLK HERO

CRESTED BUTTE, Colo. (AP) - For a man in hiding, Neil Murdoch
lived a very public life.

For 25 years, when he wasn't feuding with town leaders over
buildings for the arts, he was promoting mountain biking. Or wearing a
diaper to a frosty night's New Year's Eve party. Or tangling with the
law for scattering rocks on a road to stop speeders in this mountain
town of 1,500.

So folks were astounded when U.S. marshals marched in last April,
announcing that Murdoch wasn't Murdoch but Richard Gordon Bannister,
57, wanted for jumping bail in 1973 in Albuquerque, N.M., after his
arrest on charges of intending to distribute 26 pounds of cocaine.

Murdoch bolted again, and now he's a folk hero to many of the locals,
who refuse to help the marshals find him.

`He's already paid'

``I don't know Bannister. I knew Murdoch, and he did a lot for this
community,'' said former Mayor Mickey Cooper, a developer. ``He's
already paid for what he did in ways none of us could ever guess. If
someone wants a manhunt, I won't help them.''

That Attitude Angers Marshals.

``He's not a folk hero. He's an accused drug trafficker,'' said Larry
Homenick, chief deputy in the Denver office of the U.S. Marshals Service.

Early on, Homenick said, ``people were not cooperating, not giving us
information that could've led to an immediate capture.'' But now, he
said, investigators do not believe Murdoch is keeping in touch with
anyone in Crested Butte.

Investigators learned of Murdoch's true identity when he slipped up,
using his real Social Security number in applying for a job.

Marshals questioned him April 28 but let him go, convinced they had
made a mistake. Two days later, the marshals returned to this town 250
miles southwest of Denver, intending to arrest him, only to find
Murdoch had fled.

Residents rallied, and sold 2,000 ``Free Murdoch'' stickers for $2
apiece. Council members donned Murdoch masks and marched in the Fourth
of July parade, pursued by someone in an FBI hat. One local, Jay
Mayfield, wrote ``Ode to Murdoch,'' which reads in part:

``Don't know the specifics /

of his chosen name and crime/

but it seems like he's been/

rehabilitated with time.''

Theater officials gave the fugitive a Golden Marmot award, their
lighthearted version of the Oscar, for best acting.

``We gave it to him in absentia, of course,'' Cooper said. ``He did a
great job of acting for 25 years.''

In Crested Butte, Murdoch lived alone in a downstairs apartment and
opened a shop devoted to mountain biking. He volunteered at the
community theater and at a day care center.

``He raised my two kids,'' said Jeff Neumann, who worked with Murdoch
at a printing business. No one knew Murdoch's background, and no one
asked, Neumann said.

``In a small town like Crested Butte, we take people for who they are.
We don't hold their past against them,'' he said. He added: ``People
feel they've lost a valuable member of the community. It's like he
died. We feel a loss, and we're grieving.''

Not A Hero To All

Town Manager Bill Crank, who has known Murdoch for 25 years, insisted
Murdoch is ``not my hero.'' ``I don't think the people who are touting
Murdoch have talked to the guy who had his Social Security number
stolen. I understand he's pretty angry,'' Crank said.

At the same time, Crank said: ``Hell, I don't know if I'd turn him in
or not. It's kind of comical: The feds lost him for 25 years, then
they found him, then they lost him again. It's all sort of amusing.''

Checked-by: Patrick Henry