A NEW MOVEMENT IN COLORADO

21. September 2009 by Rev Young.

I am pleased to announce a new education campaign that has been launched, as a collaborative effort, to END THE PRACTICE OF DIRECT FILE. 

For those of you who are fortunate enough to NOT know about this practice, let me give you the run down.  In the state of Colorado, DIRECT FILE gives the District Attorney the sole authority to decide whether or not a juvenile case will be transferred, tried and sentenced in adult court.  Once a juvenile case has been transferred to adult court with adult charges, he is held in county jail, in isolation, throughout his legal process.  If the juvenile is convicted in adult court, he serves his prison sentence in adult prisons.

There was a recent article posted concerning the abolishment of FELONY MURDER and CONSPIRACY (Go To http://s246427087.onlinehome.us/freejonny/abolish-felony-murder).  For those of you who are not familiar with this law and it’s frequent use:  Felony murder states that if a person dies during the commission of a felonious act, all persons involved can and will be charged with murder irregardless of the intent of the crime.  What this means is, if you drop your friend off at the 7-11 convenience store and he decides to rob the place and in the commission of that robbery someone is killed, ALL persons involved can be charged with felony murder which carries a mandatory sentence of LIFE WITHOUT THE POSSIBILITY OF PAROLE.  Let me give you a sample case.  Erik Jensen had taken his friend Nathan to his house.  Erik went to Nathan’s room while Nathan spoke with his mother.  Nathan’s mother was very abusive, an argument broke out, then a fight and by the time Erik came out of Nathan’s room Nathan’s mother was dead.  Nathan had hit her with an object and killed her.  Erik panicked and tried to help Nathan clean up the mess.  They were both charged as adults and they are BOTH serving Life sentences.  Erik received that sentence under the felony murder law.  You see one friend told police officers that Erik must have known Nathan was going to kill his mother.  (you can see more on youths serving life and the PBS FRONTLINE PROGRAM “WHEN KIDS GET LIFE” by going to www.pendulumfoundation.org )

Now, if we did not make DIRECT FILE so easy for District Attorney’s to use, Erik would be home.  It used to be that we protected our kids.  It used to be that we believed that they were inherently good and they had a future ahead of them.  We used to require that the District Attorney, the juvenile’s attorney, the juveniles parents, school records, any previous delinquency issues or records, be presented  and heard by a judge who decided whether or not a juvenile could be direct filed into adult court.  IT ALMOST NEVER HAPPENED.  The result?  The juveniles in question went to juvenile detention facilities, were educated, rehabilitated  and disciplined so that they could go on to be model citizens.  As a matter of fact, if you think back, you probably new someone like that yourself.   Yes, even those who committed violent crimes!

Direct File is a barbaric law and tool used by District Attorney’s to demonstrate their tough on crime attitudes to a public that they love to hold bound in fear.  It is not a civil or humane way to deal with ANY juvenile offender and should be removed…….along with Felony Murder, Conspiracy and the Colorado Organized Crime Act.  The only ones that have been caught and eliminated by these laws are our children. 

FOR MORE INFORMATION ON DIRECT FILE PLEASE GO TO :

http://stopdirectfile.org/

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