10/21/25 Blog: Colorado Let Criminals Out Of Jail, Crime Went Up

GO ON VACATION WITH ME! Get your cabin on the next Mandy Connell Adventure to the Rhine River in Europe before they sell out! Get more info here.

COLORADO LET TOO MANY CRIMINALS OUT OF JAIL And joining me today to talk about a new study from the Common Sense Institute that shows just how many and just how bad things have gotten is former Police Chief Paul Pazen. From the press release (I don't have the study yet):

The report, authored by CSI Public Safety Fellow Paul Pazen, with contributions from DJ Summers and Emma Roberts, offers a comprehensive analysis of Colorado’s two-decade criminal justice reform movement. The findings reveal that while recidivism rates have declined sharply, the drop appears tied more to falling arrest and incarceration rates than to genuine rehabilitation success.

Joining the press conference will be Paul Pazen, CSI Owens-Early Criminal Justice Fellows, Mitch Morrissey and John Kellner (former District Attorneys), and DJ Summers, CSI’s Director of Communications and Research Operations.

Key findings from the report include:

Colorado’s three-year recidivism rate fell by 40% between 2008 and 2019 — the third-largest drop in the nation.

Arrest rates have declined by nearly 50% over 15 years, outpacing reductions in recidivism.

Violent crime and arrest rates are strongly correlated (r = –0.83), indicating that declining arrests have coincided with rising violent crime.

Colorado’s incarcerated population fell 12% from 2016 to 2024, while violent crime rose over 55%.

None of this is good news, especially with soft on crime Democrats leading the show. Paul is on at 12:30. Find all of the great work at Common Sense by clicking here. Read the entire study here.

IT'S NOT JUST COLORADO, CRIME REALLY IS UP And John Lott writes about the real numbers here.

HAS THE DENVER POST STOPPED PAYING ITS RENT? I am confused here about who DP Media Network is in this story about the largest leaseholder on the building the city stupidly overpaid for a year ago that houses what's left of the Denver Post. The company has stopped paying it's rent and they owe the city big now. But who is that? You'd think that CBS Denver would mention that it's the Denver Post but they don't, even though this story about the sale clearly shows them to be the largest leaseholder on the building:

On Thursday, Thomas Gounley of BusinessDen reported that the City of Denver would buy for $89 million the iconic 11-story building near the Capitol and City Hall that still bears the Post’s name.

“The building is leased to the Post through October 2029, according to a city spokeswoman,” he reported. “The newspaper and its parent company moved out years ago and have been subleasing the space, largely to the city, which has 145,000 square feet across five floors. The Post lease will remain in place as the building sells. The Post will pay about $7.8 million in rent the first year.”

Now we see this:

Lisa Lumley, Denver's Director of Real Estate, told council members the deal would be revenue neutral as the monthly $650,000 payments from the master leaseholder, DP Media Network LLC, would cover the city's financing charges.

But in August, the leaseholder, DP Media Network LLC, stopped making its monthly rent payments, according to a notice of default obtained by CBS News. For August, September and October, it has not only not paid rent but has also accrued late charges of $32,477.51 for each month, bringing the total amount owed to just over $2 million in unpaid rent and late fees.

So it certainly SEEMS as if the Denver Post has stopped paying the rent. I think they buried the lede on this one if that is the case. Am I misreading this? The amount in default is EQUAL to the amount that the Post was committed to pay. This business deal stunk to high heaven and now the taxpayers are going to be on the hook for a building they don't need and overpaid for. This Mayor is a disaster. I think he bought it to curry favor with the paper, taxpayers be damned.

COLORADO POLITICIANS ARE STILL MAKING RENT MORE EXPENSIVE Oh, not NOW, but in the near future. Why? In this article about FALLING rent prices they explain why building of multi-family homes has pretty much stopped. It's not because we don't have a need for them, it's because of the idiotic rules put in place by politicians. Read this:

The Apartment Association cites an August report by the research firm Metrosight, which specializing in urban, labor, housing, and real estate economics, that concludes such regulations have numbers of unintended consequences that tend to increase housing prices. 

Those regulatory factors, all active in the Denver market Hamrick said, include requiring apartments to accept housing choice vouchers, limiting apartment operators from screening rent-to-income ratios, and requiring compulsory lease renewals. Each of those, the study authors showed, are associated with substantial drops in new rental project investment.

“We have all three, which makes it more difficult for investment here,” Hamrick said.

Every time the Democrats say they are saving you money assume the opposite.

CONNECT FOR HEALTH HAS MANAGEMENT ISSUES And don't just take my word for it, read this. I expect nothing less from a quasi governmental agency.

CAN WEED USERS OWN GUNS? This is a BIG question for many in Colorado and now the Supreme Court will be deciding if someone who admits using marijuana is able to legally own a firearm. If you're on a medical marijuana list you need to pay attention.

NANNY BLOOMBERG GIVES BIG TO BENNET And I have to tell you, this is a huge strike against his campaign in my view. Michael Bloomberg has now meddled into lots of stuff that he has no business meddling in, and I don't want his influence in Colorado anymore. Now he's given 500k to Michael Bennet's Super PAC.

AMAZON IS LOOKING TO REPLACE HUMANS WITH ROBOTS and this is the least surprising story of the day but the scale is shocking to see in print. From the New York Times:

Amazon’s U.S. work force has more than tripled since 2018 to almost 1.2 million. But Amazon’s automation team expects the company can avoid hiring more than 160,000 people in the United States it would otherwise need by 2027. That would save about 30 cents on each item that Amazon picks, packs and delivers to customers.

Executives told Amazon’s board last year that they hoped robotic automation would allow the company to continue to avoid adding to its U.S. work force in the coming years, even though they expect to sell twice as many products by 2033. That would translate to more than 600,000 people whom Amazon didn’t need to hire.

The reason I say the scale is shocking is that this will be replicated by Walmart and other retailers who currently move a lot of goods via online shopping. I'm not here saying that an Amazon warehouse job is a long term career but I know multiple young people who got their first decent paying job at an Amazon warehouse in areas where there isn't a lot of opportunity for someone without a lot of experience. Kids today better develop some skills that can't be replaced easily, like taking care of these robots.

WHY DOESN'T POLIS GET CRAP FOR MEDICAID CUTS? This is what I mentioned yesterday in passing and Dick Wadhams writes it up here.

BE LIKE COLORADO, OR DON'T Jon Caldara has a great column on the ways Colorado has been at the forefront of policy making for the good, and not so good. We've done some good stuff and some dumb stuff, but now some of the good is being undone by the dumb.

DID THE BRONCOS THREATEN TO KICK OUT A GUY IN A MAGA HAT? This is a very short video and I'm trying to give the Broncos the benefit of the doubt because we don't know what happened before or after, but if this is what it seems, this is effed up.

Does anyone know this guy? Or have more info? I'd love to know the rest of this story.

DRE GREENLAW GETS A ONE GAME SUSPENSION Because apparently he went after a referee verbally after the game. This is what happens when grown ass men can't control their emotions.

RUSH IS COMING TO DENVER And I've already signed up for the presale. Find out more here.

COLORADO'S COLLEGE DEGREES ARE NOT WORTH THE MONEY A new study on the Return On Investment (ROI) for a college degree returned some unpleasant news for those attending Colorado's state universities: They aren't worth the money. Read more here. It would be cool if our universities did something to improve their rankings where they fell short but I've found higher ed to be extremely intractable when it comes to making needed changes.

WHY YOU SHOULD VOTE NO ON PROP LL AND PROP MM First off, the state created an entirely unnecessary new program to buy lunch for kids who have plenty of money to buy their own. Why? To put more people on the government dole so they can use it to buy votes. Secondly, when the program was grossly underfunded they acted surprised, showing what crappy money managers they are once again. Third, this is the way they will come to raise YOUR taxes eventually, though they are couching this as just "taxing the rich". The income tax started out this way, look it up. I want free and reduced lunch for kids who need it, and everyone can pay for their own kid who can afford it. If you vote for this you are simply picking the pocket of someone else to pay for YOUR KID. Period, full stop. You can read more here, but if you want a TABOR refund EVER AGAIN, you must vote no. Mike Rosen writes about it here. He agrees with me.

YES, WE'RE GETTING TABOR REFUNDS THIS YEAR But we won't next year, or the years after if the idiotic Prop LL and MM pass. Vote accordingly.

D51 SCHOOLS, RE ELECT YOUR SCHOOL BOARD, PLEASE And here is the who and the why.

CHERRY CREEK SCHOOLS, PLEASE INJECT SOME SANITY BACK ONTO THAT BOARD You really should read this and then vote accordingly. Check out this bit:

The Board of Education has taken its eye off the classroom. As a result, fewer than half of Cherry Creek students are proficient at grade level in core subjects — a staggering statistic for a district once considered a statewide leader in academic performance. This is unacceptable. (Source: Denver Post, Aug. 21, 2025)

While nearby districts like Boulder Valley have earned the state’s top accreditation rating, and Douglas County is rapidly improving student outcomes, Cherry Creek continues to lag behind. We have not returned to pre-COVID achievement levels — and in some areas, we are falling further behind.

The current board is worried about keeping parents from knowing pretty much anything about their kids, including if they want to change gender, and academic performance has DROPPED because the focus has been lost. There are no more valedictorians starting this year, is that what you want, Cherry Creek parents? VOTE ACCORDINGLY. Vote for Amanda Thayer and Tatyana Sturm

JEFFCO SCHOOLS VOTERS, IT'S AN EASY CHOICE As even the Teachers union has recognized the guy they backed in the race is a non starter with his history of some sort of sexual impropriety in a sealed juvenile record. JeffCo has a real chance to do big things for students by voting for these candidates: Denine Echevarria,District 1, Samuel Myrant, District 2 and Gloria Rascon, District 5.

SCOTT JENNINGS SAYS IT BEST

I'M READY FOR CHRISTMAS MUSIC And I won't apologize. One of our competitors is going full Christmas in the middle of November, and yes, I'll be listening!

GIVE BABIES PEANUT BUTTER As a new study says tens of thousands of peanut allergies have been avoided by doing this.

BEST WISHES TO JOE BIDEN As he completes this round of treatment for aggressive prostate cancer that has spread to his bones. I hope he recovers fully.

A NEW NAME FOR SOCIAL CLIMBING Which has been around since the beginning of time. Now it's called "throning". MMMkay.

MEN, YOUR WALK SHOWS HOW YOU FIGHT And this is good information for people who are trying to project confidence. They can do it with their walk. Read this for more.

BIGGEST TAKEAWAY FOR BO FROM THE GAME?

THIS PASTOR CAN POUND SAND For giving this woman grief for ONLY donating 1200 bucks. Watch below or click here.

KENNY LOGGINS ISN'T HAPPY WITH TRUMP'S VIDEO Watch below or click here.

WHICH ONE IS AI? If you're super confident you can tell, take this quiz. It is humbling. Watch below or click here.

BUT DO THEY HAND DRY AT THE HAUNTED CAR WASH? I'm gonna make Arod go get his car washed. Watch below or click here.

DON'T TRY THIS WITH A CHEAP SUITCASE Because it will snap the handle in half. Don't ask me how I know. Watch below or click here.