- Tyler Boebert, son of GOP Rep. Lauren Boebert, says he still doesn’t have a lawyer for his criminal case.
- The 18-year-old faces multiple charges in connection to car break-ins and thefts in Colorado.
- The teen told a judge Thursday that he applied for a public defender “only a couple days ago.”
GOP Rep. Lauren Boebert’s teenage son, Tyler Boebert, appears to have dragged his feet in getting a lawyer to represent him in his criminal case.
During an appearance Thursday at Colorado’s Garfield County Courthouse, the 18-year-old told a judge that he had only sent in the paperwork to sign up for a public defender days earlier.
“I’ve sent it in. I haven’t gotten a message back, but it was very recently. It was only a couple days ago,” Tyler Boebert, wearing a dark-colored suit and tie, told Ninth Judicial District Judge John Neiley.
However, the teen said, “I’ve gotten a lot closer on working things out with the lawyer to get that figured out, so it seems like I do have options, but I am still waiting to get the 100%.”
Tyler Boebert then asked the judge to postpone the court date so he could “get that finished up.”
“Alright, well, it sounds like we’re making some progress. I wish you’d turned in that application a little sooner,” Neiley told Tyler Boebert. “But if you’ve done that, we just have to wait for the public defender to make their decision.”
The judge set a new court date for June 13.
This comes after Tyler Boebert told Neiley at a previous court appearance about a month ago that he was having trouble affording a lawyer to represent him.
“We are working to hire an attorney, but it’s just been kind of hard with the prices, but we are working on it,” the teenager said at the time.
Neiley told Boebert during that court appearance that he had time to decide whether to hire private counsel or apply for a public defender.
“I always think it’s a good idea to maybe do both because if you qualify, you have options, and options are always good,” the judge said then. “But we can set this off for a little bit of time for you to make that decision.”
Tyler Boebert was arrested by the Rifle Police Department in February in connection to a string of car break-ins and property thefts in Rifle, Colorado. He faces more than a dozen charges, including several felony charges for criminal possession of ID documents.
According to an arrest affidavit, Tyler Boebert is one of four people accused of breaking into four cars in the city of Rifle, Colorado, and stealing wallets to make purchases at businesses including McDonald’s, Starbucks, and gas stations.
A woman who reported her wallet stolen as part of a spate of thefts that led to the arrest of Tyler Boebert told investigators she had a brain tumor and wouldn’t be able to pay for surgery, according to the court documents.
At the time of his arrest, Lauren Boebert said in a statement to Business Insider that her son should be “held accountable for poor decisions just like any other citizen.”
“I love my son Tyler, who has been through some very difficult, public challenges for a young man and the subject of attention that he didn’t ask for,” the Colorado congresswoman said. “It breaks my heart to see my child struggling and, in this situation, especially when he has been provided multiple opportunities to get his life on track.”
She added, “I will never give up on him, and I will continue to be there for him. As an adult and father, Tyler will take responsibility for his actions and should be held accountable for poor decisions just like any other citizen.”
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