Welcome to Court Crawl, Colorado Politics’ roundup of news from the third branch of government. Several lawsuits were dismissed this week involving topics ranging from the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol to the question of whether COVID-19 is a disability. Plus, the federal antitrust trial against DaVita, Inc. begins today.

We bid thee farewell

?  Let’s start a little differently this week by looking at all of the lawsuits that won’t be going anywhere after all. First, a Denver judge dismissed a defamation lawsuit against 9News anchor Kyle Clark brought by a Littleton man who attended the Jan. 6 “Stop the Steal” rally in Washington, D.C. Not only was Clark’s reporting not malicious, but the judge determined that any collateral damage from Chad Burmeister’s Facebook post – “first guy to storm the capital” – was primarily his own doing.

?  Next, a federal judge dismissed Denver’s environmental contractor from a lawsuit that alleges the city violated the constitutional rights of homeless residents with its encampment-clearing tactics.

?  A multimillionaire donor and three others affiliated with the University of Colorado attempted to recover $1 billion from the charitable foundation that manages and invests donations to the university. The state Court of Appeals said that none of the plaintiffs had standing to sue over the University of Colorado Foundation’s alleged financial mismanagement – amounting largely to a difference in investment philosophies.

?  A judge threw out the lawsuit initiated by former Federal Emergency Management Agency leader Michael Brown that claimed Boulder County had violated state open meetings law in selecting a contractor to remove debris from the Marshall Fire.

?  COVID-19 may qualify as a disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act, a federal judge acknowledged. But a Colorado Springs woman hadn’t made the sufficient connection between her father’s illness and her own firing.

?  A Weld County woman alleged Safeway discriminated against her when she objected to soliciting donations on the job due to her religious beliefs. A magistrate judge said there was no discrimination and no retaliation involved.

DaVita on trial

?  After a week’s delay to the start of the trial, the United States’ prosecution of kidney dialysis company DaVita and its former leader, Kent Thiry, commences this morning at the U.S. District Court in Denver. Colorado Politics will have coverage of the trial, but to get up to speed about what is happening and why, read this overview.

State Supreme Court returns

?  On Tuesday, the Colorado Supreme Court returns to hear two cases: one asking whether a pipeline project should have obtained the necessary public utility certificate before beginning construction, and another reviewing the interest rate applied to monetary damages awarded by a jury.

?  The court also issued a decision striking down part of the state’s harassment law as unconstitutional. This was the latest in a series of decisions in which the state’s highest has court found the legislature failed to lay out the elements of a harassment offense in a manner that complied with the First Amendment.

?  The justices agreed to hear two more cases. The first involves their colleague, Justice Carlos A. Samour Jr., in a criminal trial he handled when he was an Arapahoe County District Court judge. The appeal questions whether Samour correctly evaluated an allegation of race-based discrimination in jury selection after the Court of Appeals remanded it for further review. The second case involves whether jurors should receive a definition of “universal malice” in certain murder trials. The complicating factor, though, is that there’s no definition written down in law or in the jury instructions.

10th Circuit weighs in on immigration, immunity

?  In a major decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit said an immigration judge was wrong to conclude that a transgender woman from Honduras would not face LGBT-related persecution if she were deported to her country of birth. A 2-1 ruling found that the evidence, including from the U.S. Department of State, pointed to a failure by the Honduran government to address violence against transgender women in particular.

?  The dissenting vote came from Judge Joel M. Carson III, a Trump administration appointee, who believed that even if the Honduran government wasn’t doing the best job of enforcing LGBT protections, it was possible that Kelly Gonzalez Aguilar wouldn’t be killed if the government deported her.

?  “The perhaps unintended result of the majority opinion is a policy victory for certain asylum seekers. But in my opinion, one we should not award,” Carson wrote.

?  Another panel of 10th Circuit judges reversed a lower court’s decision and granted qualified immunity to a Denver officer who tased an unarmed, surrendering suspect within seconds of contacting him. In reaching their decision, the panel oddly did their own review of the body-worn camera footage and ultimately believed they saw things differently from the trial judge.

?  Speaking of qualified immunity, the 10th Circuit in late 2019 reinstated an inmate’s lawsuit by reversing a lower court judge who called it “frivolous.” But upon further review, the lower court granted immunity to prison officials because the alleged overcrowding and failure to accommodate the plaintiff’s private showering did not amount to clearly-established constitutional violations.

Vacancies and appointments

?  Applications are due by April 22 to succeed Judge Michael Schiferl on the district court of the 16th Judicial District (Bent, Crowley and Otero counties).

?  The governor has just under two weeks now to appoint one of three finalists to succeed Judge Brian N. Bowen on the Adams County Court: Marques Ivey of Aurora, Lara Jimenez of Brighton and Joshua Nowak of Thornton.

?  For any attorneys looking to make $73.86 per hour to hear traffic cases, civil protection orders, small claims and criminal arraignments, Denver County Court is hiring part-time magistrates.

Miscellaneous decisions

?  Good news for certain divorcing spouses: The Court of Appeals said a woman’s not-yet-awarded job bonus was not part of the marital property that needed to be divided in her divorce.

?  The Court of Appeals reversed a man’s conviction based on an unlawful backpack search, but also addressed the strange situation of a jury commissioner who made unflattering comments about the defendant to jurors.

?  A former head coach of the women’s lacrosse team at Colorado Mesa University has plausibly alleged that her race or gender played a role in her firing, a judge found.

Court Crawl goes on mini-vacation

?  The Court Crawl will take next Monday off and will return on April 18.