Legend has it that when Judge Melville B. Gerry handed down a death sentence on Alferd Packer, he said, "There was seven Democrats in Hinsdale Country, but you, you voracious man-eatin' son of a bitch, you ate five of them. I sentence you to be hanged ... as a warning against reducing the Democratic population of this state." According to the actual trial records, Judge Gerry was more succinct (and apolitical) in his death sentence, stressing that Packer would be "hung by the neck until you are dead, dead, dead!".
If Judge Gerry was upset with Alf Packer, he was hardly the only one. As the sole survivor of a six-man prospecting expedition that had become snow-bound in the Colorado Rockies in 1874, Packer's story was that one of the other prospectors, Shannon Bell, had gone mad and killed the others before Packer killed him in self-defense. The fact that Packer admitted to cannibalism, had changed his story 
several times, and had money belonging to the other prospectors with him when arrested counted didn’t help his cause, though. While in custody awaiting a hearing, Packer escaped from jail (nobody ever found out how) and spent nearly nine years on the run before being re-arrested. In the meantime, investigators found the bodies of the other prospectors with evidence that they were bludgeoned to death.
On March 14, 1883, Alf Packer was arrested at Wagonhound Creek, where he had been living under the name of John Schwartze. Since cannibalism isn't a crime in most states (only Idaho has an actual law against it), Packer/Schwartze went on trial for murder. Despite his account of killing Bell in self-defense, neither the jury nor Judge Gerry found his version of events credible, and Packer received a death sentence. Given the public hatred directed against him, authorities arranged for him to be transferred to another jail to avoid possible lynch mobs, and the execution stayed.
It's hard to understand the hatred for Packer since accounts of cannibalism weren't all that rare. Given the brutal winters in that part of the country and the tendency of isolated groups to be snowbound for months, desperate measures were often needed to avoid starvation (much like the famous Donner party of the 1840s). Local and national newspapers certainly shaped how the public viewed Packer (one described him as a "Human Ghoul who Murdered and Grew Corpulent on the Flesh of his Comrades").
While Packer was awaiting execution, the legal wrangling dragged out for years. One lawyer pointed out that Colorado was a territory when the crime occurred and argued that the murders were not illegal at the time under territorial law. The Colorado Supreme Court overturned the murder conviction, although Packer was later tried and convicted of five counts of manslaughter. He received a sentence of forty years in the state prison at Canon City.
Not that the story ended there. A model inmate in prison, Alf Packer (aka "Prisoner 1389") became the focus of numerous legal appeals and applications for pardons by a string of attorneys. The "Free Packer" movement gained its greatest champion in Polly Pry, a Denver Post columnist who wrote numerous columns on Packer's "unjust" imprisonment. Pry aimed her crusade at Colorado governor Charles S. Thomas who finally gave in and ordered Packer paroled as his last official act before leaving office on January 1, 1901.
After his release, Alf Packer worked as a security guard at the offices of the Denver Post. Growing tired of city life and suffering from Bright's Disease (diagnosed in prison), he moved back to Colorado and spent the last years of his life as a mine caretaker. Despite his notoriety, Packer was a favorite with the local children, and he often regaled them with stories about the Old West (they just considered him a "nice old man"). His liver problems worsened, and a state game warden found him unconscious near his home in 1906. He spent the last few months of his life as an invalid, although he wrote a letter to the governor pleading for a full pardon ( which was denied).
Alf Packer died on April 24, 1907. According to one local news story, his last words were, "I am not guilty of the charge." The cause of death was likely stroke-related, although his death certificate listed his condition as "senility - trouble & worry." He is buried in the Prince Avenue cemetery in Littleton, Colorado, at government expense (he was a veteran), and his gravesite has attracted thousands of visitors over the years.
Still, the debate over Packer's guilt dragged on for decades after his death. In 1989, the case became news again when a team of forensic scientists, led by James Starr of George Washington University, unearthed the bodies of Packer's fellow prospectors (their burial site is still known as Cannibalism Plateau in Colorado). After forensic analysis of the bodies, Starr concluded that Packer had lied about killing Bell in self-defense and that Alf Packer was "as guilty as sin and all his sins were mortal ones."
But other forensic analyses soon disputed Starr's conclusions. One determined curator, David Bailey, launched his own project to prove Packer's innocence based on Packer's rusted Colt revolver believed to have been used to kill Shannon Bell in self-defense. In a fantastic feat of forensic science, he matched fragments of a lead bullet found at the death scene to Packer's revolver. Although the research is ongoing, the question of Alf Packer's guilt seems unlikely to be resolved.
In the meantime, Alf Packer has found his way into American folklore. He is an unofficial mascot of the University of Colorado (the student cafeteria was named after him for a time), and his bust is on display in the Colorado state capital building. He's been the subject of several movies, musicals, and a semi-humorous Alferd Packer Society (their motto is "serving our fellow man since 1874"). Lake City, Colorado, has an annual celebration of the Packer story and the local tourism based on Packer's cannibalism tends to be famous (not to mention macabre).
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