COLORADO, USA — A bi-partisan group of state legislators unveiled a proposed law Monday aimed at largely ending the practice of tying the seriousness of a criminal auto theft charge to the value of the stolen car – part of an effort to shift the emphasis from what’s taken to the impact on the victims.
If passed, the measure would all but eliminate the current system that allows a misdemeanor charge to be filed in many cases if the stolen vehicle is worth less than $2,000.
“It shouldn't matter if a stolen car is a brand-new BMW worth more than most folks making a year, or a 20-year-old Prius like mine worth $700,” said Sen. Rachel Zenzinger, a Democrat from Jefferson and Adams counties, at a press conference announcing the proposed legislation. “A car is a car – and the crime of stealing one should be treated the same.”
Zenzinger was joined at the announcement by Sen. Bob Gardner, a Republican from El Paso County, and by co-sponsors from both sides of the aisle, and law enforcement.
“Last year, close to $1 billion worth of vehicles were stolen from Colorado residents,” Gardner said. “That's a huge number. But it doesn't begin to describe the hardship and the burden that auto theft has had – particularly on those families that are economically challenged, where that vehicle might be their single means of transportation to take the children to school, to take their children to medical appointments, and to go to work.”
Currently, state law divides auto thefts into two categories and assigns a criminal charge based on the value of the vehicle – less than $2,000, between $2,000 and $20,000, between $20,000 and $100,000, and more than $100,000. That, in combination with factors such as whether anyone was hurt or whether the damage was done to the vehicle, determines whether a suspect will be charged with a class 3, 4,5, or 6 felonies or a class 1 misdemeanor.
The misdemeanor charge can be filed in any case where the stolen car is worth less than $2,000 and the suspect isn’t accused of any of a host of aggravating factors, such as removing the license plates, altering the vehicle’s appearance, or using it in another crime.
Over a 22-month span – from Jan. 1, 2021, through Oct. 31, 2022 – 10,373 criminal cases were filed in Colorado against suspected car thieves.
During that span, the suspects were charged with a misdemeanor in nearly one in five of the cases, a 9Wants to Know analysis of that state court data found.
That same analysis also showed that among the cases in which suspects were charged with a felony, about 14% pleaded down to a misdemeanor.
Under the proposal unveiled Monday, the misdemeanor charge would all but disappear – it could be used in a small percentage of very minor cases, such as a teenager taking a family member’s car without permission. And many charges filed would be filed as higher-level felonies.
The law would also strengthen a measure on the books now, which makes someone with two prior convictions for auto theft subject to the highest-level felony.
This would not address an issue that is the subject of frequent complaints from law officers – that too many auto theft suspects are receiving very low bail and are able to be back on the streets quickly.
However, Gardner said he believed one of the byproducts of the law – more people charged with felonies and in some cases more serious felonies than they are now – would be that judges would set bail and other conditions of release that would keep people behind bars longer after an arrest.
He said it’s vital “to make sure that those who commit these crimes and do so on a repeated basis are not released without sufficient bail or release conditions to ensure that they don't re-offend while awaiting trial.”
Investigative data producer Zack Newman contributed to this story.
Contact 9Wants to Know investigator Kevin Vaughan with tips about this or any story: kevin.vaughan@9news.com or 303-871-1862.
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