Gov. Jared Polis’ choice to abruptly cut back the 110-year jail sentence for the truck driver who killed 4 individuals in a fiery 2019 crash is impacting different ongoing court docket circumstances, a bipartisan pair of Colorado district attorneys instructed the governor in a five-page letter that was extremely essential of the commutation.
Boulder County District Legal professional Michael Dougherty, a Democrat, and Mesa County District Legal professional Dan Rubinstein, a Republican, known as the commutation “unprecedented, untimely and unwarranted” in a Jan. 20 letter to Polis obtained by The Denver Publish on Tuesday via an open information request.
The prosecutors mentioned the governor’s choice to scale back Rogel Aguilera-Mederos’ 110-year sentence to 10 years whereas the trucker’s case was nonetheless pending within the courts “undercut the neighborhood’s belief” within the justice system and has impacted plea-bargain negotiations in some circumstances.
“Your choice is having a considerable ripple impact,” the district attorneys wrote.
In a current Boulder County case, they mentioned, prosecutors prolonged a plea supply of eight years in jail to an individual who sexually assaulted a woman. The protection legal professional in that case argued the sentence was extreme in mild of Aguilera-Mederos’ lowered jail time period, the letter mentioned.
“Sentences ought to be influenced by the details and circumstances, not by petitions, on-line surveys or tweets,” the letter mentioned.
The 2 district attorneys despatched the letter to Polis the day earlier than the governor was scheduled to fulfill with the board of the Colorado District Attorneys’ Council. The letter was supposed to permit Polis to arrange to handle their considerations, Dougherty mentioned.
“The governor needed to clear the air and acknowledged that his motion was unprecedented,” Dougherty mentioned of the assembly. “DA Rubinstein and I are optimistic that our considerations have been understood and that what occurred in that case was an exception.”
Conor Cahill, a spokesman for Polis, known as Aguilera-Mederos’ 110-year jail sentence “weird” and mentioned Polis acted rapidly as a result of “there was clearly an urgency to treatment this sentence and restore confidence within the uniformity and equity of our prison justice system.”
Each Dougherty and Rubinstein mentioned within the letter that the 110-year jail sentence was extreme, however argued that Polis ought to have waited for a decide to scale back his sentence — a process that was underway — earlier than performing.
Aguilera-Mederos’ obligatory minimal sentence drew widespread outrage after it was imposed in December, with greater than 5 million individuals signing a web based petition that requested or not it’s lowered.
Polis’ choice to commute the sentence days earlier than the decide overseeing Aguilera-Mederos’ case was scheduled to think about decreasing the jail time period drew rebukes from the judge and from members of the family of people that died within the April 25, 2019, crash on Interstate 70 in Lakewood.
