Rep. Mark Ferrandino could see the handwriting on the wall — and the garage, fence and lamp post — but still left a committee room smiling Tuesday after lawmakers killed his graffiti bill today.
The Denver Democrat said the 5-6 vote that scuttled his measure to toughen graffiti penalties — including instituting felony charges in some cases — is the closest lawmakers have gotten in recent years to passing a graffiti bill.
House Bill 1061 by Ferrandino and Rep. Jim Kerr, R-Littleton, would have allowed prosecutors to charge offenders not only with the graffiti that got them arrested, but also with past incidents of tagging if it could be proven it was the vandals’ handiwork.
“Some day we’re going to have a graffiti bill but that day is not today,” Rep. Bob Gardner, R-Colorado Springs, announced when the House Judiciary Committee killed the measure.
Ferrandino last year introduced a bill that prohibited someone besides a parent or guardian from furnishing spray paint, broad-tipped markers or paint sticks. Concerns about the practicality of the measure and whether it violated civil liberties helped kill it.
A bill from Kerr two years ago made it a Class 2 misdemeanor to possess graffiti tools. It also was killed.
Rep. B.J. Nikkel, of Loveland, was the lone Republican to join Democrats in killing this year’s proposal. Nikkel has been active in juvenile justice issues, including whether children should be tried as adults with murder, and she said bumping some graffiti crimes to a felony is “contrary to what we’re trying to achieve.”
Defense attorney Maureen Cain, representing the Colorado Criminal Defense Bar, said her office is close to the Capitol and regularly is vandalized by taggers. But she questioned whether lawmakers, who already have seen a 500 percent increase in corrections costs in recent years, really want to make the crime a felony.
Rep. Mark Waller, R-Colorado Springs, pointed out that someone arrested for causing more than $20,000 damage during a graffiti incident already faces a felony charge.
The bill, among other things, would allow prosecutors to charge someone with a felony if the person commits two more offenses within a three-year period and if the graffiti damage is of a certain amount.
Denver Detective George Gray, who serves in the graffiti unit, testified that technology allows police to capture images of vandals’ work and log it. Police can track images to specific individuals, who sometimes admit the handiwork done over a period of time was theirs.
Michelle Schoen of the Westwood Residence Association, passed around pictures of graffiti in her neighborhood. After the hearing, she said she was disappointed but not disheartened that the bill died.
“We’re southwest Denver residents,” she said. “We don’t give up that easily.
Lynn Bartels: 303-954-5327 or lbartels@denverpost.com
