Alan Todd May escaped from the federal prison in Englewood in 2018 where he was serving 20 years for a Ponzi scheme.
Colorado prisons
Posted inOpinion Columns
Opinion: We tried lock-’em-up before, and it didn’t work
Throwing more than $1 billion at state prisons may be good politics, but it’s not a strategy for actually reducing crime.
Posted inEconomy
What’s Working: People with a felony record are getting more opportunities from Colorado employers
Workers with a felony in their past could really use Honest Jobs. Plus: Denver’s slowing inflation rate puts it among “least rising” in U.S., fraud updates and more!
Posted inOpinion, Opinion Columns
Opinion: Stan, a prison inmate, writes about conditions on the inside during the COVID-19 era
This is the story of a Black man from Denver named Stan, who has spent much of his life in prison for crimes he admits to committing in order to obtain money for drugs. Right now, Stan is an inmate at the Colorado State Penitentiary in Cañon City. He wants to share personal information about […]
Posted inOpinion, Opinion Columns
Opinion: End private prisons in Colorado
Allowing profit into the criminal justice system undermines its integrity, effectiveness, and the public trust. We would never tolerate profit incentives for judges, public defenders, or prosecutors; we should not do so for prisons. Two private, for-profit prisons in Colorado hold roughly 18% of our state’s prison population. These facilities are owned by CoreCivic, a […]
Posted inCrime and Courts, News, Politics and Government
A lot more drugs are being confiscated in Colorado prisons as inmates die from overdoses
Prison staff had no idea what was happening when an inmate suddenly lost consciousness at the Limon Correctional Facility in May. It turned out the man was overdosing from fentanyl that had been snuck into the facility on the Eastern Plains. The drug is an opioid said to be 50 times more potent than heroin […]
Posted inCrime and Courts, News, Politics and Government
How expensive is it to call Colorado jails and prisons? Lawmakers want to find out.
The $9 that Jim Anthony paid for each video visit with his jailed son last year was expensive, but the best way he could make sure his son got to know his own child, after the coronavirus pandemic shut down in-person visits to the jail. But several of the calls dropped after a minute or […]
Posted inCrime and Courts, Health, News, Politics and Government
Colorado prisons have strict limits on when they can place inmates in solitary confinement. Jails could be next.
Ryan Partridge had a number of run-ins with the Boulder County Sheriff’s Department in 2016. At the time, he suffered from paranoia, delusions and psychosis, and was in and out of jail for minor charges. While in jail, Ryan Partridge was often placed in a restraint chair or kept in solitary confinement for several days […]
Posted inCOVID, News
In Colorado prisons and jails, a piecemeal approach to the threat of coronavirus
There are nearly 20,000 adult prison inmates in Colorado (about one-fifth of whom are older than 60), and thousands more in county jails. Those involved at all levels of the criminal justice system are concerned that if COVID-19 finds its way inside a prison or jail, there will be little ability to stop its spread. […]
Posted inCrime and Courts, News, Politics and Government
Gov. Polis said he wanted to close a private prison. GEO Group beat him to it, leaving Colorado scrambling.
After months of saying it wanted to close a private prison in Colorado Springs, the Polis administration got the surprise news on Tuesday that GEO Group will be shuttering the facility on its own, leaving hundreds of inmates and employees in limbo. GEO announced it will close the Cheyenne Mountain Reentry Center in just 60 […]