COLORADO SPRINGS — Leaders across El Paso County are calling the recent rise in violent juvenile crime a public safety crisis.
Local and state officials addressed the topic during a public safety summit hosted by the City of Colorado Springs on Wednesday. The Colorado Springs Police Department (CSPD) reports a 59% increase in juveniles suspected of violent crimes across the city since 2021, while overall violent crime increased by 10% during the same period.
Colorado Springs City Councilmembers, El Paso County Commissioners, state legislators, local law enforcement, nonprofit partners, and community members met to discuss solutions to address the trend. Leaders also talked about the recent rise in smash-and-grab burglaries. CSPD said there have been 43 smash-and-grabs across the city this year, where mainly juveniles are caught on business surveillance video ramming stolen vehicles into storefronts to steal items.
“These smash and grabs that we’ve seen, especially the gun store smash and grabs, they’re taking firearms to go and commit other violent offenses," said 4th Judicial District Attorney Michael Allen.
Ted Collins, the owner of Spartan Defense Armory and Training, attended the safety summit on Wednesday. His gun store was burglarized in August after juvenile suspects drove a stolen Hyundai into the front of the shop. He said business owners are hurting financially by the smash-and-grab crime trend and need immediate action from government officials.
One solution on the table is to increase the number of beds at youth detention facilities across Colorado. In 2003, Colorado legislators set a 479-bed cap on juvenile detention facilities. Over the years, the statutory cap has been cut by more than half and now stands at 215 beds. The Pikes Peak Region is allocated 27 beds at Zebulon Pike, the youth detention facility in Colorado Springs.
4th Judicial District Attorney Michael Allen and Colorado Springs Police Chief Adrian Vasquez said increasing the bed cap would help law enforcement detain repeat juvenile offenders for a longer period and prevent them from committing more crimes pending trial.
“In the best case scenario, we’ve got to get back to what it was in 2019. Whether that’s 320 or 380 [beds]. Any one of those numbers will be better than what we’ve got today," said Allen.
4th Judicial District Court Judge Diana May said Zebulon Pike in Colorado Springs is constantly at capacity. She said it puts pressure on her and other judges to make decisions about who to let out of custody when other juveniles need to be detained.
“Who are we going to let out? Is it going to be the aggravated motor vehicle theft person? Is it going to be the person that assaulted somebody with a knife? Or... maybe the gun?” said Judge May.
Many state lawmakers who attended the summit, both Democrats and Republicans, said they agreed with raising the juvenile detention bed cap.
“It sounded to me like we very clearly need more beds and I think that’s something we should do," said Colorado House District 18 Representative-elect Amy Paschal, while acknowledging youth detention is one part of the multi-faceted issue.
Rep. Marc Snyder said he agrees with increasing space in youth detention facilities, but said it will be difficult to fund as the state faces a billion-dollar budget deficit.
“Especially in a tight budget year like this it’s going to be a challenge to find the funding to increase juvenile bed space, but I really don’t think there’s any other option for us," said Rep. Snyder.
Juaquin Mobley, CEO of Community Anchor Academy, said officials should also work to address the root cause of crime. He said troubled youth need more avenues to access jobs and legislators should work to fund more diversion programs to end cycles of crime.
Colorado Springs Mayor Yemi Mobolade said Wednesday's public safety summit will be the first of several discussions over the next few months to address public safety concerns.
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