Criminal suspects who are deemed mentally incompetent — unable to grasp the charges against them — have the right in Colorado not to be prosecuted on those charges. 

But they also shouldn’t simply be turned loose to endanger others. 

Too often, they are. 

A number of alarming criminal cases have made the news in which suspects were found mentally incompetent after allegedly committing serious crimes. They were released only to reoffend. 

And there’s another wrinkle that came to light last week in a new report by the advocacy group Advance Colorado. Current law not only recklessly enables dangerous lawbreakers to return to our streets — it also can serve as a loophole to avoid prosecution for those who know how to work the system. In other words, the current system is ripe for abuse.

What’s needed is for the courts to confine all such suspects to alternative facilities where they can be evaluated and treated for their mental incapacity — while remaining sequestered for society’s sake. That approach also could screen out suspects who are just putting on an act.

It will require a change in state law because a statute enacted by our soft-on-crime legislature in 2024 requires courts to drop charges against any and all suspects found to be permanently mentally incompetent. The law makes no provision for remanding those suspects to the custody of mental health facilities. They can walk free.

Advance Colorado’s eye-opening report lends new urgency to the case for reform. 

Calling the 2024 law a “failure of justice,” the report noted it, “…requires charges to be dismissed, even where a single evaluator determines the accused is ‘mentally incompetent and unable to be restored to competency.’ This has resulted in high-profile, repeat criminals being released on the streets in Colorado because it is illegal for them to stand trial or be convicted.”

Alongside the law’s lax standard for assessing incompetency, Advance says, “Colorado is missing a clear, defined path to civil commitment for a number of violent and repeat offenders.”

Those deficiencies must be addressed by the legislature.

Advance’s report reveals a rogues’ gallery of recent Colorado cases in which charges were dropped against dangerous suspects — in some cases on dubious findings of incompetence. 

The report cites for example the case of Joel Lang, who confessed to killing a woman with his car at a parking lot in Monument in November 2024. The report notes, “Because Lang was found permanently mentally incompetent … his charges had to be dropped.”

The report then points out how Lang’s case, among others, underscores a “highly problematic” aspect of current law: “a defendant may be able to understand enough to game the system and avoid charges and jail time entirely.”

The report recounts, “When a doctor asked Lang, ‘What does being incompetent mean?’ Lang responded by saying, ‘this problem all goes away,’ demonstrating that Lang knew his charges would be dropped and that he would be released if he was found permanently mentally incompetent. These facts also call into question the lax evaluation process where a single evaluator can tell the court that a defendant is ‘permanently mentally incompetent without the ability to be restored.’”

It’s one of numerous cases Advance says “demonstrate that the evaluation process is releasing people who are ‘competent’ enough to have a driver’s license, obtain a weapon, purchase drugs, post on social media, and participate in a variety of common societal activities, yet are deemed by evaluators to lack the understanding of how a trial works or what the charges against them mean.”

It demands action by our legislature, ASAP.

Read the full report — it’s compelling: https://www.advancecolorado.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/Advance-Colorado_Mental-Health-Report.pdf