An Aurora judge has approved the city’s request for an emergency order to shut down The Edge of Lowry, a second troubled apartment complex that became the focal point of America’s debate on illegal immigration, particularly after the tentacles of a Venezuelan gang came to light. 

More recently, the gang members kidnapped and tortured a couple on the property, police said.

The emergency order was issued by Aurora Municipal Court Presiding Judge Shawn Day on Jan. 10.

Zev Baumgarten, who owns CBZ Management, has requested a jury trial in the criminal nuisance case the city has against him.

Aurora city officials were in court Monday to discuss the next steps.

Aurora City Attorney Pete Schulte called the move for a jury trial a delay tactic in court — something Bud Slatkin, a CBZ Management attorney, denied.

“I’ll be honest your honor, this is stall, stall, stall,” Schulte said.

The matter criminal case is expected before the judge again in March.

‘A breaking point’

According to the city’s petition, The Edge has been plagued with violent crimes and quality of life issues since September 2023.

In defending the request, Aurora Police Chief Todd Chamberlain said in a sworn affidavit that the violence at the property had “reached a breaking point.”

“Without intervention, I believe the criminal behavior will flourish, making living conditions untenable for any law-abiding residents in this neighborhood,”  Chamberlain said in court documents.

According to the city’s petition, the property has been plagued with violent crimes and quality of life issues since September 2023.

The petition for the emergency order also cited the home invasion that involved the kidnapping and torture of a couple on the property last month. The Arapahoe County District Attorney’s Office has charged a dozen individuals involved in the incident.

Aurora police believe the Tren de Aragua prison gang was behind the kidnapping.

The apartment complex is owned by Five Dallas Partners LLC, a subsidiary of CBZ Management, a Brooklyn, N.Y.-based company that owns 11 properties in Colorado, including three in Aurora.

The owners — according to city officials — had agreed The Edge should be boarded up, as the city did with another troubled complex.

In August, city officials shuttered Aspen Grove — a 99-unit apartment complex on Nome Street — citing a litany of health and safety violations that included rodent infestations, sewage backups and trash pileups.

But emails obtained by The Denver Gazette show an attorney representing CBZ Management believed its closure was necessary to thwart the Venezuelan gang that had taken over Aspen Grove through threats and intimidation.

The move left about 300 residents homeless.

CBZ Management owns 11 properties in Colorado, including three in Aurora.

Tren de Aragua, or TdA, a Venezuelan prison gang with tentacles in the U.S. and Denver, is linked to various criminal activities. TdA gang members have been involved in a multitude of criminal activities that include drug and human trafficking — particularly immigrant women and girls and money laundering — kidnapping and extortion.

‘Whack-a-mole’

Initially, the city sought to reach an agreement with the owners but ultimately went for the emergency order after a group of more than a dozen men believed to be TdA gang members kidnapped and tortured a couple on the property last month.

Schulte said Monday the closure would likely be finalized by mid-February.

While saying the actions being taken by the city isn’t to “point fingers” at anyone, Chamberlain blamed Denver for relocating immigrants — who arrived in Colorado after illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border — into Aurora during a press conference after the hearing on Monday. 

It’s a sentiment that echoed those by Mayor Mike Coffman, who has blamed Denver Mayor Mike Johnson for the “national embarrassment” Aurora has suffered following the activities of the Venezuelan gang drawing the national spotlight.

Chamberlain has said that boarding up properties under the control of the gang is part of the city’s stratagy to address the violence. On Monday, Chamberlain said his department would be keep an eye on the gang’s movements.

“I don’t want to play whack-a-mole with these TdA gang members,” Chamberlain said.

Councilwoman Danielle Jurinsky said she worries the city’s strategy will only force TdA gang members out of one location and into another.

“The city shut them down and pushed them further into other properties,” said Jurinsky, who chairs Aurora’s public safety committee.

David Pyrooz, a sociology professor and gang expert at the University of Colorado at Boulder, has called TdA’s strategy “very rare.”

‘Not to this extent’

The buildings being sought for closure are not in receivership.

“The city will place a lien on the properties to recoup any costs associated with a closure and any assistance provided to people staying at the properties,” Ryan Luby, a city spokesperson, has said. “The property owners would be required to pay those costs.”

While it is uncertain what those costs might come to, CBZ Management agreed to assume $60,000 of the expenses associated with boarding up Aspen Grove.

City officials do not expect any movement in the case until mid-January.

Attorneys for CBZ Management did not respond to an inquiry seeking comment.

Built in the 1970s, the Edge at Lowry has 74 units.

Officials said the city has fielded “numerous” calls for service over the past year that include aggravated assault, robbery and larceny, according to court documents.

Aurora has seen a 6% decrease in reported violent crime, while properties owned by CBZ Management have seen citations and reported crime nearly double since 2022, according to a Common Sense Institute study.

The owners have repeatedly said the TdA gang exerted control over management at all three of their Aurora complexes, making it dangerous for their staffers to care for the properties.

The city intends to hire a company to act as a sort of receiver to identify who is living on the property, said Jessica Prosser, director of Aurora’s Housing and Community Services.

Prosser acknowledged Monday there are other properties in Aurora with similar issues, though “not to this extent.”

“We do have other properties. The difference is we have responsible property owners and usually property management companies and they are willing to fix it,” Prosser said. “Sometimes they’re slower than we would like them to fix it, but they are present and they are responsible.”

The roughly 20 housing advocates and residents at The Edge who gathered outside the courthouse before the hearing Monday blamed the property’s rapidly deteriorating conditions on what who described as an out-of-state “slumlord.” 

“Today, after years of criminal neglect and abandonment of his buildings and after half a year of him dragging the name of migrants through the mud to escape his own guilt, we demand justice and accountability for those he has forsaken,” said V. Reeves, a spokesperson for Housekeys Action Network Denver, a group that advocates for homeless people.