Release of More Than 100 Sex Offenders Halted Pending Appeal
Originally published by The Associated Press, October 2, 2000
DENVER (AP) — The head of the state's Department of Corrections has called off the planned release of more than 100 imprisoned sex offenders after a plea from Colorado's Attorney General.
Corrections Chief John Suthers had ordered 112 offenders released from prison and 170 released from parole after a Sept. 18 Colorado Supreme Court ruling found legislators had enacted conflicting laws when the offenders were sentenced.
Suthers called off the release of prisoners on Saturday because Attorney General Ken Salazar wants time to appeal the ruling. Salazar said prison officials acted too quickly in releasing them without a judge reviewing each convict's case.
The release action came so quickly that victims didn't receive the warnings the law says they must have.
The court's ruling came after the review of a 1993 child molestation case in Denver. The court said offenders who committed crimes between July 1, 1993, and July 1, 1996 can be paroled for no longer than the unserved portions of their original prison sentences, or five years, whichever is less.
That meant that nearly 300 sex offenders were wrongly on parole or behind bars for parole violations.
Suthers said a lawyer on Salazar's staff advised prison officials last week that the releases had to start immediately and that the judicial reviews were only a formality that could be skipped.
But the release action came so quickly that victims didn't receive the warnings the law says they must have.
"I understand that this is a court decision that is rectifying, supposedly, a past wrong, but what concerns me is its effect on victims," said Jennifer Gamblin of Denver, a rape survivor and victims advocate.
Suthers said that the offenders released from parole last week had already been free from prison. But they no longer are being supervised, and that's reason for the public to worry, he said.
"These are sex offenders who are likely in need of supervision," Suthers said.
Suthers said the problem was that the legislature failed to clean up the language of older state laws when it enacted new ones intended to be tougher on sex offenders.
Today, sex offenders are sentenced to indefinite prison terms and can be paroled only if they make progress in treatment programs. Even when they're on parole, they get lifetime supervision, Suthers said.
Teresa Wroe, spokeswoman for the Colorado Coalition Against Sexual Assault called the end of supervision "very scary."
"The risk for recidivism is so high," she said. "That's just not how we do sex offender management in Colorado any more, knowing what we know now about the number of offenses they commit and their level of secrecy and manipulation with children and victims."
Salazar said his appeal of the Supreme Court ruling will be an uphill battle because all seven justices voted for it.
