OAN Staff Brooke Mallory
11:42 AM – Monday, July 14, 2025
Prosecutors in Colorado are reportedly planning to dismiss charges against a registered sex offender whom witnesses say attempted to abduct a child from an elementary school last year, citing his “incompetence to stand trial.”
The 18th Judicial District Attorney’s Office—which has jurisdiction over Arapahoe County, including the cities of Aurora and Littleton—confirmed to FOX31 on Friday that it plans to drop the case against 33-year-old Solomon Galligan.
Galligan had been charged with one count of attempted kidnapping following an April 2024 incident in which he allegedly tried to abduct an 11-year-old boy during recess at Black Forest Hills Elementary School.
According to Aurora police, Galligan is a registered sex offender, with his registration filed through the Pueblo County Sheriff’s Office.
Following his arrest, Galligan was subjected to a court-ordered mental competency evaluation, which concluded that he is not fit to stand trial.
Consequently, prosecutors stated that they are compelled to dismiss the charges due to his legal incapacity. They emphasized that the decision is not a reflection of Galligan’s presumed guilt or innocence.
The 2024 incident was captured on video, depicting the 33-year-old man pursuing and attempting to forcibly grab the young boy while other children in the vicinity ran away in fear.
“It’s super scary to watch,” Dante White, whose child was present during the incident, told the press at the time. “Especially seeing the perpetrator, the pictures of him. I would be freaked out if that guy touched me. It was an attempted kidnapping.”
In the wake of the incident, concerned parents at the Aurora-based elementary school submitted a ten-page letter to Cherry Creek School District officials, calling for an independent review of the school’s response to the attempted abduction.
Following the internal investigation, the district went on to replace former Black Forest Hills Elementary School principal Amanda Replogle, according to reports.
“The information obtained through this investigation has led us to decide that we need to make an administrative change at Black Forest Hills,” a previous statement from the district sent to FOX31 read. “We are making that change now so that we can move forward with the final weeks of the school year in a positive and productive way.”
“I, along with district leadership, own that mistake. There was confusion at the time and we did not know all the details of what occurred as we do now,” Replogle said in a letter, obtained by FOX31.
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