Colorado Springs may be held liable for the death of Jeffrey Melvin after police officers reportedly restrained, choked and tased him, a federal judge determined on Wednesday.

The decision from U.S. District Court Judge Christine M. Arguello deviated from the earlier recommendation of a magistrate judge, who found Melvin’s surviving father had not shown in his lawsuit that there were similar incidents of alleged racially-based policing involving Colorado Springs’ officers. But a single constitutional violation, Arguello said, is enough to trigger the city’s liability if Colorado Springs did not adjust its training in response.

“Plaintiff has alleged facts which, if true, would demonstrate that the city was on notice of at least one similar prior violation of federal rights, giving rise to an obligation to train,” she concluded in a September 29 order keeping Jeffrey Melvin Sr.’s claim against the city intact. “The plaintiff has also alleged that, despite this obligation, the city has failed to provide the necessary training.”

In addition to prior instances of reportedly racially motivated policing, Colorado Springs police also have come under scrutiny for the shooting death of De’Von Bailey, who, like Melvin, was Black. Officers were responding to a false report of a crime when they shot Bailey, 19, as he was running away in August 2019.

Darold W. Killmer, a partner with Killmer Lane & Newman who has litigated both the Melvin and Bailey lawsuits against Colorado Springs, said the lack of consequences for officers who target racial minorities is itself a sort of informal training exercise.

“When the conclusion, which was forgone, is made that the officers did nothing wrong and their conduct was consistent with policy and practice, the rest of the troops see that the department has their back,” he said.

According to the federal lawsuit, Colorado Springs officers were responding to a disturbance at the Remington Apartments just past midnight on April 26, 2018, when Melvin, 27, showed up. Officers forcibly detained him, choked him, pepper sprayed him and used a Taser five times in fewer than two minutes.

“Just to hear somebody screaming and hearing it again, and again, and again. I’ve heard shots before but I’ve never seen somebody tased so many times,” Melvin’s friend Jordan Bruno said at the time.

The El Paso County coroner ruled Melvin’s death a homicide. Police said Melvin had hastily entered and was reportedly “flailing around,” resisting orders to comply and allegedly trying to leap from a second-story window.

Jeffrey Melvin Sr., alleged in the lawsuit that Colorado Springs police were the aggressors, and his son was faced with the choice of remaining in the apartment and being beaten by officers or else trying to flee.

“The Colorado Springs Police Department has a long history of unjustified violence and discriminatory law enforcement against people of color,” wrote lawyers for Melvin Sr. “This brutality continues because CSPD, through the repeated formal tolerance and approval of violent, racially biased policing by its officers, has made clear that CSPD officers are authorized and even encouraged to use excessive force against people of color.”

The lawsuit stated that while 6.5% of Colorado Springs residents are Black, between one-fifth and one-quarter of people against whom police used force between 2014 and 2017 were Black. That, Melvin Sr. alleged, indicated a longtime custom of racially-biased policing that the city should have known about and addressed. Instead, it adopted a “policy of inaction.”

The city defended itself and the officers involved, Daniel Patterson and Joshua Archer, by pointing out a lack of evidence that its police force as a whole knew of any sanctioned practice of discriminatory policing. Of the six prior instances the lawsuit referenced of Colorado Springs police arresting mem of color without probable cause, the city said those were not at all similar to the circumstances of Melvin’s arrest.

“None of the six cases involved an officer’s attempt to detain someone who ‘hastily entered’ a dwelling where officers were investigating a reported disturbance and shut the dwelling door in an officer’s face,” wrote Assistant City Attorney Anne H. Turner.

In February, U.S. Magistrate Judge Kathleen M. Tafoya reviewed the allegations and recommended dismissal of the liability claim against Colorado Springs. She agreed that the other cited cases of alleged racially biased policing were not close enough to Melvin’s case to illustrate a pattern of insufficient training and supervision.

Melvin Sr. objected to Tafoya’s findings, arguing that Tafoya had set too high of a bar at this early stage in the lawsuit.

“Certainly, the previous constitutional violations were not ‘the same’ as defendants’ killing of Mr. Melvin — that would be mind-boggling,” his attorneys wrote. “However, Pplaintiff has alleged substantial similarity in Fourth Amendment violations focused upon legally unjustified stops and arrests, as well as the use of excessive force, especially against Black individuals.”

Arguello agreed with Melvin Sr., finding he had plausibly alleged the officers involved in his son’s death used excessive force in a situation that is likely to recur, and that the officers’ conduct was linked to inadequate training. Finally, the city was indifferent to the lack of training on racially-biased policing.

Killmer said that with Arguello’s ruling, the discovery of evidence may resume. Melvin Sr. is asking for monetary damages, a formal apology and policy changes in the city.

The case is Estate of Jeffrey Melvin v. Colorado Springs et al.