President (To Win Colorado)
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(D) Joe Biden*
(R) Donald Trump
80%
20%
CO-01 (Denver)
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(D) Diana DeGette*
(R) V. Archuleta
98%
2%
CO-02 (Boulder-ish)
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(D) Joe Neguse*
(R) Marshall Dawson
95%
5%
CO-03 (West & Southern CO)
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(D) Adam Frisch
(R) Jeff Hurd
50%
50%
CO-04 (Northeast-ish Colorado)
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(R) Lauren Boebert
(D) Trisha Calvarese
90%
10%
CO-05 (Colorado Springs)
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(R) Jeff Crank
(D) River Gassen
80%
20%
CO-06 (Aurora)
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(D) Jason Crow*
(R) John Fabbricatore
90%
10%
CO-07 (Jefferson County)
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(D) B. Pettersen
(R) Sergei Matveyuk
90%
10%
CO-08 (Northern Colo.)
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(D) Yadira Caraveo
(R) Gabe Evans
70%
30%
State Senate Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
80%
20%
State House Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
95%
5%
April 22, 2009 01:44 AM UTC
14 Comments
Yeah, keep on pushing the soft on crime goody two shoes bit. This bill was a ticket to a Republican majority, too bad really.
but your ticket has already been punched…
Statehouse Dems saved Bill Ritter from having to actually make a decision this session.
might have to make a tough decision if abolishing the death penalty in Colorado passes the Senate. It passed the House 33-32. I am against the death penalty, but, I certainly understand the arguements for it also.
making prisons a private sector, for-profit business. I don’t expect Republicans to get this nuance. THAT is what has to change.
There are still a lot of people & interests who will lobby strongly for their continued existence.
This is currently a Huge industry that needs serious reform. Traditionally there has been little incentive for the judicial and prison systems to reform themselves or to rehabilitate offenders for that matter. As you know there are many, many special interests that have no interest in sentencing reform. The man or woman in prison with no record except for a maijuana possession charge should not be in jail. But, I would be reluctant to allow white collar criminals like Madoff to trade their prison time for ankle bracelets living in a luxury apt. somewhere.
The middle class because of these Madoff/Wall Street/Investment Firm crooks have seriously damaged the lives of millions of middle class working people who were scamed into risky investments. Congress needs to start strengthening and expanding current Federal laws to address this now. The lost wealth from the middle class and working class caused by these bastards have caused so much pain for families and people who now have to work for 10 or 15 more years before they can retire. This is absolutely criminal. These crooks do not deserve sentencing reform. Let them work hard labor in the prison system for many, many years. Because these folks who would have been retired will now have to work longer this will cause a serious increase in unemployment for MANY years.
But, the guy in jail for smoking or possession of pot should be released. He didn’t hurt anybody, unlike the white collar criminal bastards.
DA’s suck.
Here’s what it says now:
http://www.9news.com/news/arti…
I understand well the complexities around sentence reform, but the criminal justice commission has been around for two years.
Ritter appointed the commission to focus on sentence reform, but they have put it off, and put it off, and now they will put it off again for two years so the Gov can be in his second term before dealing with this issue.
To hear Suthers say they won’t have anything ready for next session truly chaps my hide. Sen. Morse, et al, should be commended for firing this shot across the commission’s bow, but I worry we’re looking at another do little commission designed to give political cover for the Governor.
There are thousands of convicted criminals who pled to something less than they were charged with and some, for example, who were originally charged with violent crimes pled to lesser offenses that might be categorized as nonviolent crimes. We need to develop a system that makes sure those who are violent aren’t put on the street without some serious vetting.
The parole boards go through this all the time.
Gov. Ritter and Attorney General Suthers, both of whom are former district atotrneys, are correct that this issue requires a very thoughtful approach and careful analysis before changing the statutes.
Thirty years ago the legislature revised the sentencing and parole statutes based on a bill carried by Ann Gorsuch-Buford, a conservative Republican, who told the legislature her bill would enhance the incarceration time for convicted criminals. After it passed, it became apparent that it did the opposite and the general assembly had to come back in the mid-1980’s and amend the statutes again governing incarceration and parole.
The budgetary pressures on the General Assembly are significant. Sen. Morse, who I believe is a peace officer and understands violent crime and certainly isn’t in favor of putting violent criminals on the street, is attempting to solve that problem by allowing some convicts to serve shorter sentences. This is certainly worth looking at but it must be done very carefully because of the public safety issues.
The Colorado District Attorney’s Council’s phalanx marched in and told Brandon Shaffer to kill this bill. This crap about loopholes and unintended consequences is completely unsubstantiated. The decision to send it to the commission for “study and recommendations” is crap, too. That commission started out as a good idea: come up with innovative ways to reform sentencing to save money and more effectively rehabilitate offenders and reduce recidivism. The commission has been working on these topics for 18 months and has studied it to death and already has recommendations. Additionally, once the commission came up with some ideas, the powers that be decided they better stick some DAs on there. Guess what? The DAs disagreed with basically all of the recommendations, and the commission’s work completely stalled.
More evidence that the Senate Dems are deathly afraid of making even remotely courageous decisions which might offend one of their entrenched and powerful lobbies–even if the decision makes economic sense and would potentially reduce recidivism.
to get passed than to put it off for at least another year. I find it hard to believe that there was no part of the bill that most people could get behind.
Reform, especially in the prisons and education, will take time. We need to have a strong general framework, but some of the small changes we can all agree on need to go forward.