A Denver judge mistakenly used an expired provision of state law to extend a defendant’s speedy trial deadline, Colorado’s second-highest court ruled on Thursday in overturning the man’s convictions and 34-years-to-life prison sentence.

As part of the constitutional guarantee of a speedy trial, Colorado law generally requires the government to bring a defendant to trial within six months of their not-guilty plea. Lawmakers have established one consequence for a violation: dismissal of the charges and a bar on further prosecution.

Prosecutors charged Anastacio Mares with multiple offenses for sexual assault on a child. Jurors found him guilty and he received an indefinite sentence of at least 34 years.

Mares entered his not-guilty plea in April 2022, meaning his speedy trial deadline fell in October. In mid-June, Mares’ lawyer suggested Mares was not competent to proceed, prompting District Court Judge Eric M. Johnson to order a competency evaluation.

Following the evaluation, Johnson found Mares to be competent after all and recalculated the speedy trial deadline to account for the time to perform the evaluation — now in mid-December.

Johnson tried to set a trial for September, but Mares’ lawyer had a conflict for late September and believed early September would be too soon. The prosecutor also called an early September trial infeasible.

After further dates were problematic for the defense or prosecution, Johnson observed the COVID-19 pandemic had created a backlog for trials. He cited a provision of Colorado law permitting judges to extend the speedy trial deadline by three or six months under certain circumstances due to pandemic congestion.

“I have worked very hard to avoid that,” he said. But “I’m going to trigger that because of the COVID pandemic.”

Johnson and the attorneys apparently did not realize that lawmakers included a clause automatically terminating judges’ authority to extend trial deadlines due to pandemic backlogs. The termination took effect in April 2022, four months earlier.

Johnson set the trial for January 2023. When the defense moved to dismiss the charges, Johnson said he “did everything I could” to bring Mares to trial within the speedy trial deadline. However, the request for a competency evaluation was a delay “that could be attributable to the defense.”

Mares appealed his convictions, citing a violation of his speedy trial rights. The government countered that even if Johnson was wrong to rely on the temporary COVID-19 provision, the defense’s delay tactics forced his hand.

“The trial court was presented an impossible situation. The statutory six months in which a trial is to be prepared and presented to a jury had been stalled by the defense’s request for a competency determination,” wrote Senior Assistant Attorney General Frank R. Lawson. Afterward, the “prosecution and court endeavored to make themselves available for multiple dates within the existing timeline, but the defense could not reciprocate.”

A three-judge Court of Appeals panel disagreed with Lawson’s interpretation of events.

Judge Ted C. Tow III wrote in the panel’s Aug. 21 opinion that Mares’ lawyer was not stonewalling Johnson’s efforts to set a trial. Moreover, it was unfair to cite the competency evaluation as grounds to violate Mares’ speedy trial rights.

“Indeed, this reading of the statute would place a defense attorney whose client presents competency concerns in an untenable position: insist on the possibly incompetent client’s speedy trial or raise competency and risk being held responsible for extensions beyond the time it takes to have the client evaluated,” wrote Tow.

As for Johnson’s use of the since-repealed authority to extend the speedy trial deadline, the “General Assembly’s words unequivocally state that the provision is not to be invoked after a specific date,” Tow concluded.

The panel overturned Mares’ convictions and, as required by state law, directed the charges to be permanently dismissed.

The case is People v. Mares.