{"id":23091,"date":"2025-03-18T21:15:00","date_gmt":"2025-03-19T03:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/police-investigating-confrontation-over-maha-hat-at-durango-recreation-center\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T22:26:27","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T04:26:27","slug":"police-investigating-confrontation-over-maha-hat-at-durango-recreation-center","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/police-investigating-confrontation-over-maha-hat-at-durango-recreation-center\/","title":{"rendered":"Police investigating confrontation over \u2018MAHA\u2019 hat at Durango recreation center"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Durango
Durango Parks and Recreation consultants suggest either adding space to the existing Durango Community Recreation Center or building an additional one. A final draft of a parks, open space, trails and recreation master plan calls for more than $300 million in capital-improvement projects over the next 10 years.<\/span>Durango Herald file<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Durango police are investigating a Saturday incident at the Durango Community Recreation Center in which a woman wearing a \u201cMake America Healthy Again\u201d hat was allegedly harassed by another patron at the gym.<\/p>\n

Police were called by a city employee working at the recreation center around noon.<\/p>\n

Bernadette Lake was working out sporting a red \u201cMAHA\u201d hat when a man estimated to be in his 60s confronted her, according to Durango Police Chief Brice Current. The hat\u2019s slogan and design are closely associated with President Donald Trump. <\/a><\/p>\n

The man \u201cgot within her space and possibly touched her hat,\u201d Current said.<\/p>\n

Lake posted her version of the event on X, formerly known as Twitter, where her story has gathered 8.2 million views and 18,000 responses.<\/p>\n

\u201cLiterally minding my own business working out and an unhinged man came up and verbally accosted me, screaming at me 4 INCHES from my face, calling me every name in the book \u2018f-ing B\u2019\u2026\u2026then, HIT MY HAT twice!\u201d she wrote.<\/p>\n

In a previous post,<\/a> which featured a photo of Lake at the recreation center wearing a shirt that read \u201cPost-Roe generation,\u201d Lake wrote \u201cTHIS T-shirt made them apoplectic!! \u2026.and I love it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Efforts to reach Lake Tuesday were unsuccessful.<\/p>\n

Current said officers are speaking with witnesses and investigating exactly what happened. The man could be charged with harassment, municipal battery or disorderly conduct if officers find probable cause.<\/p>\n

\"Bernadette
Bernadette Lake was working out sporting a red \u201cMAHA\u201d hat when a man estimated to be in his 60s confronted her. Lake posted her version of the event on X, formerly known as Twitter, where her story has gathered 8.2 million views and 18,000 responses. (Screenshot)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Two men came to Lake\u2019s aid, and a third recreation center employee stayed with the alleged aggressor after calling 911. Lake on X alleged that the employee apologized to the man who confronted her. That accusation has sparked a torrent of comments on the Parks and Recreation Department\u2019s Facebook page.<\/p>\n

\u201cYour organization does not protect women being harassed. You care more about the new liberal Nazi party,\u201d one commenter under the name Ron Woods II wrote. \u201cWhy do you hate women? Is this the place to go if a woman wants to be harassed by a man? Will you let a man beat up a woman and then applaud?\u201d another person under the name Duane Sutherland wrote.<\/p>\n

Current said the employee who stayed with the accused aggressor was trying to de-escalate the situation and was unaware of what had transpired.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe didn\u2019t know what happened,\u201d Current said of the employee. \u201cAll she knew was these two guys were near him, and she called the cops and then sat him on the stairs and was trying to de-escalate him so he wouldn\u2019t leave until the cops got there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Accusations that a recreation center employee was among those clapping in support of the accused aggressor are being investigated internally, Current said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf anybody violated a law, they\u2019re going to be held accountable if we can find probable cause and if the statements line up,\u201d Current said.<\/p>\n

Anybody who witnessed the event is asked to contact the Durango Police Department at 385-2900 and ask for Detective Dustin Sergeant.<\/p>\n

rschafir@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A woman alleges a man confronted her aggressively over conservative slogan<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23092,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[1551,1065,28,315],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-23091","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-durango-community-recreation-center","tag-durango-police-department","tag-headlines","tag-president-donald-trump"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23091","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23091"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23091\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":77973,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23091\/revisions\/77973"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23092"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23091"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23091"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23091"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=23091"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}