A poll commissioned by a group seeking to change Colorado's juvenile sentencing system found that most of those responding would support changes to a system that now allows juveniles to be sentenced to life without parole.

The study was conducted Aug. 19 to Aug. 24 on behalf of Pendulum Juvenile Justice, an organization that advocates for more flexibility in sentencing for juveniles. In Colorado, teenagers who are convicted of first-degree murder face the same mandatory sentences of life without parole as adults.

Colorado's prisons hold 46 people who are serving life without parole for murders committed as juveniles.

A Republican-sponsored bill that would have created a process to study the issue was approved by the legislature, but vetoed by Republican Gov. Bill Owens this spring. The Colorado District Attorneys Council opposed the bill.

On Monday, Bob Grant, head of the council, said that group believes that stricter sentences and other changes that toughened juvenile penalties were responsible for a marked drop in juvenile crime in the past several years.

Last month's poll by Ridder/ Braden Inc., a consulting firm that often works for Democrats, asked 501 likely voters around the state a series of questions about the sentencing and treatment of juveniles.

One of the poll's initial questions concerned a possible ballot initiative that proposed several changes to the current system of sentencing and treating young offenders. A total of 62 percent of the respondents said they would strongly or somewhat support such changes.

Then the poll asked more detailed questions; for instance, whether people would support giving judges discretion in cases involving juveniles convicted of violent crimes.

Under the current system, district attorneys make the decision whether a juvenile is charged as an adult. Seventy percent of those responding said they strongly or somewhat supported that change.

The poll also noted that critics of the proposed changes maintain that it would let dangerous people out of prison, while others say that the current system has resulted in "numerous" instances of youngsters serving life sentences for killing a parent who sexually abused them.

The Rocky Mountain News interviewed more than half the 46 inmates serving life without parole who were juveniles when they killed people.

Only two of those inmates alleged sexual abuse by their parents.

The poll question should have said "some, not numerous," said Mary Ellen Johnson, head of the Pendulum Foundation. Pendulum Juvenile Justice is the foundation's political arm.

After those questions were answered, pollsters repeated the earlier question about the ballot initiative.

The question was:

Shall the state of Colorado, in regards to the sentencing and punishment of juveniles, establish the following: the Court, rather than district attorneys, shall determine whether a juvenile is tried as an adult; juveniles tried as adults shall have a different sentencing structure from adults; juveniles will be segregated within their own age group in adult prisons until they reach the age of 21; and juveniles currently serving life in prison may go before the Court and apply for stringent parole after serving 15 years of their sentence?

Seventy-two percent said they would strongly or somewhat back such a plan.