April 23, 2012 08:16 PM UTC

Liberals Cheer Hickenlooper's Direct-File Signature

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• by: Colorado Pols

As the Pueblo Chieftain’s Patrick Malone reports:

Judges will decide whether it is appropriate to criminally charge 16- and 17-year-olds in Colorado as adults under a Pueblo lawmaker’s bill signed into law Friday by Gov. John Hickenlooper.

Prosecutors will no longer have the authority to directly file adult charges against juveniles. Instead, they must justify the charge to a judge under HB1271, sponsored by Sen. Angela Giron, D-Pueblo, and others.

Prosecutors still can charge 16- and 17-year-olds as adults for the most serious offenses, first-degree murder and second-degree murder for instance, but the defendants are entitled to ask for a judge to review that decision.

Hickenlooper said he grappled with the decision to sign the bill into law.

“This is about as close as I’ve come to a veto without vetoing,” he said.

The pressure that Gov. John Hickenlooper was under to veto House Bill 12-1271 was indeed considerable, and from friendly quarters like the current Denver District Attorney and prominent Democrat Mitch Morrissey, and his predecessor former Gov. Bill Ritter.

It will be dismissed in some circles as a mere bone thrown to the liberals before Hickenlooper does a bunch of things that greatly upset them, but we actually think he could have done that elsewhere and more easily. That being the case, even some critics on the left will look past the political play-by-play and see a legitimate act of conscience on Hickenlooper’s part.