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State courts across the country have gradually reopened for in-person proceedings, although many have yet to reach their ...

The El Paso County Jail in Colorado Springs, Tuesday, Feb. 2, 2021. Should paddleboarding while drunk be a misdemeanor? Should it be treated differently than boating while drunk? What about not registering a vehicle — is that a crime, or should that just be a ticket? What about juvenile fishing without a license? Last fall, an unlikely group of bedfellows — community activists and public defenders and prosecutors — began meeting to go line by line through all of Colorado’s 1,100 misdemeanors to decide what to do with them: Asking whether any should be combined into broader categories...

David Zalubowski/AP A year after passing a sweeping police accountability bill with bipartisan support, it's a very different climate for criminal justice reform at the Capitol this year. Amid a flurry of police brutality protests in the wake of George Floyd’s murder, criminal justice reform advocates at the Colorado legislature seized the moment last summer and passed one of the most sweeping police reform laws in the country.  Advocates and lawmakers hoped to nudge those efforts forward this year — introducing a series of criminal justice bills that could further overhaul how police o...

Six months after widespread racial justice protests catalyzed the Colorado General Assembly to pass sweeping reforms to policing and law enforcement accountability, the Democratic majority is planning to push the envelope further. “The entire General Assembly, especially and particularly my side of the aisle — the Democratic side of the aisle — have taken up the mantra of law enforcement accountability,” said Rep. Leslie Herod, D-Denver, one of the chief proponents of Senate Bill 217 in the 2020 session. Herod said she plans to bring forward technical changes to SB217, tho...

At 84 years old, Anthony Martinez is nearly blind and deaf. He can no longer walk on his own and his kidneys are failing. He struggles to write his own name, his niece says, a sign of brain deterioration after more than 30 years in prison. And though he seemingly poses little threat to anyone, he remains confined at Sterling Correctional Facility, among those at highest risk of falling victim to COVID-19, which has sickened hundreds of his fellow inmates and killing six at the northeast Colorado prison.  “I’m afraid the first time I see my uncle is going to be at his funeral,” said hi...