Colorado DA Under Scrutiny for Letting Illegal Immigrant Teen Walk Free After Fatal Crash
A 15-year-old illegal immigrant who killed a young woman in a high-speed crash in Colorado has walked free without serving a single day in jail, sparking outrage from the victim’s family and renewed scrutiny of progressive prosecutors and immigration loopholes.
The Colombian teen, who was in the U.S. unlawfully and unlicensed at the time of the deadly incident, was handed a shockingly lenient sentence.
He was given just two years of probation and 100 hours of community service—after striking a plea deal with the office of Arapahoe County District Attorney Amy Padden.
The sentence comes in connection with the July 2024 crash that took the life of 24-year-old Kaitlyn Weaver in Aurora, a Denver suburb.
According to her father, John Weaver, Kaitlyn was sitting at a stop sign, speaking to her boyfriend on speakerphone, when the teen slammed into her vehicle while allegedly racing his Jeep through the residential neighborhood at approximately 90 mph.
“It was an instantaneous death,” her father told Fox News.
She was kept on life support for two days before doctors removed her from machines and donated her organs.
Initially, the Weavers were told the case would involve no plea deals due to the gravity of the charges. The teen had been arrested for vehicular homicide.
Just months later, the district attorney’s office reversed course. John Weaver said DA Padden’s office reached out in January 2025 to inform the family that they would offer a probation deal instead.
Padden, a Democrat endorsed by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Colorado Gov. Jared Polis (D), has come under fire for the decision.
The Weavers’ attorney, Matthew Durkin, called the deal “abhorrent,” noting that Kaitlyn’s life was cut short during her prime.
“She spent her life trying to help people,” John Weaver said during an appearance on “Fox & Friends.” “She was an amazing human.”
The teen, whose identity remains undisclosed due to juvenile privacy laws, had reportedly taken the uninsured Jeep without his mother’s permission.
His mother later told authorities she intended to return him to Colombia, but he has since filed for asylum.
“We had a collision where the immigration system and the criminal justice system collided, and now my daughter’s dead,” John Weaver said.
Arapahoe County Assistant DA Ryan Brackley attempted to defend the plea deal, stating that the conviction for the highest charge and probation sentence “acknowledges the seriousness” of the incident.
“No legal outcome can truly make up for the profound loss and void Kaitlyn’s loved ones will live with permanently,” he added.
Padden herself commented on the tragedy in a Facebook post this week but notably focused her message on speeding dangers rather than immigration status or prosecutorial discretion.
“We acknowledge Kaitlyn Weaver’s death was the direct result of a crash caused by an unlicensed teenager driving at nearly twice the posted speed limit,” she wrote.
John Weaver, however, remains unconvinced.
“You don’t have to participate in a bad system,” he told Fox News. If the judge wanted to sentence him to less, that’s the judge’s issue. But what happened in this case is the prosecutors became part of the problem.”
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