House advances criminal penalties targeting theft of critical‑infrastructure metals after amendment fight

Representative Espinosa, the bill sponsor, told the Committee of the Whole that House Bill 11‑01 rewrites commodity‑metal theft law to identify three distinct crimes and align penalties with the level of conduct, extending protections to victims in transportation, housing and telecommunications sectors. She argued the change was meant to close a market for stolen copper and other critical materials and to give law enforcement better tools to stop repeat harm.

The sponsor said the committee redraft (amendment L004) reorganizes the statutory section to match conduct with appropriate penalties and to avoid sweeping overly broad punishments. "Critical infrastructure theft has resulted in loss of street lights, RTD downtime and removed materials from cell towers," she said, calling the problem “ubiquitous across all of our districts.”

Several members pressed for narrower standards to avoid criminalizing legitimate business activity. Representative Bottoms described past local theft problems and warned that the bill, as drafted, could unfairly penalize salvage yards and secondary‑market dealers. She urged incentives for reporting and immediate investigations rather than criminalizing dealers, saying, "Let's go after bad guys and maybe give businesses incentives for reporting."

Representative Graff moved an amendment (L006) to add a culpable mental‑state requirement so that a scrapyard or dealer would be liable only if they knew or reasonably should have known material was unlawfully obtained. Supporters said the change protects lawful commerce and prevents strict‑liability offenses. The sponsor opposed the change, arguing that the negotiated safe harbors and affidavit process already limit liability for good‑faith purchasers and that raising the mens rea threshold would undermine protections achieved with scrapyard stakeholders. The amendment failed on a voice vote.

Lawmakers adopted a smaller technical correction (L005) to reinstate an affidavit formulation that staff had omitted, and they rejected several other floor proposals including affirmative‑defense and sunset‑clause amendments. The sponsor said the final L004 restructure preserves safe harbors for lawful transactions — including an affidavit process for purchasers — while making it easier to hold accountable those who traffic in stolen critical‑infrastructure materials.

The Committee of the Whole voted to adopt L004 as amended, and the body announced that House Bill 11‑01 passed on second reading and was placed on the calendar for third and final passage.

Next steps: the bill advances toward final passage; members said they expect subsequent technical discussions with stakeholders to continue as implementation details are finalized.