YODER • Except for the “Private Property” sign nailed to a pole at the crossroads, the half-mile of dirt-packed dead-end in eastern El Paso County looks like the rest of the roads here, a fence-lined etch through endless tumbleweed plains dotted with the occasional barn, outbuilding and ranch-style home.

It’s the kind of route you wouldn’t take unless you got hopelessly lost, or knew precisely where you’re going and that they’re expecting you.

This dusty strip of easement between properties owned by Black ranchers Courtney and Nicole Mallery and their neighbor, Teresa Clark, who is white, is ground zero of a Colorado feud that’s led to restraining orders and felony charges. Their story now is drawing global scrutiny and dividing neighbors in what residents describe as a hard-working, isolated agricultural community where people rely on one another to get by, even if they don’t always see eye to eye.

The fight between the Mallerys and their neighbor didn’t start when the Mallerys aired their side in a story published last month by Ark Republic, an online media outlet based in New Jersey. But that’s where it gained steam and went viral.

In that piece, the Mallerys told of a horrifying tale of hate-based terror and intimidation that feels like it was ripped from the Jim Crow era of America’s Deep South. After they raised a Black Lives Matter flag and signs on their property, Freedom Acres Ranch, the Mallerys said they’d suffered abuse and threats online and in person by anonymous people in trucks, with guns. Their animals had been killed, their chicken coop set ablaze, and their surveillance system disabled by high-tech jamming devices.

When a ranchhand who worked for the Mallerys was shot dead in Rush, about 14 miles from their Yoder ranch, Courtney Mallery said he believed it was a “clear message” to the couple to get out or else. The body of 43-year-old Donaciano Amaya was found May 21, 2021, and his killer remains at large.

The Mallerys said the El Paso County Sheriff’s Office had ignored and dismissed their complaints, and they accused one deputy of being complicit in the hate crimes they described as being committed against them.

The couple’s story went nuclear early last week when Courtney Mallery was arrested Monday by the El Paso County Sheriff’s Office on accusations including a Class 5 felony charge of stalking.

The NAACP vowed to investigate. By Tuesday, a rally supporting the Mallerys was being organized in Denver. By Thursday, influencers were sharing the story online and one Twitter thread inspired by a post and story link, from an account with fewer than 2,000 followers, had garnered almost 7 million views. And by Saturday, a GoFundMe campaign launched in January on their behalf, with a $25,000 goal, had galloped past $130,000.

But this story that began small, with a they said/they said squabble over property rights, this Hatfields and McCoys with an ugly racial twist and no love story, is messier than the dueling narratives that are taking off and touching raw nerves on both sides.

Neighbor Valerie Clayborn said the feud and its fallout have left her wondering whether she and her late husband made the wrong decision moving here from Widefield in 2012.

We “moved here for peace and tranquility. We loved it out here, but now I question myself,” she said. “I’m worried for the Mallerys. I’m worried for us, also. I feel like I’m back in the 1800s.”

Before tensions in Yoder ran red, before sides were picked, and neighbors started answering their doors to strangers with gun in hand, life wasn’t easy around this strip of non-road in a beautiful but barren region dominated by agricultural operations and long-haul commuters living beyond Colorado Springs’ eastern exurbs.

This part of El Paso County, rimmed by distant peaks but with a distinctly Kansas vibe, is home to roughly six people per square mile. Yoder has a post office but no town hall or community gathering spot since PJ’s General Store in Rush closed. Checking in on what your neighbors are up to from your own yard, in most cases, requires a powerful pair of binoculars.

But people still talk.

Residents with knowledge of the situation between the Mallerys and Teresa Clark, who owns the Crazy Ewe Ranch, say the two families initially had a congenial, if not close, relationship.

“They started out like regular neighbors,” said a Yoder resident who asked not to be named.

The Mallerys and the Clarks live about a mile apart, but as their disagreement over rights to the easement caused a growing estrangement, they began to see a lot more of each other.

In December 2021, the Mallerys took out a restraining order against Clark that required her to stay at least 100 yards from the property except when she was going to or from her own home. Her driveway lies about 1,000 feet down the easement between their ranches. 

On Sept. 8, 2022, Clark was arrested for violating that order. According to the affidavit, Nicole Mallery called the Sheriff’s Office after seeing Clark trespass onto her property to approach one of the video surveillance cameras she and her husband installed on posts at and near the boundary between their land, lenses trained toward the easement.

In the video, Clark is seen approaching one of the cameras and taking a photo with her cellphone before moving out of view, according to the arrest warrant. Nicole Mallery told police she believed her neighbor had tampered with the video security system.

Clark posted $500 bail on Sept. 14, according to court records.

On Nov. 22, Nicole Mallery was arrested on two counts of felony stalking after Clark contacted police and showed them a voluminous “stalking log” she’d been keeping since late April 2021, about eight months after the Mallerys moved to town.

“Each page had space for 10 entries. The log was created to show that the Mallery’s (sic) have no fear of her (Clark), and that they are actually going out of their way to put her in fear for her safety” by repeatedly driving along the easement between their properties, and using a gate that opens onto that dirt lane to access their land, even though it’s far removed from the main entrance.

Nicole Mallery posted $2,000 bail in December and was due back in court last week. The Gazette was unable to ascertain the outcome of that hearing or whether it had occurred.

Then on Feb. 6, Courtney Mallery was arrested on a December warrant for felony stalking. His arrest warrant was similar to his wife’s, but also included alleged misdemeanor crimes of tampering with a utility meter to power a surveillance camera supposedly used to spy on Clark, and petty theft of a trash can kept on the easement.

According to arrest documents obtained by The Gazette,  Clark is listed as the stalking victim in Courtney Mallery’s arrest. She has declined a request for comment. Courtney Mallery’s bail was set at $6,000, three times what the prosecution requested during his preliminary court appearance Tuesday.

El Paso District and County Magistrate Deborah Pearson said she came to the decision after considering the long history of conflict, complaints and investigations by the Sheriff’s Office, and because of concern “about the risk to the community and the victim.”

Back at the ranch with her husband on Wednesday, Nicole Mallery said she believes the Sheriff’s Office never took their claims of being harassed and victimized seriously.

“(The Sheriff’s Office) is supposed to protect and serve, and that’s not happening for me,” Nicole Mallery said. “It’s like our lives don’t matter, and that’s not OK.”

In addition to accusations of racism on social media, the Sheriff’s Office has received hundreds of threatening phone calls, according to spokeswoman Lt. Deborah Mynatt.

“We’ve received threats through email, voicemail, on our (social media accounts), and on just about any communication line that is connected to our office,” Mynatt said. “We’ve been called every name you can think of, and there have been racial allegations that we completely deny.”

Sheriff Joe Roybal on Tuesday proposed a meeting with Nicole and Courtney Mallery and other members of the Yoder community. But the couple questioned the sincerity of the request and expressed reluctance to attend a town hall-style meeting.

“They want to put us in a room, like we’re sheep amongst wolves, for people to attack us,” Nicole Mallery said. “That won’t work.”

Much of the public anger has been directed at Deputy Emory Gerhart of the county’s Rural Enforcement and Outreach Unit. In the online article, the Mallerys accused Gerhart of being complicit in the alleged harassment. Nicole Mallery on Wednesday implied that the deputy plays favorites, referring to Gerhart as Clark’s “personal policeman.”

The couple has started an online petition calling for Gerhart’s ouster. As of late last week, the petition has garnered more than 4,900 signatures.

In accordance with Sheriff’s Office policy, Gerhart was unable to comment, officials said.

Sheriff’s officials take issue with the Ark Republic article’s contention that the department has ignored the Mallerys.

Since April 2021, the deputies have responded to more than 170 service calls and investigated 19 complaints that were either filed by, or involved, the couple, Mynatt said.

“(The Mallerys) claim the Sheriff’s Office has done nothing, has not responded to their calls for service,” she said. “That’s just not true.”

Mynatt said that while sheriff’s officials feel the online article was one-sided and misinformed, she understands some of the reaction to it.

“If I read that article and I didn’t know the other side of it, I would also be upset and infuriated,” Mynatt said. “We understand that people want and need to know what is going on.”

To that end, the Sheriff’s Office Record Division is currently in the process of compiling documents and body-worn camera footage that will accurately depict the department’s numerous responses to calls from the Mallerys, officials said. Nearly 130 pages and more than 44 hours of footage need to be closely reviewed and redacted of names, addresses, images and other information that could compromise an open investigation or jeopardize someone’s safety.

The Sheriff’s Office plans to make the documents available free to the public “so that our community, as well as those across the country that have reached out to us in the last week and a half, can read it and make a determination for themselves,” Mynatt said.

You know, in case they haven’t already picked a side.