FELONY DRUG CASES IN STATE ON THE RISE
Report sparks calls for sentencing that prefers treatment over prison time
Prosecutors filed more than 15,200 felony drug cases in Colorado in 2017, which is nearly double the cases in 2012, sparking calls for sentencing that prioritizes treatment.
Colorado prosecutors filed more than 15,200 felony drug cases in 2017, twice as many as they did in 2012, according to a new report that has prompted renewed calls for sentencing reforms that send low-level drug offenders to treatment rather than prison.
The Colorado Criminal Justice Reform Coalition report, released Monday, also found 75 percent of felony drug filings last year were for simple possession. Of those sentenced last year to prison for drug possession, 84 percent were originally charged only with possession. The increase in drug felony filings appears to have a disproportionate impact on women offenders, the report states.
Two Democrats — Rep. Leslie Herod of Denver and Rep. Pete Lee of Colorado Springs — said the report likely would give ammunition to those opposed to efforts by corrections officials to reopen a closed prison in Cañon City. Lee chairs the House Judiciary Committee.
Herod, Lee and Rep. Cole Wist, a Republican of Centennial, are pushing bipartisan legislation this year to encourage using community corrections beds to handle a projected surge in prison populations.
“We have a different path forward that is possible,” Herod said. Community corrections programs, which are used as an alternative to prison incarceration, are better equipped to get offenders drug rehabilitation and mental health services, she said.
Lee said he doubted legislators have “much appetite for increasing the number of prison beds in Colorado.”
“We’re looking at a number of legislative initiatives to deal with prison overcrowding, and we are looking at what’s driving prison incarceration,” he said.
Monday’s report showed legislation signed into law in 2013 that was meant to prioritize treatment for offenders charged with drug possession as opposed to incarceration isn’t working as intended and more reforms are needed, Lee said.
“The 2013 drug sentencing reform legislation was well intentioned, but it clearly has not had that effect,” Lee said in a prepared statement. “The Legislature should revisit the state’s drug sentencing structure, come up with some new ideas for reaching that original goal, and redouble efforts to steer people struggling with addiction into treatment rather than prisons.”
The report from the nonprofit reform coalition was released before the Joint Budget Committee meets Wednesday to consider budget proposals from corrections officials. A bipartisan task force Gov. John Hickenlooper
formed by executive order to study prison population projections also is scheduled to meet Wednesday. Herod and Wist predicted the JBC won’t finalize the debate over new prison space on Wednesday and will wait until later in the session to deal with the correction capacity issues.
“We’re being asked to make fairly significant fiscal decisions, and it’s important to get this right,” said Wist, who added he is working “shoulder to shoulder” with Herod on ways to avoid building too many prison beds.
Christie Donner, executive director of the reform coalition, said the group’s report was prepared from court filing data Lee had requested from the state and then provided to the coalition.
“Despite reform efforts, the war on drugs continues to play an outsized role in fueling Colorado’s prison population and, in turn, its prison budget,” Donner said in a statement.
The Colorado Department of Corrections this year submitted a budget request that called for reopening Centennial Correctional Facility-South in Cañon City, a prison designed for solitary confinement that the state closed in 2013. Corrections officials last year secured $10.6 million to increase prison capacity, and this year they requested that the legislature approve an additional $19.4 million to build extra prison space and make additional upgrades.