AURORA, Colo. — There's been mixed messaging regarding claims that a Venezuelan gang has taken over an Aurora apartment complex. Denver7 took those claims directly to Aurora Mayor Mike Coffman during a one-on-one interview.
Coffman on Monday visited the Edge at Lowry apartment complex off Dallas Street, which has been the subject of national scrutiny following a viral video that depicts several males, who appear to be armed, attempting to break into an apartment unit. The mayor went to the apartment complex accompanied by members of the Aurora Police Department (APD).
Coffman said he spoke to many residents while at the complex.
“Those people that came and talked to [me], it didn't seem fearful, quite frankly," Coffman said on Tuesday. “They gave a lot of explanation as to why they weren't paying rent. There wasn't the property management there... I thought that the people who were the so-called gang members were extracting the rent from them, but the people that came up to me said that was not the case... They wanted to stay there, but they wanted the place maintained.”
Coffman believes the property managers, CBZ Management, were "chased" off the premises.
“What we need to do is figure out how to bring it back under the control of the owner of the property. And so, there's a meeting with representatives of the owners on Thursday, and I'll be participating in that meeting," Coffman said. “I think there's a pattern on all these properties. I mean, you know, I'm going to be blunt that I think it's an out-of-state slumlord and hasn't maintained the properties.”
Aurora PD said it is concerned about a "small Tren de Aragua (TdA) presence" in the city. Authorities arrested 22-year-old Jhonardy Jose Pacheco-Chirinos, a documented member of TdA, in connection with a July 28 shooting. He is currently in the custody of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Denver7 asked Coffman if he had confirmed any TdA activity near the apartment complexes.
“I think the view is kind of mixed on that. Quite frankly, that part is not relevant to me," Coffman said. "Now, the DEA has confirmed to me that there are Tren de Aragua elements that are involved in fentanyl distribution in and around this area that is of deep concern to me.”
Aurora
APD investigates claim of Venezuelan gang takeover of apartment building
Coffman said his goal is to ultimately eliminate any kind of organized crime within the city, regardless of gang affiliation.
“I'm trying to be realistic on how I portray this, but I am worried that there is a tendency, inherently, to exaggerate and to say this incident that's isolated to three buildings under the same ownership with the same people — concentration of Venezuelan migrants — is the city of Aurora, that the entire city is unsafe. And that narrative isn't true, and that's a destructive narrative to the economic health of this city," Coffman said.
Denver7 obtained the viral video that shows reportedly armed individuals at one apartment complex. We requested an interview from the person who caught the video on their doorbell camera but were told we needed to first receive a "password" from Aurora City Councilwoman Danielle Jurinsky.
"I don't understand why somebody would be censored, why an elected official would be trying to censor someone from basically telling their story," Coffman said.
When asked why he believes Aurora is seeing this attention, Coffman pointed to a variety of reasons.
"I don't think this just naturally occurred. I think because in going back, you had in the migrant crisis, the height of the migrant crisis, you have Governor Abbott from Texas sending busloads of migrants to Denver," Coffman began to explain. “[Aurora] took the position early on that this was a problem born by federal policy, and it will have to be resolved by federal policy, and we're not going to acquiesce to it by helping out. And so, we chose that we would not be expending our tax dollars to assist in the migrants, but we went one step further and said we would not be a conduit to state or federal funding.”
Watch the full interview with Mayor Coffman in the video player below:
The mayor plans to launch an investigation into what brought immigrants to Aurora.
"We haven't confirmed this, but I believe that an investigation will show that you had nonprofit organizations who, unbeknownst to us and didn't go through us, but were a recipient of state and or federal funds to provide assistance to migrants who were predominantly Venezuelan, and to place them in apartments. We didn't know where they placed them, but I believe that they placed them in these apartments in such concentrations that have created a problem," said Coffman.
Ultimately, Coffman believes what is allegedly happening within the impacted apartment complexes is not representative of the city as a whole.
“This is an isolated incident in our city of three apartment complexes under one owner that I believe, you know, probably made some missteps in handling the situation. And we're going to bring it to closure, and we're going to walk it back to understand what happened, to make sure it never happens again," Coffman said.
Hear from residents at the impacted apartments in the video player below:
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