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Man arrested for allegedly touching theater coworker

Naomi Havlen
Aspen Times Staff Writer

A Stage Three Theatres employee was arrested Thursday after a coworker told police he had touched her inappropriately.

Saul Meraz, 39, is charged with unlawful sexual contact, a class-six felony. He is being held in the Pitkin County Jail on $5,000 bond.

According to the arrest warrant, on July 31 a woman called police to report that her daughter had been victimized. The mother told police that her daughter, 19, works at Stage Three Theatres in Aspen and is mentally and physically disabled.



The woman, whose name is not being released because of the nature of the crime, told police she works in the theater with Meraz. She said on July 26 she had finished her shift and called her mother to pick her up.

She told police Meraz asked her to watch a movie while waiting for her ride, and she agreed. According to the woman, Meraz “grabbed [her] hand and kissed it,” and she told him to stop.




The woman said she told Meraz to “stop it” when he also allegedly touched her thigh, neck and breast. When Meraz suggested they go outside to see if her mother was there, she said they got up and left the theater. She told her mother what had happened.

According to the warrant, police also talked to another woman who works at Stage Three. She told police Meraz came to her apartment when she was looking for a roommate. The woman said when Meraz was in her apartment, he tried to massage her shoulders and rubbed her calf until the woman asked him to leave.

She told police Meraz left after she asked him to, but came back three days later to look at the apartment again. The woman told police she again asked Meraz to leave and shut the door.

The general manager of Stage Three Theatres, David Nolan, told police he confronted Meraz about the allegations with the 19-year-old woman and fired Meraz on July 25, since he believes the woman “doesn’t lie.”