A Colorado prosecutor granted probation to a teenaged illegal migrant who fatally struck a young woman while driving without a license in an uninsured vehicle taken from his mother, CBS News reported.
Twenty-four-year-old Kaitlyn Weaver was killed in July 2024 in Aurora, Colorado, after being struck by a 15-year-old illegal migrant, CBS reported on Tuesday. The defendant, whose name cannot be disclosed due to state law, was speeding through a residential neighborhood, reportedly driving at 90 mph in a 45 mph zone when he crashed into the victim’s car.
The prosecutor had initially promised to pursue the maximum sentence of two years in youth corrections without any plea deal, according to CBS. However, when the current district attorney, Amy Padden, took over, the suspect was offered two years of probation in exchange for a guilty plea.
“Why the change? If he had taken a firearm and recklessly just shot it and killed someone, this would be a different case. They would be pushing it completely differently,” the victim’s father, John Weaver, expressed to CBS. “There’s no deterrence.”
Arapahoe County Assistant District Attorney Ryan Brackley defended the decision to CBS, saying, that “the negotiated sentence acknowledges the seriousness of this preventable tragedy.”
However, the victim’s family said the prosecutor didn’t speak at the sentencing, and the defendant never apologized for the crime, according to the outlet. Additionally, the family will not receive any restitution for their daughter’s nearly $1 million in medical bills.
“Immigration and the criminal justice system and all these things landed together one day in Aurora and now I sit here today without a daughter,” John Weaver said to CBS.
Kaitlyn Weaver had worked as a volunteer for a suicide hotline and at a drug rehabilitation center prior to her death, her father told CBS News.
Factors such as the impact on the victim and the community, the defendant’s characteristics — including age, culpability, and remorse — and the objective of the sentencing, such as deterrence or rehabilitation, were considered during sentencing, Brackley told CBS.
The plea deal requires the teen to complete 100 hours of community service, attend school and “not break any laws,” according to CBS.
“Generally speaking, being in the U.S. without authorization does not, in itself, constitute a federal crime. However, those who are in the country illegally are subject to deportation,” a spokesperson for the Arapahoe County government told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “Local DA offices do not oversee deportation efforts. Removal orders and execution of removal orders are done by ICE.”
The Department of Justice under President Donald Trump has sued the state of Colorado and Denver for their so-called “sanctuary policies,” which the Trump administration says allowed a Venezuelan gang to seize control of an apartment complex in Aurora last year.
In January, the president signed the Laken Riley Act into law, mandating federal immigration authorities to detain illegal migrants who are accused of theft, burglary, assaulting law enforcement, or any crime that causes death or serious injury. The law was named after the 22-year-old nursing student who was murdered by an illegal immigrant on the University of Georgia campus in 2024.
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