Revolving door makes sentencing a farce in Colorado

By George Brauchler

Sep 5, 2024 Updated Sep 5, 2024

from Colorado Politics

Our prison system is broken and failing Coloradans. Decisions by the Colorado Department of Corrections (DOC), Gov. Jared Polis’ parole board and our increasingly progressive legislature have put Coloradans at risk of criminal victimization. The responsibility for this deteriorating situation lies completely at the feet of those decision-makers.

This November, Coloradans have the chance to prevent some of those inexplicable and reckless decisions.

Initiative 112, entitled "Truth in Sentencing" — referred to the ballot by the voters, not the politicians — would mandate convicted violent criminals serve at least 85% of their prison sentences. Currently, violent criminals serve on average only 43% of their sentences. That sounds crazy to those of us who are living through a 25-year high in the violent crime rate.

Our current sad lot is not the product of chance or mandated outcomes, but choices.

Remember Gov. Polis appointed the DOC executive director and all but one member of the parole board (Hick appointed the other). Those individuals wield extraordinary discretion to decide who and when to release violent felons onto our streets. The Polis era has seen significant and negative trends in prison management.

For instance, despite a 28% increase in the violent crime rate over the past decade, last month’s total prison population was more than 2,000 prisoners fewer than July 2019 — a 12% decrease, since Polis’ first year in office.

Colorado is not incarcerating less because there has been less crime. It is a policy choice by those in power, especially when it comes to discretionary parole and parole violations resulting in a return to prison.

Polis’ administration is returning an increasing number of convicted felons to our neighborhoods by choice, and not because those convicts have served their sentences. The number and percentage of “discretionary” (by choice) paroles under Polis has exploded. In 2018, a little more than one-third of all discharges from prison were “discretionary.” In 2024, that percentage has nearly doubled to two-thirds. Polis’ parole board increased the number of discretionary releases by 32% in just the last year alone.

During that same period, the annual ratio of parolees returned to prison for having been convicted of new felonies (not including misdemeanors or other rule violations) to new parolees has increased from 10.8% to 13%.

The sine qua non metric for a prison and a parole board must be the rate of recidivism. Nationally, Colorado has the fourth highest rate of new crimes committed by those released from prison, worse than California’s, New York’s or Illinois’.

Remember DOC’s stated mission is, “To protect the citizens of Colorado by holding inmates accountable and engaging them in opportunities to make positive behavioral changes and become law-abiding productive citizens.”

DOC and the parole board are not good at this. The laws and DOC rules governing computation of time for prison sentences is one explanation. Buckle up, because this is bonkers.

Colorado law currently mandates convicted violent felons serve 75% of their sentences before they are parole eligible. That is a lie. Everyone in the criminal justice system knows it. Violent criminals get significant discounts off their sentences — just because. They are gifts.

Earned time requires nominal earning through effort by the violent felon. Time is deducted from an offender’s parole eligibility date for routine things, such as personal hygiene, housekeeping, showing up to work on time and being compliant with programming. Offenders who are simply on waiting lists for programs are treated as compliant. Also noteworthy, an offender who refuses to participate in sexual violence programming (which seems like a big deal) only loses two days of earned time per month.

The rewards given for such de minimis effort are staggering. Violent offenders get 10 days per month off their sentence for meeting that minimal standard. If their violent crime sentence was for a fourth-class felony, they get an additional two days off their sentence per month. Convicted drug dealers get those same 12 days per month. Equally inexplicable, habitual criminals and those whose parole was revoked for new felony convictions are also eligible for the same earned time.

Even offenders who have proven to be so violent they are given “the highest level of supervision and control to maintain the safety of the public, employees, volunteers, and offenders” are eligible to have their sentences reduced through earned time.

However, violent offenders “who have harassed the victim of their current offense will be ineligible for any type of earned time….” But only for the month in which they harassed their victim. No joke.

Added to earned time is good time, which is a deduction of 25% off the violent felon’s sentence — automatically, and at the time of sentencing. A 10-year sentence for armed robbery is already cut to 7.5 years as the robber walks out of court.

DOC makes it incredibly difficult to take away that gifted time. Violations of the Code of Penal Conduct result in laugh-out-loud losses of good time.

Raping a cell mate can result in the loss of “up to” 45 days of good time. Murdering that same cell mate can result in the loss of no more than 90 days. Ironically, saving another person’s life in prison can get you no more than 60 days of “extraordinary” earned time. Among the many other hand-slapping punitive sanctions is the potential loss of 45 days for using force to escape from prison.

Color me old school here, but shouldn’t rape, murder, assaulting guards, escaping from prison and the other crimes one might choose to commit while incarcerated for having been convicted of a violent felony result in the forfeiture of every single second of good time? And earned time?

As if that were not enough, violent offenders are placed into halfway housing six months before their parole eligibility date.

We have the power to end this circus for violent felons. Vote yes on Initiative 112 —Truth in Sentencing — and convicted violent criminals will serve at least 85% of their sentences, no matter how many times they brush their teeth, make their bed, sit on a waiting list for programs, or merely resist the temptation to rape or kill their cell mate.

George Brauchler is the former district attorney for the 18th Judicial District and is a candidate for district attorney in the newly created 23rd Judicial District. He has served as an Owens Early Criminal Justice Fellow at the Common Sense Institute. Follow him on Twitter(X): @GeorgeBrauchler.