The Gazette reported last week that Gov. Jared Polis and some lawmakers are proposing to spend up to $12 million to confine and treat more of the lawbreakers who are found mentally incompetent to face criminal proceedings — but pose a threat to society. 

The extra accommodations are needed. 

Suspects deemed incompetent to grasp the criminal charges against them have a constitutional right not to be prosecuted or imprisoned. But they shouldn’t be turned loose to endanger others.

Some currently languish in jail for lack of space in mental health facilities; others are released back into the community — despite the risk to society. Neither is acceptable.

So, funding more alternative accommodations can’t come too soon. 

But will our justice system actually make use of the extra space? 

The problem, after all, isn’t just a lack of capacity for mentally incompetent suspects. It’s that our legislature, as well as some of Colorado’s judiciary and even some elected DAs — have fallen under the spell of the so-called justice reform movement. Its dogma seems to view incarceration as a last resort — public safety be damned. For justice reformers, incompetency is just another pretext to limit the state’s ability to confine wrongdoers, even for mental help.

A law adopted by the legislature last year makes that clear. It requires charges to be dropped — rather than leaving it to a judge’s discretion — if a suspect is found incompetent and unrestorable to competency. That’s even if there are no openings for the suspect to be committed to a treatment facility. 

There can be grim consequences to release without commitment.

Elijah David Caudill allegedly went on a knifing rampage in downtown Denver last January, stabbing four random victims. Two died. He had been released on his own recognizance only months earlier on other charges — so he could get treatment to restore him to competency to face those charges in court. But he never made it to a mental health provider; he disappeared once he was released — only to resurface and, allegedly, carry out the gruesome knifing melee.

Ephraim Debisa was released from the Weld County jail and set free in Greeley this past summer after attempted-murder charges against him were dropped under the 2024 law. He had been found incompetent — not for mental incapacity but because he was ill-educated and had grown up in another country. His lawyers argued he did not understand how the U.S. justice system works. The court bought it. Debisa was picked up again — on a weapons charge — and now remains in custody.

The latest case to make the news involved a suspect released recently, with charges dismissed, by an Arapahoe County district court due to a mental incompetency finding. He allegedly committed a series of robberies in Aurora. Arapahoe County’s District Attorney Amy Padden — a recently elected DA who came to office embracing justice reform — offered this candid acknowledgment:  

“The statute is currently mandatory that if someone is found incompetent and not likely to be restored … the court shall dismiss the case and it doesn’t matter how serious the case is. In many cases these individuals are just getting released to the street without any services without any mental health.” 

That’s quite an admission from an advocate of leniency like Padden.

Colorado doesn’t need this “reform.” The legal loophole must be closed, ASAP. 

By law, no charges ever should be dropped against a dangerous, mentally incompetent criminal suspect until commitment to a mental health facility is secured.

Incompetency shouldn’t be a “Get Out of Jail Free” card.