The space in the local juvenile detention center is full as the trend towards predatory crime continues

COLORADO SPRINGS – The increase in burglaries involving fights across Colorado Springs is sparking frustration among local business owners and law enforcement as juvenile suspects continue to find their way back onto the streets after being arrested.

According to Colorado Springs police, there have been 40 burglaries across the city this year, including some in unincorporated El Paso County. According to police, the vast majority of crimes involve teenage suspects, who often crash a stolen car into storefronts, steal merchandise and then drive off in another stolen vehicle.

Most burglaries are captured by store surveillance cameras and typically occur between 1 and 5 a.m. Gun shops, pawn shops and smoke shops are the likely targets, leaving business owners scrambling to clean up broken glass, damaged storefronts and scattered merchandise as they arrive at their stores in the morning.

WATCH: Surveillance footage shows robbery at local vape store

Dutch Knudson, owner of Session Supply smoke shop, said he will close his South Academy Boulevard location after it became the target of an overnight raid in July. He said the group of suspects caused nearly $70,000 in damage when they rammed a car through the front of the store and made off with merchandise. He caught the crime on camera.

“The first thing I noticed was how short the driver of this Kia was and could barely reach the mirror. “It was a little kid driving this thing,” Knudson said.

Several other affected business owners have shared with News5 their frustration with the crime pattern in recent months. We reached out to the Colorado Springs Police Department (CSPD) and the Fourth Judicial District Attorney’s Office to ask why this crime continues to occur.

Colorado Springs Police Chief Adrian Vasquez said most of the teenage suspects arrested in the burglaries are back on the streets after a court decided to release them pending trial. According to CSPD, officers have identified 19 juvenile suspects and arrested 11 juvenile suspects in connection with the robberies. Police said of the 11 people arrested, four were still being held at a juvenile detention center.

The Department of Child Services says a youth will be held in a detention center if they pose a high risk to others or are a flight risk. Once the juvenile is in custody, he or she will be brought before a judge within 48 hours to determine how to proceed. Chief Vasquez said a judge will often release the juvenile at home while he waits for the court case to be completed.

“It will be pretty quick for them to be released,” Chief Vasquez said. “So many times when we go back and contact them again and arrest them again, they tell our investigators, ‘Okay, yeah. I’m going to come out and do this again tomorrow.'”

Chief Vasquez said because burglaries are property crimes, they are considered less violent and typically would not send a juvenile into custody. But he points to a specific problem within the juvenile justice system as a reason why some common teen offenders can continue to commit crimes: space for juvenile detention beds.

In 2003, Colorado lawmakers set a cap of 479 beds for juvenile correctional facilities. Over the years, the legal limit has been reduced by more than half and is now 215 beds. The Pikes Peak Region has 27 beds available at Zebulon Pike, the juvenile detention center in Colorado Springs.

“With fewer places to sleep and more crime, it doesn’t make sense,” he said. “It doesn’t fit with what we see here locally. That’s just not possible.”

The Department of Youth Services said there was a 28% increase in juvenile arrests in the state from 2021 to 2023.

Fourth Judicial District Attorney Michael Allen shares the same concerns as Chief Vasquez. Allen said the Colorado Springs juvenile detention center is often at capacity and rarely has room for new offenders.

“What we know now is that we are almost always at capacity, meaning there are 27 children in custody at any given time. “So when a child commits an act of violence and is taken into custody, that means another child has to be kicked out to the other side and back into a family life that is not supportive and law-abiding,” District Attorney Allen said.

He said he is working with other district attorneys across the state to push legislation that would raise the cap on juvenile detention. At its quarterly meeting last week, the Colorado Youth Detention Continuum (CYDC) Advisory Board voted to recommend that lawmakers increase the bed cap from 215 to 252 beds. The CYDC Advisory Board consists of 27 members who work in the juvenile justice system in Colorado.

But District Attorney Allen said he knows raising the bed cap will be an uphill battle. State Representative Lindsey Daugherty, a Democrat who represents Adams and Jefferson counties, sponsored a bill in 2021 that lowered the cap on juvenile detention centers from 327 to 215 beds. She said the reason Colorado is hitting the bed cap is because facilities are holding on to low-risk youth who should be let out.

“When we increase bed caps, what we’re saying is that as a society and as a legislature, we haven’t found a better way than to lock up our young people, which I have a really, really big problem with,” said Rep. Daugherty.

A report released by the Colorado Department of Human Services shows that one in three youth incarcerated in the second half of 2022 were classified as low risk, meaning the risk of reoffending was also low.

As the predatory crime trend continues in Colorado Springs, business owners are doing everything they can to protect their businesses. Some have placed concrete bollards in front of their businesses and others said they would park their vehicles in front of their businesses overnight. Chief Vasquez said gun store owners should take extra security measures and lock weapons in safes before closing.

Steven Kinder, a manager at the Spartan Defense gun store in the city’s northeast, said suspects stole 15 guns from the store after breaking into it in August.

“We have steel shutters at every opening in the building, but the steel shutters fell right off the wall with a car,” he said. “This is a very, very, very serious thing that they’re doing. “It’s incredibly dangerous for them and anyone else who gets involved, and in turn, it’s frustrating for the state of Colorado to see it as more of a nuisance.”

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