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Colorado lawmakers hope to improve the state's long-troubled competency system by creating a statewide program aimed at moving mentally ill defendants out of criminal courts and into mental health care.
Colorado lawmakers hope to improve the state's long-troubled competency system by creating a statewide program aimed at moving mentally ill defendants out of criminal courts and into mental health care.
The legislation takes aim at the backlog of defendants deemed mentally incompetent to stand trial, creating a diversion program for those accused of low-level crimes
Since 2010, the juvenile murder rate in Colorado has skyrocketed by 210 percent, while violent crime as a whole is up 7 percent.
A handful of judicial districts in Colorado have implemented competency courts as a way to ease the burden on the state and keep the justice system moving.