Colorado's crime wave is as much about mental health and community resiliency as it is about crime and punishment or America's broken justice system.

Late this past month, The Denver Post reported that in 2020, Colorado's homicide rate reached a 25-year high with 293 victims. It's a startling, tragic turn after decades of declining crime rates.

That surge was felt most acutely in Denver and Aurora where the rate of violent crime – the number of homicides, rapes, robberies, and aggravated assaults per 100,000 people – rose to levels not seen since the early- to mid-1990s. There were 882 violent crimes committed for every 100,000 people living in Denver in 2020, and 898 in Aurora.

And critically, a third of the state's 293 homicides in 2020 occurred in Denver, and of those 95 homicides, more than a third were concentrated in seven of the city's 77 neighborhoods, The Denver Post's Elise Schmelzer reported.

The data should help drive the public policy response to this crime wave, but data only tells so much. The other critical analysis, which Schmelzer began in early 2021, is looking at each of those 95 homicides and determining the driving factors.

So we looked at the records from all 95 of those homicides and found clearly that a majority, certainly not all, killings were sparked by petty grievances, fights, or arguments that drove someone – often irrationally – to pull out a knife or a gun or swing their fists. Some of those petty grievances were tied to what were likely organized crime rings or gangs but often that was not the case.

Marnee Kelley-Mills, 17, was stabbed to death by her own brother who may have been suffering from schizophrenia.

Arthur Robinson, 36, was shot in the back while walking away from an argument at 1 a.m. on the sidewalk.

Ramon Perez, 55, was killed with a knife in an alley after a teen felt offended, possibly by a comment about his girlfriend.

Dennis Lozoya, 38, was killed after a dispute at a family gathering and police suspect his step-son fired the shots.

Isabella Thallas, 21, was shot and killed while she was walking her dog by a man possibly upset about dog poop.

Jared Villaluz-Jones was stabbed to death while waiting in line for a shower at a homeless shelter.

Joryn Dean, 21, was killed after a neighbor opened fire through the living room window at a group playing video games.

Fernando Martinez Briones, 45, was shot and killed during an argument with his neighbor about parking spaces in the alley behind their houses.

Lee Keltner was shot and killed during an argument at a political rally in support of the police. Keltner pulled mace and a security guard pulled a gun.

The list goes on and on.

According to a 2020 analysis of Denver police data, of 48 homicides where the relationship between victim and killer was known, 36 victims were killed by a family member, acquaintance, neighbor, or romantic partner. In several of those cases, it was a domestic dispute that led to the crime or the sometimes justified killing.

Preventing these homicides feels daunting, but Colorado must invest in its mental health safety net, and we need to build resilient communities where violence is not the answer to problems and disputes.

Just as Denver's violent crime rate began to increase in 2014, slowly at first then rapidly in 2019, the solution is a long term battle that fights an invisible enemy with more counselors and social workers in schools, more psychiatrists working in free clinics across the city and state, more high-quality drug rehabilitation centers that are free of cost, and more economic prospects that give those on the brink hope for a future.

The comparatively easier task is investing in our police officers, detectives, and district attorneys to shut down the criminal enterprises that led to some horrific and shocking crimes in 2020.

East Denver was shaken at the end of 2020 when armed robbers shot and killed Mark Outman, 64, in his home on Monaco Street. Outman's killers disguised themselves as utility workers in an attempt to burglarize the home.

And we now know it was both a petty grievance (a stolen cell phone) and a crime ring (teens who were operating some kind of a drug-dealing operation), that led to a completely innocent family of five being burned alive in their home, including two young children.

If only police had arrested those teens and those robbers for their other crimes before they became the suspects in tragic murder cases. There is no quick solution. but the long-term solutions of investing in police and mental health services should be a top priority for mayors and municipal officials across the state.

We must drive the violent crime rate back down and return a sense of safety to our communities.

— Megan Schrader for The Denver Post Editorial Board