News Brief — Prosecutors Drop Death Penalty in Last Remaining Colorado Capital Prosecution

NEWS (4/​13/​20) — Colorado: Prosecutors in Colorado Springs have dropped the death penal­ty in their mur­der case against Marco Garcia-Bravo in the shoot­ing death of two high school stu­dents, the last remain­ing cap­i­tal pros­e­cu­tion in Colorado since the state abol­ished the death penal­ty on March 23. Parroting lan­guage used by Adams County pros­e­cu­tors when they dropped the death penal­ty against Dreion Dearing on March 30 in the state’s oth­er pend­ing cap­i­tal pros­e­cu­tion, 4^th Judicial District Attorney Dan May blamed Governor Jared Polis for May’s deci­sion, call­ing Polis a ​”13^th juror” who would block any death sen­tence ​”with the stroke of the pen.”

On the same day that he signed the bill repeal­ing Colorado’s death penal­ty, Polis also com­mut­ed the sen­tences of the three men on the state’s death row ​“to reflect what is now Colorado law.” The com­mu­ta­tions, Polis said, ​“are con­sis­tent with the abo­li­tion of the death penal­ty in the State of Colorado, and con­sis­tent with the recog­ni­tion that the death penal­ty can­not be, and nev­er has been, admin­is­tered equi­tably in the State of Colorado.”

Veteran Denver cap­i­tal defense lawyer Phil Cherner said, ​“Tonight, for the first time that I can remem­ber, Colorado has no one on death row, no death cas­es on appeal and none pend­ing tri­al.” Despite cap­i­tal pros­e­cu­tions in sev­er­al high-pro­file Colorado mass mur­der cas­es, no jury in the state has vot­ed to impose the death penal­ty since June 2009.