The headline-making seizure of a staggering 114 pounds of pure, deadly fentanyl recently on Interstate 70, as reported Saturday by The Gazette, is a stark reminder of Colorado’s fight for survival amid an epic crime wave. And it isn’t just hitting the metro areas of the Front Range.

With just 46,796 citizens, the six-county 12th Judicial District spanning southern Colorado’s San Luis Valley is an unlikely place to be caught up in the state’s crime wave. Yet, law-abiding citizens there are wary of criminals as never before — thanks in large part to a top prosecutor who refuses to put them in jail. It seems that, as in Colorado’s capital and elsewhere, some rural elected officials naively believe coddling criminals curbs crime.

Now, fed-up voters are preparing to send their soft-on-crime DA packing.

Locals have collected 4,757 valid signatures needed to ask voters to a recall District Attorney Alonzo “Let ‘Em Go Alonzo” Payne. A recall of a DA is rare. Though it’s estimated to cost taxpayers $10,000, the City Council in Alamosa, the valley’s population center, is so gung-ho to dump Payne it devoted a page on the council’s website to the effort. Yes, city hall itself is championing the recall.

A Bernie Sanders-endorsed candidate, Payne surfed the tidal wave of the anti-police cultural zeitgeist in 2020 to win election, complete with a campaign slogan to “Change The Narrative.” He committed to “stop unwarranted prosecution of low-level offenses”; “practice transparency in the DA’s office and all law enforcement,” and “reduce incarceration and stop the criminalization of poverty in southern Colorado.”

Payne has followed through on his pledge to empty jails, so much so that Colorado Politics reported law-abiding Alamosans are hesitant to go shopping for fear of running into criminals.

Beyond the Valley, Payne is under investigation by the state Attorney General’s Office for allegations he violated the Victim’s Rights Act after the Colorado Crime Advisory Board received eight complaints about him since February. Each complaint was reviewed by the Victim’s Rights Act subcommittee, finding victims were not consulted or treated with fairness.

The pushback against Payne even has reached the national pages of The Washington Post. In an April 21 report, the newspaper puts into perspective the predicament Payne put the valley in by way of such decisions as choosing not to prosecute even one of 20 arrest warrants tied to SWAT-team drug busts.

“They had not even been looked at, which is a problem, because every one of these cases has a victim,” Alamosa Mayor Ty Coleman — himself a Black unaffiliated voter — told The Post. “I’m running out of responses for the community.”

And Payne is running out of excuses. Case in point: after not responding to numerous requests for comment from The Gazette and our news affiliate Colorado Politics, Payne finally opened up to The Washington Post.

“I was very honest during my campaign that I intended to empty the jails,” he said. “It’s a mark against society when somebody is in custody.”

“I plead out drug offenses. I do. I give them opportunities for rehabilitation. We haven’t come across kingpins.”

“They got into drugs, and, you know, horrible things happened,” Payne told The Post of his decision to let the parents of a dead 16-month-old plead guilty to lower-level offenses without jail time after they were accused of murder and child abuse. “If they’re going to be rehabilitated, they can be rehabilitated on probation.”

At least he’s honest, but “Let em Go” Alonzo needs to go himself.

For when he makes victims out of criminals, the real victims of such crimes as domestic abuse, like Alamosan Lani Welch, are forced to stand up and fight back.

“I have always been this quiet person,” Welch told The Washington Post. “But too many people are hurt.”

Denver Gazette editorial board