Colorado’s second-highest court reversed a man’s sexual assault conviction last month after finding an El Paso County judge applied the wrong legal standard when assessing whether the defendant was competent to stand trial.

Prosecutors charged Micheal Cochran with numerous sex-related offenses, but his defense attorney became concerned that Cochran was struggling to understand the charges, possible penalties and the procedures more broadly.

Ultimately, Cochran underwent a court-ordered competency evaluation and a psychologist found him capable of moving forward. However, the defense requested a second evaluation after Cochran fell and suffered a head injury requiring surgery. A second psychologist met with Cochran and found him to have a mental or developmental disability with signs of possible dementia.

District Court Judge Eric Bentley then ordered the state to provide Cochran with competency restoration services. Before the services even began, however, a third psychologist evaluated Cochran and found him competent, with no signs of serious impairment.

Bentley held a hearing on the question of Cochran’s ability to proceed to trial. Although the district attorney’s office acknowledged it had the responsibility to prove Cochran was now competent, Cochran’s defense attorney opened by mistakenly stating it was his burden to prove Cochran lacked competency.

Bentley heard from the psychologists about their competing evaluations of Cochran and deemed it a “close call.” But Bentley, echoing the defense’s incorrect understanding of the law, concluded Cochran had not proven he remained incompetent. Subsequently, Cochran pleaded guilty to one count of sexual assault and he received a sentence of three years to life in prison.

A three-judge panel for the Court of Appeals concluded Bentley and the defense attorney had confused two provisions of state law, one of which correctly required the prosecution to prove competency and the other required the defense to prove incompetency. Although the Colorado Attorney General’s Office painted the defense attorney’s mistake as deliberate, the panel was not convinced.

“On this record, we can’t conclude that if the court had properly placed the burden on the prosecution to prove that Cochran was competent, the outcome would have been the same,” wrote Judge Janice B. Davidson in the July 11 opinion.

The panel returned the case to Bentley to determine if it was feasible to assess whether Cochran was competent at the time of his 2022 guilty plea. If so, Cochran could be re-sentenced for the sex assault charge. If not, Bentley would need to resume the process under Colorado’s competency laws.

The case is People v. Cochran.