The arraignments for the five police officers and two paramedics charged in connection with Elijah McClain’s 2019 death in Aurora have been rescheduled for Jan. 20, with none of the defendants entering pleas in a brief hearing Friday afternoon. 

McClain, 23, died in hospital in August 2019 days after police officers forcibly restrained him, put him in a control neck hold and paramedics injected him with the sedative ketamine. Officers had responded to a call reporting a person acting suspiciously, but McClain was not suspected of any crime. He was walking home from a convenience store. 

Judge Priscilla Loewe decided in late July a grand jury convened by Attorney General Phil Weiser had found probable cause to indict the two paramedics and three officers: Peter Cichuniec, Jeremy Cooper, Jason Rosenblatt, Nathan Woodyard and Randy Roedema. The five face 32 counts altogether, including criminally negligent homicide and manslaughter.

The 17th Judicial District Attorney’s Office previously declined to bring charges.

During Friday’s hearing, officials from the Adams County Sheriff’s Office flanked the courtroom doors. A crowd of a few dozen supporters, some of them armed, gathered outside shortly before and discussed plans to walk the paramedics out of the building following the hearing to help them avoid media. They continued discussing their plans in the lobby, at one point mentioning the word “paparazzi.”

Loewe has presided over the cases since they were filed, but she said she will soon move to a new division in the district and Judge Mark Warner will take over the case.