AURORA | Prosecutors in the 18th Judicial District will soon unveil a new Aurora office designed to give more children and some adults a chance to steer themselves away from the justice system, officials announced at a virtual town hall Wednesday night.
Sarah Ericson, diversion director for the district attorney’s office in the state’s largest judicial district, said officials plan to cut the ribbon on a new office down the street from the Nine Mile light rail station next month, expanding access for the hundreds of kids who participate in diversion programs each year.
“We felt we needed to be in the community that we’re providing services to in Aurora,” she said.
The project has been more than half a dozen years in the making, according to Ericson, who said the new Aurora office was boosted to fruition following the passage of bellwether juvenile justice reform legislation in 2019. The bipartisan senate bill — co-sponsored by Democratic Aurora Rep. Dafna Michaelson Jenet — allocated millions of dollars for new diversion programs across the state and enhanced how the offerings are funded.
Two years later, the upshot means three therapists and a victim advocate will now lead sessions for children, their family members and some adults in an office at the intersection of South Peoria Street and East Cornell Avenue.
The team will walk qualified participants through the juvenile diversion counseling program’s various offerings designed to keep people out of courts for good. Ranging from art therapy to wilderness excursions, the programs available mostly to first-time offenders between the ages of 10 and 17 typically last six to nine months.
About 40% of all juvenile cases referred to the district attorney’s office are diverted to such programs, which equates to about 600 annual referrals, according to Ericson. Numbers were down slightly last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The early intervention efforts translate to just a small portion of participants re-offending, with about 6.7% of children who successfully complete the program getting charged again within one year. The percentage is slightly higher for those who drop out or fail to comply with stipulations.
Statewide, the recidivism rate for children who complete diversion programs is about 15%, according to a report from the Colorado Division of Criminal Justice. Some 10,000 kids entered into more than 200 different diversion programs across the Centennial State last year, and 85% of participants successfully completed the offerings.
Some adults who qualify for new diversion programs designed to aid drug users or those with unsupported mental illnesses will also be treated at the new Aurora office. Earlier this summer, District Attorney John Kellner announced a pilot diversion program for adults charged with possessing a small amount of drugs, which has since enrolled about 75 people.
Ericson said she’s optimistic the new office in Aurora will bolster participation for diversion clients in Aurora after a former facility was moved out of the city when resources were consolidated into a single Centennial facility several years ago.
“Most importantly, they need to show up,” she said.
And the new office in south-central Aurora could further improve a path away from police citations and the municipal court system for local teens charged with low-level offenses like trespassing and theft.
Unlike kids in cities like Highlands Ranch, where there is no municipal court and all crimes are forwarded straight to the elected district attorney, Aurora teens charged with offenses like trespassing and theft end up in municipal court, which offers fewer diversion opportunities, according to Ericson.
“In municipal court, it historically has looked very different,” she said. “They’re not set up to do the same level of screening and assessment … They’re still using a sort of old-fashioned or traditional models of court with kids, with things like fines, community service and writing essays.”
For years, the city has offered a “teen court,” which allows certain misdemeanor offenders to be “sentenced” by a jury of middle and high schoolers instead of a sworn judge.
Ericson said she hopes the new office and increased diversion capacity will encourage municipal court officials and Aurora police to recommend kids accused of crimes to participate in her programs instead of thrusting them into the traditional criminal process.
“We’re ready and able to take more referrals from APD or from the municipal system into our diversion program,” she said. “… We have always taken referrals for them, and we continue to do so. It’s our hope to increase the number of kids that are referred.”
Currently, the juvenile diversion group has offices in Centennial, Castle Rock and Littleton, and participants can choose to attend programs at whichever facility is most convenient for them.
Participation in the programs has been up in recent months, according to Ericson, who said the screen-riddled world fueled by the pandemic has been an unexpectedly welcome change for the latest generation of digital natives.
“Kids are very comfortable online, and they’re very comfortable on their phones, so we actually found that our attendance and engagement has gone up,” she said. “We’ve also found that, surprisingly, people are comfortable being vulnerable in therapy if they get to pick their own space … We haven’t found it to be the barrier across the board that we were expecting.”
Diversion specialists are expected to host an open house to showcase the new Aurora hub sometime in October.
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