Being under arrest involves some combination of handcuffs, a police vehicle and not having the freedom to leave. But when, precisely, does someone become “under arrest?”

Weston Jefferson Thomas is asking the Colorado Supreme Court to overturn his conviction for resisting arrest based on what transpired after Mesa County authorities showed up at his home. His lawyer argued to the justices on Wednesday that it was not possible for Thomas to resist arrest after he was put in handcuffs, because the handcuffs meant he was already under arrest.

The government, by contrast, urged the Court not to adopt a black-and-white rule to characterize the exact moment someone is placed under arrest for the purposes of the resisting arrest offense.

“The defendant’s interpretation leaves loopholes and gaps and subverts the legislative intent, which is to protect the public and police when making good-faith arrests,” said Senior Assistant Attorney General Carmen Moraleda.

At the time Mesa County sheriff’s deputies made contact with Thomas on March 6, 2015, he had parked his camper on the property owned by a 78-year-old woman. She received complaints about noise, and she went to his trailer to quiet him down.

The property owner testified Thomas grabbed her by the neck, slammed her against a car and yelled that she “didn’t belong in this world.” It was then that a neighbor came to her aid and took Thomas down in a chokehold. Thomas claimed, however, that the woman did not, in fact, come to his door, but rather a friend of hers and another man jumped him, prompting a fight. 

When two deputies arrived, they took note of the victim’s injuries and arrested Thomas for assault on an at-risk adult. Reportedly, Thomas pulled his arms away when they tried to handcuff him, prompting each deputy to grab an arm and place him in the handcuffs.

Afterward, Thomas “went limp,” requiring the deputies to maneuver him into a patrol car approximately 20 feet away. In doing so, they walked past debris, including broken glass, television sets and microwaves on the ground.

A jury found him guilty of assault, resisting arrest and negligent bodily injury.

Under Colorado law, someone resists arrest when they prevent a law enforcement officer from carrying out an arrest by using physical force or “any other means” that creates a substantial risk of injury. Prosecutors used the debris present at the campsite to argue that had the deputies fallen due to Thomas’ resistance, they could have injured themselves.

But during oral arguments, multiple members of the Supreme Court questioned the wisdom of endorsing that theory.

“Anytime someone goes limp and you have to extricate them from a scene that’s in disarray, which they typically are for a lot of reasons — including poverty — it seems odd to criminalize those circumstances,” said Justice William W. Hood III. “Is that really what we want to do?”

Justice Monica M. Márquez said she could envision a suspect forcing police to climb over materials or hiding in the environment to make apprehension more difficult.

“That to me would be using a means. But here, simply going limp, and it just happens to be in that environment, I’m struggling to see how that means using the environment,” she added.

Moraleda acknowledged Thomas was not necessarily using his environment to resist arrest, but his decision to go limp put officers at heightened risk in a hazardous scenario, justifying the charge.

Last year, the Court of Appeals upheld Thomas’ conviction for resisting arrest. Even though Thomas was in handcuffs, his behavior blocked the “completion of the arrest,” an appellate panel explained.

Thomas’ attorney, public defender Jacob B. McMahon, asked the justices to examine a U.S. Supreme Court decision handed down after the Court of Appeals’ ruling, in which the nation’s highest court defined a seizure — which includes an arrest of a person — as the application of physical force intended to restrain someone, even if they are not subdued.

But some members of the Colorado Supreme Court acknowledged they could probably decide the meaning of an arrest without adopting the High Court’s view.

“We could simply say that handcuffs were enough,” Hood observed.

The case is Thomas v. People.