The Murder of Kenia Monge — Talk Murder With Me

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It’s a story we know all too well. A young woman stands in the entryway of a nightclub in the early hours of the morning. She is intoxicated and has wandered off, away from her friends, now finding herself alone outside. Her phone, purse and keys are still sitting on the table inside the club. Being Denver in April, there is a chill in the air, and all she has on is a light jacket over a short dress and a pair of heels. She just wants to go home and go to sleep.

When a man drives up and asks her if she needs help, she is quick to accept. In his early 30s, he is clean-cut, with a wide, charming smile. His teeth are perfectly straight and white. It's clear that he takes pride in his appearance. He also looks as though he is genuinely concerned for her welfare. He is just a friendly stranger, a good Samaritan looking to do a good deed, she thinks to herself. Plus, as the warm buzz from the alcohol is beginning to fade, she’s starting to feel the cold. So she gratefully climbs inside the vehicle.

No one would ever see her alive again.

An Unstoppable Force

Kenia Monge was not one to back down in the face of adversity.

Born Jan. 26, 1992 in Honduras, Kenia’s mother, Maria, was just 15 when she gave birth to her. In April of 1993, when Kenia was just a little over a year old, Maria left Honduras for the United States, leaving Kenia with her mother (Kenia’s grandmother). It was no doubt the hardest thing Maria had ever done. But at 16, she was still a child herself; moving to an all new country and navigating life there was difficult enough without a baby. She was doing what was best for Kenia.

Maria loved her daughter more than anything, and all she ever wanted was for Kenia to come live with her in America permanently. In 1994, Maria met a man named Anthony (Tony) Lee. They fell in love, married and had two children of their own, Kimberly (Kim) and Anthony.

In 2004, when Kenia was 12, she moved to the United States. It was Maria's dream come true; her family was finally whole. Kenia spoke very little English when she first arrived, but she was a fast learner and never let it hold her back.

To Maria's delight, Tony loved Kenia like she was his own daughter. It was just a matter of weeks after Kenia moved into her new home that she began calling Tony "dad". Kenia immediately bonded with her half-siblings, particularly Kim; the two became instant best friends. Everything just felt perfect.

Kenia and her mother, Maria (source: Facebook)

The Monge-Lee family lived in Aurora, Colorado, located directly east of Denver. As of 2019, Aurora had a population of 380,000. It is the third largest city in Colorado, known as the “Gateway to the Rockies”.

Having spent her childhood in Honduras, a country where poverty is widespread and opportunities are few and far between, when Kenia came to the United States, she never took anything for granted. She was determined to embrace all her new country had to offer. She excelled in her classes at Cherry Creek High School. On graduating, she began attending a local college in Denver where she studied broadcasting. By this point, she had moved out of her family home and was living in an apartment with her boyfriend, Lewis Easton.

Not only was Kenia highly intelligent, she was extremely kind and caring. She made friends easily, thanks to her warm and fun-loving personality. She had an active social life, but also enjoyed relaxing at home with her family.

Kenia had already achieved so much in her short life. She was ready to take on the world; everyone around her could see she was going places.

The Nightmare Begins

At 19, Kenia and her friends were not of legal drinking age, so they used fake IDs to gain entry to bars and clubs in downtown Denver.

Kenia's father, Tony Lee, said that he and her mother Maria did not know that Kenia and her friends had fake IDs and were using them to get into clubs. They had always viewed their daughter as responsible. She had never been in trouble with the law. But parents don’t know everything about their children. Kenia was, after all, still a teenager, and it's sort of expected that teens will rebel a little (or in some cases, a lot).

Kenia and her friends made plans to go out the evening of March 31, 2011. They eventually ended up at the 24K Lounge in downtown Denver. As the night progressed, they became very drunk. Kenia was just 4"11 and weighed between 90 and 115lbs, so it did not take much for her to feel the effects of alcohol.

I've read differing reports about how Kenia ended up outside the club, including that she told her friends she was going to the bathroom and never returned to the table. I also read that she was kicked out for being too drunk. Either way, she ended up outside on her own, without her purse, keys or her phone, which were sitting on the table with her friends inside the club.

I would assume that her friends looked for her but when they had no luck, they just thought she made her own way home or bumped into someone she knew and went off with them. However, something I could not figure out was how there were not serious alarm bells going off when they realized she had just left without her personal belongings she would normally have on her person at all times.

Kenia’s family would find out the following day that she had not spent the night with her usual group of friends, but rather two girls she was not as close with. The family had never met these girls before. Kenia had never gone on a night out with them, so they did not really know each other’s “nightclub behavior”, for example, if it was normal for Kenia to just wander off on her own.

The Following Morning

On the morning of Friday April 1, Kenia's boyfriend, Lewis, became worried when he realized Kenia had not come home the night before. There were no calls or messages on his phone from her either. She had been on plenty of nights out and always made it back to their apartment. If she didn't, he was sure that she would have let him know where she was going.

Sounding the alarm, Lewis called Kenia's sister, Kim, asking if she had seen or heard anything from Kenia. Kim replied that she had not. He told her that she needed to talk to her parents right away and find out if they had heard anything.

Kim called her parents, telling them that Kenia had not come home last night. Both Tony and Maria rushed home from work right away. They called everybody they could think of who might have an idea of where Kenia was. According to her close group of friends she usually went out with, Kenia had spent the night with her “other friends'', and they had not seen her at all the night before.

That afternoon, the two friends Kenia had been out with came to the Monge-Lee home. Tony, Maria and Kim were frantic, hurling question after question at the girls about what happened the night before. To Tony and Maria’s dismay, they admitted that they had used fake IDs to get into the 24K nightclub. The last time they saw Kenia was just after midnight, they added.

The girls also brought along Kenia’s purse with her phone, keys and wallet inside, which they explained she had left on a table at the club. At that, Tony, Maria and Kim felt their hearts sink. Kenia going anywhere without her phone was unheard of. There was no doubt in their minds that something was seriously wrong.

A Mysterious Message

"Hey this is Travis, the guy who gave you a ride last night - white creepy van :-) did you get home okay?"

The text message had come from a number that was not saved on Kenia’s phone. Tony, who had discovered the message, felt a jolt of adrenaline. This was huge. Travis, whoever he was, might know Kenia's whereabouts. He called the number repeatedly, but nobody answered.

Frustrated and overcome with worry, Tony and Maria made the decision to file a missing person's report. But when Tony explained the situation, the officer on the line was dismissive and unsympathetic, telling him that she would probably turn up soon. Besides, they could not file a report until she had been missing for 72 hours.

The following day, Saturday April 2, Travis, who Tony had been trying to get in touch with, finally called back. He relayed to Tony an elaborate story about how he had seen Kenia on the street outside 24K talking to a homeless man at around 2:30 a.m. He asked her if she needed help and she said that yes, she needed to get her car, which was parked at another club. Kenia was very drunk, Travis told Tony, so he offered to give Kenia a ride to her car.

(Given she had left her car keys at 24K, and how intoxicated she was, I'm not sure what she would have done when she got to her car, but anyway.)

They drove to the club but couldn't find her car, so Travis offered to give her a ride home. She told him where she lived (the apartment she shared with her boyfriend), and he said it was super close to the bakery where he rented a workspace, so he knew it well. He began driving in that direction. But then Kenia said she wanted to buy cigarettes (except she didn't have any money...), so they stopped at a Conoco gas station. However, the station was closed. Then Kenia saw an Asian man standing nearby smoking, who Travis referred to as "Dan". Kenia approached Dan, and he gave her a cigarette. They smoked and were speaking to each other in Spanish, then they walked off together. That was the last he saw of her, Travis told Tony.

Tony was pretty suspicious of Travis's outlandish story, but he thanked him for the information.

Once again, Tony called the police, telling them that he had spoken to this man Travis who told him that Kenia had wandered off with some guy she met at a gas station in the middle of the night. He pleaded with them to file a missing person's report, but they still refused because it had not been long enough.

Understandably, Tony was upset at the lack of concern. He called Travis again and began grilling him. Travis suggested that he and Tony meet at the Conoco gas station where he had last seen Kenia. Tony agreed, saying he could be there right away.

On hanging up the phone, Tony went and grabbed his 9mm handgun. Maria asked what he was doing. Tony explained that he was going to meet with Travis at the gas station. The police were not helping, so he had to take matters into his own hands.

Maria's mind began racing; she did not like this at all. Her husband was going to meet this mystery man, whom they knew nothing about. He could be dangerous. And he was bringing his gun? What if his emotions overcame him and he did something irrational?

Maria begged him not to go. He had no choice, he told her. Then he was gone.

A Strange Meeting

Maria was so worried, she called the police, telling them where Tony was going and that he was carrying a gun (this is legal, just in case you were wondering - Colorado is an open-carry state). They agreed to send an officer to the Conoco station where Tony and Travis planned to meet in case things got out of hand.

When Tony arrived, the police officer was already there, as well as Travis and a friend he had brought along. He had parked his white van and came over to talk to Tony. He gave the same account he had given on the phone to Tony earlier that day. He (Travis) and Kenia had sat in his van in the gas station parking lot, after she asked him to stop so she could buy cigarettes. She was very upset, so he tried to teach her breathing exercises to calm her down. When she saw a man walking by smoking (“Dan”) she got out of Travis's van and asked for a cigarette. Then the two walked away together.

Tony studied Travis as he spoke. He seemed genuine and trustworthy. From his appearance, Tony did not get the feeling that he was some sort of hardened criminal (then again, what is a hardened criminal supposed to look like, right?) But his story just sounded off. Tony could not imagine Kenia just wandering off with some man she met at a gas station in the middle of the night. The police officer also thought the story sounded strange. He asked that Tony give him and Travis some privacy while he asked a few more questions.

While the officer spoke to Travis, Tony walked in the direction of Travis’s van. As he got closer, he was hit with an overwhelming smell of bleach. This really threw him. He took the officer aside and told him about the odor emanating from the van. The officer approached the van and experienced the same thing - an intense chemical smell he could not ignore.

Person of Interest

Before I continue with this story, I’m going to go back and briefly look at Travis Forbes’ criminal history, which is pretty extensive. This information came from this article in the Denver Post.

In 2011, Travis was 31-years-old. When he was 17, he was charged with breaking into 16 different homes and businesses in Fort Collins, CO, stealing over $15,000 worth of cash and goods. When police searched his room, they discovered pairs of women’s underwear which had been "vandalized" - they were ripped and the letter "M" had been written on them in black marker pen.

Travis was convicted on two counts of felony burglary, and sentenced to 9 years in prison. But instead of going to prison, he was ordered to enroll in a military camp, according to Court Junkie. However, he spent less than 2 months at the camp before being kicked out. He was then placed on probation.

In 1998, he was arrested for criminal harassment while still on probation. In 1999, he was caught carrying a knife, violating his probation once again. He broke his curfew 43 times. This resulted in him being sent to community corrections.

A prison mugshot of Travis Forbes (source: The Denver Post)

He was charged with assault in 2004 for throwing rocks at women jogging in Highlands Ranch, CO. He pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of “harassment involving physical force” and went to jail for one month.

I couldn't find when this was exactly, but Travis also told 9News Denver that he "used to be a drug addict and would steal Demerol from dentist offices". He was convicted of burglary and spent 3 years in prison.

At the time that Kenia disappeared, he was on probation for a domestic violence charge.

Denver homicide Detective Louis Estrada, spoke of how Travis’s criminal history was one which started with relatively minor offenses and progressed into more violent crime.

“It started with burglaries, theft, and moved on to harassment, assault,” said Estrada. “It started to get a little more severe every time.”

Estrada believed that violence gave Travis thrills. Two of his ex-girlfriends described him as going through a sort of “transformation” when engaging in sexual role-playing.

“He had this real “screeching” look on his face,” Estrada said. “He really enjoyed the pain he inflicted on them.” (I’m not sure what screeching means in this context)

So Travis did not have a great track record. What sticks out to me is the stolen women’s underwear found in his room, which is never a sign of anything good. Plus his pelting rocks at random women indicates a resentment of females. Furthermore, he does not appear to be someone who learns from his mistakes, having broken his curfew 43 times. But then again, it’s more likely that he just didn't care.

Now back to Kenia’s case. The police officer at the gas station asked Travis if he could take a look inside his van. Travis agreed to let him do so. On opening the back door of the vehicle, he revealed an absolutely spotless interior, complete with brand new carpeting. But the front of the van, around the driver and passenger seats, was a complete mess with food wrappers and other garbage strewn everywhere.

The officer found this suspicious, but it was not reason enough to hold him. Travis agreed to write out his statement from the night Kenia disappeared.

As they were about to leave, Travis approached Tony once more. He began blubbering like a baby and apologizing to Tony, saying that he “wished he had followed through on what he started”. Tony thanked him for his help and put out his hand for him to shake. When Travis took it, however, his hand was shaking violently. According to Tony, it was there and then that he just knew - Travis was the last person to see Kenia alive.

The Investigation Finally Begins

After 72 hours had passed - which to Kenia's family felt more like a month - the investigation into her disappearance began on Monday, April 4.

Kenia's family and friends spent the preceding days handing out missing person's fliers and searching everywhere they could think of. There were posters everywhere you looked. Kenia's disappearance affected so many; the entire community was in a state of shock.

Leading the investigation was Denver police Detective Nash Gurule of the Missing and Exploited Persons Unit. Detective Estrada was there to assist, were it to become a homicide investigation.

On April 5, surveillance footage of Travis Forbes was given to detectives by the owner of Deby's Bakery and Cafe, Monica Poole. The footage was from April 1. The bakery, located on S. Trenton Way in Aurora, was where Travis rented a space to bake his gluten-free granola bars for his business - the bars were called "Forbies" and he sold them to other businesses in the area.

On April 6, Travis was brought into the Denver Police Station for a formal interview. He repeated the story he told Tony and the police officer when they met at the gas station on April 2. After he left the Conoco gas station, he said, he went to his girlfriend, Kerry Humphrey's home, arriving between 3 and 3:30 a.m. He said he left for work at 8:30 a.m. on April 1.

When detectives examined Travis's phone records, however, they revealed that he was nowhere near Kerry Humphrey's home. This would be the first time they caught him in a lie.

Detectives were not feeling good at this point about the prospects of finding Kenia alive. On April 8, Denver Police spokesman Lt. Matthew Murray commented on the severity of the situation:

"We get lots of missing cases. No one thinks this girl ran away. We have reason to believe that what took place is not good. We are very concerned."

Red Flags Popping Up Everywhere

Monica Poole, the owner of Deby's Bakery, had a wealth of information regarding Travis Forbes that she was eager to tell detectives.

She told them that she was dismayed when she went into the bakery on the morning of April 2 and realized her surveillance cameras had been turned off. She checked the recordings, and the one right before the cameras were turned off showed Travis, alone in the bakery, at around 7:30 p.m. on April 1. She could see he was wearing long latex cleaning gloves.

Despite what Travis had said to detectives about leaving his girlfriend's home for work on April 1, he was not actually scheduled to come into the bakery that day, Monica told them.

Detectives viewed the footage from before the cameras were turned off. It showed Travis rolling a cart with a large, white cooler on top into the walk-in freezer in the bakery. The cooler had been duct-taped shut. He was then caught on film carrying a roll of carpet into the bakery. Next, he walked back out to his van holding what appeared to be a bottle of bleach. He then turned off the surveillance cameras.

A still from the surveillance footage of Travis wheeling the cooler into the bakery’s walk-in freezer from his van. You can watch the 17-second clip here.

Detectives interviewed other business owners in the buildings surrounding Deby's. One man told them he had seen a 55 gallon barrel being burned by two men behind Deby's Bakery later in the evening of April 1. A white van was parked nearby, he added.

On the afternoon of April 2, another business owner told detectives he had seen Travis cleaning a large white cooler in the back of his van, which was parked behind the bakery.

When Monica asked Travis what he had been burning, he told her it was marijuana that had gotten moldy. He explained that he turned the cameras off because he was going to change his clothes. He lies all the time, she told the detectives.

She also noticed that he had a gash on his arm, which he said was a result of being attacked by a homeless man as he slept in his van.

Travis Forbes, Ultimate Gaslighter

Kenia's case was all over every news channel in Colorado, as well as making headlines out of state.

Travis Forbes, who clearly thought himself to be a pretty good actor, seemed to be enjoying giving interviews to the media. It's pretty sickening, watching to him act like a concerned citizen.

You can hear his interview with 9News on the Court Junkie episode at 28:37 - unfortunately I couldn't find the clip to put here.

He's very emotional in the interview, going over all the things he "could have done" in relation to his made up story about Kenia going off with the strange man she met at the gas station.

Then he seems to pretend that he forgot Kenia's name, which is absurd. He kept referring to her as "the missing girl". Her story was everywhere and if you're the main suspect in the case (as he acknowledged he was) you do not forget the victim's name.

Detective Gurule believed that Travis had an agenda when he spoke to the media; he was fishing for information from reporters about what detectives might know.

“They like to get in there and see what the cops know. I’ve never personally had that happen until now,” Gurule said.

Travis Flees to Texas

Despite suspicions mounting against him, Travis fled the state. I believe this was about a month after Kenia’s disappearance, so late April/early May.

Monica Poole, owner of Deby’s Bakery, recalled that in addition to behaving suspiciously on the surveillance footage, Travis also said and did some bizarre things in the weeks following Kenia’s disappearance.

He approached her asking if she wanted to buy $1,000 worth of oats for $100, and ended up selling them for $50. Then he started muttering about how he would have to change his name and leave the country because “that girl ruined my life”.

Not long after this exchange, Travis got in his friend’s car and drove to Austin, Texas.

The Investigation Continues

Detectives continued to scrutinize every detail of Travis’s story. The fact that he had just disappeared did not really help his case either. Innocent people don’t tend to make a run for it when an investigation begins heating up.

They questioned Travis’s girlfriend, Kerry Humphrey, whom Travis said he had been with between 3 a.m. and 8:30 a.m. on April 1. She confirmed his story.

But remember how I mentioned earlier that detectives obtained Travis’s phone records and they showed that he was not, in fact, anywhere near Kerry’s home at this time? He was actually in Keenesburg, a tiny rural town about 40 miles northeast of Denver. While in Keenesburg, detectives found that he had made several calls.

Police would search Keenesburg 15 times over the five months that followed. They searched on foot, horseback, and used helicopters. While they were technically still searching for a living person, they unfortunately knew they also had to search ditches and waterways for human remains. Nothing ever came of these searches, despite how thoroughly they were conducted.

Travis is Arrested

On May 4, after leaving Colorado in his friend's car, Travis was arrested in Austin, Texas on suspicion of car theft.

Detective Gurule flew to Austin, where he met Travis in a police station. He interviewed him for 3 hours about everything their investigation had turned up so far, particularly the surveillance footage from the bakery.

“He just explained everything away,” Gurule said. “He had an excuse for everything: the barrel, the cooler, everything.”

When asked about what he was burning in the barrel on the night of April 1, Travis gave Gurule the same answer he had given Monica Poole - "moldy marijuana". Travis asked why Gurule had not arrested him.

"You guys were so close", he said, taunting the detective.

Travis refused to give certain details about whether he had sex with Kenia in his van and asked for a lawyer. Gurule then presented Travis with a search warrant to collect a sample of his DNA.

On June 30, Travis was extradited back to Jefferson County, Colorado. However, his friend dropped the car theft charges against him, so he was released.

Nightmare in Fort Collins

Once back in Colorado, Travis went to live in Fort Collins (his hometown) with his father. Fort Collins is home to Colorado State University. So it was not the sort of place detectives wanted Travis living, considering they suspected him of murdering a female college student.

However, Denver detectives were surveilling Travis Forbes. They followed him when he went out to bars and nightclubs, and witnessed him being stopped by Fort Collins police (I believe this was on July 1). He was very drunk, yelling and making a nuisance of himself. The Denver detectives approached the Fort Collins police, explaining to them who Travis was and why they were surveilling him.

After being stopped by police that first night, Travis seemed to calm down. Denver detectives could not justify continuing to surveil him when he was not making trouble. So after 3 nights, they ended their surveillance. This was one decision the Denver detectives would regret for the remainder of their careers.

This is the point in this story that for me points to Travis being a sadist with a very real and dangerous compulsion to hurt women.

Homicide Detective Estrada would later say:

“He has this inner evil, this demon. He can’t control it.”

On July 4, a mere four days after arriving back in Colorado, Travis went out on the hunt in downtown Fort Collins. I say it “on the hunt” because he was literally prowling around, looking for a woman to viciously attack.

Lydia Tillman, who was 30 at the time, was originally from Longmont, Colorado. She had been working in New York as a sommelier for six years before moving back to Colorado at the beginning of 2011.

That July 4, Lydia was walking home after watching the fireworks display in downtown Fort Collins. Being new to the area, she didn’t know many people.

Once the fireworks were finished, she began walking home to her apartment. She did not know she was being followed.

Travis Forbes pushed Lydia into her apartment where he raped and strangled her. He then beat her, punching her repeatedly in the face, smashing her jaw and causing severe head trauma. Lydia fought back, kicking and scratching him, but he was physically stronger and far larger than she was. She eventually stopped fighting him and lay still. Before he left, he doused her naked body with bleach. Then he set the apartment on fire.

Something in Lydia, an innate instinct to survive, forced her up from where she lay so badly beaten and bloodied. She had to get out. She threw herself out the window of her second story apartment, escaping from the flames.

By the time she jumped, firefighters, police and an ambulance were at the scene, having responded to a report of the blaze. Lydia was transported to hospital.

Lydia was asked by paramedics if she knew the man who attacked her. She replied that she did not. Devastatingly, shortly after arriving at the hospital, she suffered a stroke. She was in a coma for five weeks.

Fire and Bleach

Bleach had been spread throughout the apartment before it was set on fire, so police had nothing to work with in terms of finding forensic evidence.

However, investigators were able to collect microscopic DNA from under Lydia's fingernails. This was sent to the lab for analysis.

On July 7, Fort Collins Detective Jaclyn Shaklee, who was leading the investigation into the attack on Lydia, got in touch with Detective Gurule, asking about the “suspicious man” Denver detectives had been surveilling in Fort Collins on July 1. Shaklee explained how, after examining the details in both cases, she thought the same person who attacked Lydia could be responsible for Kenia Monge’s disappearance.

“There was silence on the other end of the phone,” Shaklee said. “This was almost so freakishly similar it has to be the same guy.”

Detective Gurule was convinced that Lydia’s attack was the work of Travis Forbes. The detail about the bleach in the apartment caught his attention in particular.

"I said, you know, 'It sounds like him…he likes bleach. This is his thing," Gurule said.

Bringing Down Travis Forbes

Everyone was on edge in the days following the attack on Lydia. Detectives were really close to catching their guy, however.

Travis was once again being surveilled by officers from both Fort Collins and Denver. He spent his evenings downtown, not going into bars, but just stalking the streets and leering at women.

In the early hours of July 10, officers watched as Travis spoke to a woman for a good 30 minutes. When they began walking off together, an officer approached Travis and began asking him questions. Visibly nervous, he told the officer that his name was Travis Kennedy. He did not did not have any ID, a phone number and he couldn’t remember his address, he told the officer. By that point, the woman Travis had been talking to was long gone. They had to let him go.

Then Travis reappeared about 20 minutes later, having changed his T-shirt and put on a hat. Now he was following another woman, who was visibly drunk. This was a disaster just waiting to happen. They needed to get him off the streets.

At around 3 a.m., they arrested him for lying about his name to the police. They did not mention that he was suspected of the attack on Lydia Tillman. They were only holding him for a misdemeanor and he would easily be able to make bond.

At 10:45 p.m. on July 11, Travis was literally minutes away from posting bond. But forensic investigators had been working tirelessly to analyze the DNA found under Lydia’s fingernails. They compared it to the sample Gurule had taken from Travis while he was being held in Austin on car theft charges.

It was a match.

Around midnight on July 12, Travis was rebooked at the jail in Fort Collins on suspicion of attempted murder, sexual assault and arson.

Travis Makes a Deal

From here, everything began to happen really fast.

It was not until Aug. 26 that Gurule went to Fort Collins to interview Travis in jail. He wanted as solid a case as possible against him for Kenia’s disappearance.

"We want to have a strong case -- a case that we know, that when we get into a courtroom, that the jury is gonna say, 'This guy killed her, this guy did this,'" Gurule said.

But as it turned out, Gurule did not need to spend all this time preparing himself for the interview. Travis made it very easy for detectives.

“I’ll tell you everything, but I want a deal,” Travis said to Gurule.

He told Gurule exactly what happened in early morning hours of April 1. In return, he asked that he not go to prison labelled as a sex offender, and prosecutors not pursue the death penalty against him.

“Because if I go to prison as a sex offender, I’m f**ked,” he said.

Travis's account of what happened is as follows: He and a friend had seen Kenia alone near the 24K nightclub talking to a homeless man and asked her if she needed help getting home. They tried to get her a cab to her boyfriend's apartment, but they couldn't find one, so the three of them got into Travis's van. Travis dropped his friend off at his apartment.

Then Kenia passed out in the van. Travis pulled over and climbed on top of her, trying to rape her, but she woke up and began fighting him. So he strangled her to death.

He placed her body in the cooler he had in his van, duct-taping it shut. Then he put the cooler in the freezer at Deby's Bakery until he figured out where he would bury her. He decided on Keenesburg, where he dug a shallow grave under a grove of cottonwood trees near Interstate 76.

On returning to the bakery, Travis cleaned the inside of his van with bleach and burned everything Kenia had touched in the 55-gallon barrel.

On Sept. 7, Travis, his attorney and Detectives Gurule, Estrada and Shaklee went to Keenesburg so Travis could show them where Kenia’s grave was. When they arrived, he became visibly emotional, breaking down in tears.

The grave was about four feet deep. She was in a fetal position, covered in a plastic tarp.

The memorial for Kenia where her body was found (source: Court Junkie Podcast)

As they drove back to Fort Collins, Travis said to Gurule:

“Are you happy, Nash? Are you happy you found her? Are you happy you got her back?”

Travis Pleads Guilty

On Sept. 26, 2011, Travis pleaded guilty to the first degree murder of Kenia Monge during his advisement hearing, where he was to be advised of the charges he was facing. This is rare; defendants almost never enter a plea this early in the process.

"What I did was horrible and cowardly. It was a mistake," he sobbed. "Please remember me, remember me as I was, not as the monster I have become."

Immediately after, he was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

He also pleaded guilty to the attempted murder of Lydia Tillman. He said:

“Why did I do this? I have been searching for that also in my heart and soul. I think we commit violent acts because deep down we find hatred of ourselves. I am so thankful that Lydia Tillman survived because if I hadn’t been caught, I probably would have done this again because deep down I’m f**ked up. I’m evil.”

Lydia wrote her statement just days after waking up from her coma. She could not read it aloud herself, however, as she struggled to speak as a result of her jaw being crushed and the stroke. It was read aloud by Larimer County District Judge Thomas French:

“Travis Forbes, you caused me no harm. My spirit, my soul and my mind remain untouched. May you find peace in this life. It was my intention to find the strength in my heart to forgive Travis Forbes. I did. I felt extreme anger toward him, then I felt sad for him. He must be in so much extreme pain to so brutally hurt another human.”

Judge French sentenced Travis to 48 years in prison, to be served consecutively with the life sentence he received for Kenia’s murder.

Kerry Humphrey

On Oct. 5, 2011 Travis’s girlfriend, Kerry, was arrested on suspicion of attempting to influence a public official.

Detectives had brought her in for further questioning about Travis’s alibi, which she had originally confirmed, saying he was with her between 3 and 8:30 a.m. on April 1. They showed her the GPS coordinates from Travis’s phone, which proved she was lying; Travis had been in Keenesburg at that time.

Kerry told detectives that Travis had asked her to lie about where he was that night, and she did not ask any questions.

She pleaded guilty to one count of attempting to influence a public official, one count of perjury, plus two counts of false reporting to authorities.

On Sept. 14, 2012, she was sentenced to 60 days in jail and four years of supervised probation. She also was ordered to carry out 2,000 hours of community service and seek mental-health counseling.

Some Thoughts on Travis Forbes

The more I learned about this story, the more I got Ted Bundy vibes from Travis Forbes. Be prepared for some of my amateur psychoanalysis here; this might be complete and utter garbage, but bear with me. Like Bundy, Travis has this “All-American”, clean cut look about him. He’s charismatic, and can turn on the charm when he needs to. He’s also a narcissist and a pathological liar.

Travis Forbes’s most recent prison photo (source: Colorado Dept. of Corrections Inmate Search)

The part that threw me a little is how emotional Travis was throughout; he cried when talking to Kenia’s dad, when speaking to the media, when leading detectives to Kenia’s body and at his sentencing hearings. Was it all an act? Or was he feeling genuine remorse?

Travis thought he was smarter than everyone else, including the detectives on the case. He had his fun, stringing them along for five months before confessing. But he confessed on his terms. He wanted a deal. I’m pretty sure that he saw the ultimate outcome as a win for himself.

I also have zero doubt in my mind that had Travis not been caught, he would have kept assaulting and killing women.

Lydia’s Awe-Inspiring Journey

Despite being put through absolute hell, Lydia has pushed herself relentlessly throughout her recovery. She truly is an incredible force.

By 2013, she really began to get her life back, working part-time, doing yoga, some travel, driving and living on her own. In May 2013, she underwent jaw surgery.

She assists the Arvada, Colorado Police Department in teaching women self-defense.

In 2014, she graduated from the Bikram Yoga College of India in Los Angeles, California and has since moved back to Colorado to teach yoga full time.

Kenia’s Legacy

Kenia’s family established The Kenia Monge Foundation “to provide women and children in Colorado with resources, education, and funding to engage in safe, healthy, and productive behaviors and activities in the community. In addition, The Kenia Monge Foundation will provide the families of victims of violent crime and families of missing victims with the emotional, physical, and financial support they need to survive the tragic event.”

On Sept. 16, 2011, a memorial service was held at Glory to Glory Christian Center in Aurora. Hundreds of people attended to honor Kenia, who touched so many lives during her short time on Earth.

At the service, Kenia’s sister Kim gave an especially moving tribute to her big sister:

“I’m not saying goodbye, I’m saying see you later. I’ll see you when God calls me home with you. I don’t quite understand why you had to leave us all so soon, but God always has a purpose. I’m not going to look at this as a loss, I’m going to look at this as a gain. I’ve gained a guardian angel and one that I know I can trust. Rest in paradise big sister, see you when it’s my time. I love you and you are always and definitely are missed.”

Kenia Monge, 1.26.1992 - 1.4.2011 (source: Find a Grave)

Sources

Court Junkie Podcast has a fantastic and incredibly informative episode on this case, in which the host, Jillian, interviews Kenia’s parents. It’s where I got some more of the details in this article regarding the conversations Tony Lee had with Travis Forbes. I highly recommended the podcast in general, as every episode is excellent.

Kenia Yulissa Monge (1992-2011)

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