After a federal judge determined that the evidence and the law supported a jury’s multimillion-dollar verdict against the City of Boulder for failing to train its police officers, the city is hoping the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit will overturn that decision.

Last October, a seven-member jury decided after a weeklong trial that Boulder police violated Seth Garrett Franco’s constitutional rights by arresting him without probable cause, and the violation was a product of the city’s failure to train. It awarded Franco, who is now deceased, $3.41 million for the arrest and the 12 subsequent days he spent in jail.

The amount was significantly higher than the lawsuit had asked for, and Franco’s attorneys agreed to allow the trial judge to reduce the award to the requested amount: $2.1 million, still a substantial number given that Franco’s encounter with police did not involve excessive force or cause loss of life.

On Friday, Boulder announced that it was seeking review from the 10th Circuit of multiple decisions in the case, including U.S. Magistrate Judge Michael E. Hegarty’s most recent order upholding the jury’s finding of liability.

“The City of Boulder further states that in appealing these orders and judgments, it intends to bring up for review all previous rulings and orders that led up to and served as a predicate for those orders and judgments,” City Attorney Luis A. Toro wrote in a March 11 court notice.

The civil lawsuit stemmed from Franco’s Sept. 22, 2017 encounter with 16 Boulder officers – comprising more than half of the force on duty that night – who were ostensibly checking on Franco’s welfare. A judge had sentenced Franco to probation earlier that day for assaulting a police officer, and Franco was reportedly suicidal and worried police would try to entrap him in a probation violation.

When officers contacted Franco at his workplace, the Boulder Dushanbe Teahouse, they handcuffed him within seconds. Police cut off his backpack and a detective accused him of lying to her about not taking drugs.

The officers then marched Franco, still in handcuffs, out to the street, where medical first responders evaluated him. Seven minutes after first detaining Franco, an officer found psilocybin mushrooms in Franco’s backpack and an unopened can of beer. Police arrested him for possession of a controlled substance – the mushrooms – and violating his probation by possessing alcohol.

Franco spent 12 days in jail, but a Boulder County judge eventually found the search of his backpack to be unlawful.

Franco died by suicide before the federal jury trial in October. His brother, Sage B. Franco, replaced him as the plaintiff. Although the lawsuit originally named individual officers, Hegarty found they were entitled to qualified immunity for their actions. At trial, Franco’s attorneys argued that Boulder failed to train its officers that technical probation violations were not a standalone crime, and the risk of wrongful arrests was so obvious that the city’s actions were deliberately indifferent.

Jurors saw officers’ body-worn camera footage from Franco’s encounter and concluded that police had quickly moved beyond a welfare check into an arrest without probable cause of a crime.

“The tape showed me that: ‘We’re getting him for something else. Let’s put on the backburner that he may have ingested (medications). We need to find whatever it is and get him into custody,'” Dixie Sunday, one of the jurors, told Colorado Politics.

The city had promised to appeal the decision to the 10th Circuit and Franco’s attorneys similarly warned they would challenge rulings that had favored the defendants.

“The city’s continued refusal to accept any responsibility is disappointing,” said lawyer Gwyneth Whalen on Monday. “Even more so in light of a state judge and federal jury finding the Boulder police officers violated Seth Franco’s constitutional rights. We are confident that the jury’s verdict will be affirmed and look forward to reinstating the claims against the individual officers.”

In addition to the $2.1 million jury award to Sage Franco, Hegarty also granted $602,000 in attorney fees to the plaintiff’s lawyers. A spokesperson for the city said last month that it was working to create specialized training for its officers about technical probation violations.

Boulder’s most recent filings to the trial court in January reiterated the city’s belief that Franco’s attorneys failed to prove any lack of training caused the wrongful arrest.

The case is Franco v. City of Boulder.