A 43-year-old Denver man is headed to federal prison after admitting to robbing a bank, with federal officials pointing to his case as proof that the region's bank robbers will get caught. Justin Victor Velasquez was sentenced to 63 months behind bars after pleading guilty without a plea agreement to one count of bank robbery.
The sentence was announced by the U.S. Department of Justice, District of Colorado, which confirmed Velasquez's guilty plea and prison term. FBI Denver
held up the case as a warning to would-be robbers, posting that “if you are a bank robber, the FBI Rocky Mountain Safe Streets Task Force will find you, like we found Justin Velasquez. Now he is going to federal prison, and our communities are safer.”
FBI Denver Special Agent in Charge Amanda Koldjeski framed the case within a broader message about the human cost of bank robbery, pushing back on any notion that the crime is victimless simply because banks carry federal insurance. “Not only does robbing a bank steal from the institution, but the act traumatizes witnesses and collateral victims,” Koldjeski said in the same post. “Bank robbers should be warned, the FBI will find them, prosecute them, and bring justice to victims, witnesses and the institutions they negatively impacted.”
A Shrinking Problem in Denver, But Still a Federal Priority
The Velasquez sentencing lands amid a notable shift in Colorado's bank robbery numbers. The state ranked first in the country in 2021, with 191 robberies that year, according to Colorado Public Radio. Robberies in the Denver metro area alone fell from 151 in 2021 to just 34 in 2024, the outlet reported, citing figures from the U.S. Attorney's Office.
That decline came even as federal prosecutors ramped up charges, filing 20 bank robbery cases in Colorado in 2020, 75 the following year, and 86 in 2022, per the same station's reporting. The outlet also reported that convicted defendants had been receiving sentences of 16 to 19 years without the possibility of parole, though the period covered by that figure was not specified. Acting U.S. Attorney Matt Kirsch told the station that the deterrent effect was deliberate: the more potential robbers believed federal prosecution was likely, the less interested they became in robbing banks.
Other Colorado Cases Show a Range of Sentences
Velasquez's 63-month term is notably shorter than some other recent federal bank robbery sentences out of Colorado. Two Denver men, Mitchell Leland Baca and Jaki Ravion Joseph Martin-Birch, were sentenced to 224 months and 170 months, respectively, for their roles in a string of area bank robberies, according to a separate Justice Department announcement. The disparity underscores how sentences in these cases can vary widely depending on the specifics of each offense.
FBI Denver credited the Rocky Mountain Safe Streets Task Force with finding Velasquez.
