Surveillance Video Shows Trash Scattered Across Park After 4/20 Festival
DENVER (CBS4)- The country's largest 4/20 festival left something behind that didn't sit well with Denver residents-- trash was strewn across Civic Center Park Friday morning, covering the grass and brick walkways.
Water bottles, smashed food, and other nasty garbage littered the park lawn and pavement.
Organizers said the trash had been cleaned up after the event, and that someone had then dumped out close to 80 bags of garbage overnight.
Surveillance footage released by Denver police show Civic Center Park covered in trash in the aftermath of the 4/20 festival.
The video, recorded on a handful of the City of Denver's HALO cameras, show trash scattered throughout the Greek Amphitheater section of the park, hours after the festival ended.
The videos neither prove nor disprove reports that the trash from the 4/20 Festival was redistributed across the park by someone opening the sealed bags, as the event producer has claimed.
"The park had been picked up last night," explained Santino Walter, who produced the 4/20 event. "All the trash had been placed in about 74 big trash bags."
He believed the trash bags were dumped out by a few individuals who may have been hungry.
"This was my fault," Walter said. "This was a producer mistake. I should have at midnight when I staged all the stuff, I should have made sure that we were set up to have all the trash bags thrown into the roll-off."
On Friday morning, a Denver police spokesman suggested that with strong overnight winds, the trash could have been blown around if the pile from the event we not secured.
4/20 organizers have until Friday at midnight in order to clean up any remaining mess before the event permit expires.
A petition posted by Friends of Civic Center Park on Change.org is asking for Denver's future 4/20 rally to find a new home.
The petition referenced crime, noise, and trash disgracing the national historic landmark.