Colorado Springs homicide investigators look for answers after deadliest year ever
COLORADO SPRINGS — The night was quickly going south.
Just after 8 p.m., a 60-year-old parolee had shot two people — killing one — in an AutoZone parking lot. Less than 20 minutes later, officers on a domestic-violence call shot a 21-year-old who threatened to kill his girlfriend and then pointed a gun at them.
Lt. Kirk Wilson, the man in charge of the Colorado Springs Police Department's homicide unit, was en route to that second shooting when the worst call of the night came in: Three teenagers, two of them brothers, had been shot, apparently victims of road rage.
Two of the young men already were dead. The third would be pronounced dead a short time later, making July 27, 2011, the deadliest night in what would turn out to be the deadliest year in Colorado Springs history.
There were 32 homicides here last year — a 33 percent increase over 2010 and four more than the previous record, set in 2007.
While the city's 2011 murder rate remains close to or lower than comparable cities in Colorado and nationwide, the spike comes even as overall violent crime fell in Colorado Springs and amid a decades-long drop across the country.
But what is perhaps most concerning to law enforcement and community officials is that there does not seem to be a clear way to explain — or address — the increase.
"A lot of these were just completely unnecessary altercations between folks who didn't know each other," Wilson said. "There's no explanation other than threats escalating and bad decision-making.
"It's random, and we know it's very shocking to the community. They're not used to seeing those kind of numbers."
Among the crimes that fell into the "random" category are the four deaths from July 27: Aaron Fix, 16; Wayne Fix, 19; and Austin Howse, 16, whose murderer told police before he killed himself that he shot into the teens' sport utility vehicle because the driver cut him off; and Juaquin Paniagua, an immigrant from El Salvador who was fatally shot after he rushed to help another man who had been shot in the AutoZone. That other man survived.
Seemingly unexplainable deaths pocked the calendar all year long.
In February, a tow-truck driver died after he was dragged behind a vehicle he was trying to tow. A 27-year-old man was beaten to death with a rock in a November bar fight. The next day, another man died after falling down stairs during a fight with a friend. The two had been drinking, police said.
Earlier this year, Wilson reassigned four of the 14 detectives on the homicide unit to handle assault cases, with the hope that making more assault arrests would help curb the murders.
The other major cause for alarm were the deaths of seven children, all 2 years or younger. In each case, police arrested a parent or caregiver.
"We had way too many of those," said 4th Judicial District Attorney Dan May, whose district includes Colorado Springs.
Many of those cases involved families with ties to Fort Carson, May said. And most were not families that had prior contact with county human services.
"I think a lot of these are parents who couldn't believe they did this — who never would have seen themselves doing something like this, except for in that one moment," May said.
El Paso County Commissioner Sallie Clark, a military wife, said many military families face the added stress of deployment or the return of a service member. Because of the transient nature of the population, they may not have the support system they need.
In response, Clark and May convened a summit this month attended by more than 60 people from area law enforcement, Fort Carson, social services agencies, hospitals and other organizations. The group is now preparing an initiative called Not One More that will be aimed at preventing child abuse by providing help and resources to parents and caregivers.
Wilson said he suspects the stress of the poor economy also contributed to the increase in murders, not just in the child-abuse cases, but in other deaths, as well.
"It can't help but affect people's lives," he said.
Another possible factor may be the decrease in the number of police officers on the street.
In 2008, Colorado Springs budgeted for 687 authorized and sworn police officers. Through attrition and as a result of budget cuts, that number fell to 641 officers in 2011. As of October, the department had 622 officers, according to Barbara Miller, the department's senior public communications specialist.
In a community of about 416,000, that equals about 669 residents for every officer — a number much higher than other large Colorado communities and comparable cities.
For example, Aurora has about 509 residents per officer, while Denver has about 422 residents for each sworn police officer, according to data provided by those departments. At the other end of the spectrum is Omaha, which is almost identical in population to Colorado Springs and had an average of one officer for every 775 residents in 2011, according to a department spokesperson.
Wilson said it's impossible to know if the decrease in officers has played a role in the spike in murders.
"I would say it certainly hasn't helped," he said.
Some days are tougher to manage than others.
On that deadly night of July 27, for instance, police were stretched so thin that the department went on "tactical alert," meaning only the most critical calls were immediately answered. Homicide detectives found themselves paired with investigators who usually handled crimes against children and financial cases. Officers and crime-scene analysts worked around the clock.
"We sit down with and talk to every family," Wilson said. "The last thing we ever want to do is say, 'We can't solve your case.' "
If there is an upside to the situation, it may be that the department has a clearance rate close to 90 percent — an unusually high number, May said. But that also means his office's caseload has grown.
"We're going to be stretched to the max," he said.
Sara Burnett: 303-954-1661 or burnett@denverpost.com
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