For the past four years it has been my great honor and privilege to serve as District Attorney for the 18th judicial district, representing Arapahoe, Douglas, Elbert, and Lincoln counties. The 18th is the state’s most populous judicial district and is home to over 1.1 million Coloradans. The end of my term also marks the end of the 18th as it has been known since its founding, as it will now split into the state’s first new judicial districts in some 60 years. As with any ending, and new beginning, I offer these reflections and words of thanks.

I came into office during a turbulent time. Our court system was still reeling from the effects of pandemic-fueled closures and slowdowns with a backlog of several thousand cases. Crime had risen significantly, car theft was rampant, and drug cartels were pushing deadly fentanyl. Our law enforcement officers were under political fire by so-called reformers and for the previous decade, the legislature increasingly passed offender-friendly laws to reduce penalties and accountability for criminals.

Drawing on my experience as a U.S. Marine Corps officer and career prosecutor I approached my mission of protecting the public and holding offenders accountable in a straightforward, tried and true way. We would aggressively prosecute those who broke our laws.

The results speak for themselves. We cleared the backlog of cases and according to Colorado’s crime statistics database, since I took office the crime rate has dropped in nearly every category in our Judicial District. Murder is down 31%. Robbery is down 31%. Property crime is down 29%. Motor vehicle theft is down 36%. Moreover, these crime rate reductions outpace the reductions in crime around the State of Colorado.

We accomplished this by focusing on going to trial. Trials not only engage the community we serve but also show defense counsel and their clients that we will not settle for unreasonable plea bargains that fail to hold serious criminals accountable. Since 2021, we prosecuted tens of thousands of cases and went to trial over 1,200 times. Nearly 500 of those were felony trials and 77 were for the most serious offenses of murder and homicide. Accordingly, more defendants were sentenced to jail, prison and community corrections to deter other would-be criminals.

No prosecutor walks into court and wins trials alone. There is always a team of support staff, paralegals, victim advocates, and investigators who help make it happen. To be successful in trial, my approach was to build top-flight trial teams. Our emphasis on trial teams led to being recognized twice for statewide awards by the Colorado District Attorney’s Council for the best trial teams. The first was for successfully prosecuting a 1980 cold case murder and the other for dismantling a murderous group of MS-13 gang members.

Along the way, we launched groundbreaking data dashboards for greater public transparency. We expanded access to diversion services for low-level offenders across the district. We participated in or led hundreds of community engagement and education events, including our Senior Law & Safety Summit, Citizen’s Academies, human trafficking awareness, and consumer fraud prevention campaigns.

I am proud that my office brought forward the idea to fix the motor vehicle theft law and make stealing a car a felony across the board, regardless of its value. We used our focus on data to advocate for needed changes to fentanyl laws, including heightened penalties for dealers. We worked with legislators to update Colorado’s Victims’ Rights Act, hate crimes laws, and many others.

Finally, over the last four years, my team and I have worked tirelessly to plan for and implement the creation of Colorado’s first new judicial district in nearly 60 years. We have worked through the details of splitting our personnel, case files, data, everything. From winding down benefits to establishing new packages with Arapahoe and Douglas counties, to lobbying the legislature for changes to the victim compensation fund law, our goal has been to continue providing justice services seamlessly through this unique transition.

I am grateful for the tremendous support and collaboration from our partners in Arapahoe, Douglas, Elbert, and Lincoln County governments in this transition. Entire teams of county employees have helped support this new and challenging endeavor. Despite all these efforts, it is important to recognize that this has been a challenging time of uncertainty for our team at every single level and within every department in our office. Our team has had to take on the additional challenge of splitting one of the largest offices in Colorado, and all the meetings and logistics that go with it, while still doing their day jobs. For many employees, this also meant helping create services in a future judicial district uncertain they would have a job to fill in it come 2025. This was a huge lift, and I am deeply grateful for the professionalism and dedication that each member of my staff has shown throughout this undertaking.

The role of the district attorney is fundamentally one devoted to public safety and advocating for the community. Now that the work of splitting and re-forming the district is complete, it is time to pass the torch to my successors in the 18th Judicial District and the new 23rd Judicial Distirct — Amy Padden and George Brauchler. I wish them success in our fight against crime in each of their respective districts.

From the bottom of my heart, thank you to the citizens of Arapahoe, Douglas, Elbert and Lincoln counties for allowing me the opportunity to seek justice on your behalf and for the privilege of standing in court and saying, “John Kellner, for the people.”

John Kellner is the outgoing district attorney for the 18th Judicial District and a lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Marine Corps. On Wednesday, he will join the Dan Caplis Law firm as managing partner and director of litigation.