A federal judge on Tuesday reversed an order to keep a man accused of bank robbery detained pending trial, while acknowledging it was a “close question” whether to release the defendant on home detention with GPS monitoring.

In a Sept. 16 order, U.S. District Court Senior Judge William J. Martínez concluded the government failed to show why he should disregard the recommendation of probation officials to release Coby Vance Goldsmith with conditions while the criminal case proceeded.

“The Probation Office agreed that Goldsmith’s lack of criminal history makes it unlikely that he would fail to appear for court dates or pose a safety risk to the community,” wrote Martínez. “The Court notes that the Government does not argue in its response for why it believes home detention would be futile.”

The Bail Reform Act directs that federal defendants be detained pending trial only if “no condition or combination of conditions” will likely ensure the defendant will appear in court and pose no threat to community safety. The University of Chicago’s Federal Criminal Justice Clinic published a 2022 report finding roughly three-quarters of defendants are detained pending trial. But for defendants who are released pretrial, re-arrests or failures to appear only occur around 1% of the time.

“These high detention rates and these long, expensive jail stays are really not what Congress intended when they passed the Bail Reform Act,” said lead author Alison Siegler at a Colorado Springs judicial conference last year. “There was a presumption of release.”

The government charged Goldsmith and two other men with two bank robbery-related offenses on July 7, and a grand jury approved an indictment weeks later. In mid-July, the defendants appeared before Chief U.S. Magistrate Judge Scott T. Varholak, where Goldsmith contested his pretrial detention.

The prosecution described the allegations against the defendants, namely that they were part of a “Houston crew” that jammed ATMs using cards covered in glue. An ATM repairperson would then come to fix the machine, at which point the crew would jump in to rob the ATM.

The government alleged Goldsmith and the others stole more than $290,000 from a Centennial ATM in April and attempted to rob an Arvada location in early July, but law enforcement arrested them.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Brian Dunn told Varholak he “can’t speak to” why probation officials recommended Goldsmith be released on home detention with GPS monitoring. He suggested Goldsmith’s status as the youngest defendant and his lack of “significant previous felony convictions” played a role.

However, Dunn continued, Goldsmith also had an outstanding criminal case South Carolina for a similar 2023 robbery.

“It has been pending since 2023 and it does not look like there has been any violation of the conditions,” countered public defender Jared Westbroek.

“Well, other than allegedly committing the exact crime (on) multiple occasions,” interjected Varholak.

Varholak ultimately ordered that Goldsmith be continuously detained, citing the seriousness of the robbery, his lack of “ties to this community,” and an evading arrest offense as a juvenile.

“And then what is absolutely the most concerning to me is the fact that in 2023, he was arrested for virtually … the exact same offense as he’s alleged to have committed now. And he’s under supervision for that offense,” said Varholak. “I find that there are no conditions or combination of conditions that I can impose to assure his presence or the safety of the community, and I will therefore order him detained.”

Goldsmith appealed the decision and offered multiple clarifications. First, his juvenile offense for evading arrest was ultimately dismissed. Second, Goldsmith complied with all conditions of GPS monitoring in his South Carolina case, which were lifted in November 2024.

More fundamentally, “Judge Varholak did not make an assessment of whether or not the proposed release conditions — namely location monitoring and home detention — could mitigate these perceived risks,” wrote public defender Summer Woods.

Dunn, in response, emphasized that the “strong evidence” against Goldsmith and his alleged “willingness to commit the exact same crimes” were justifications for keeping him incarcerated.

Martínez called it a “decidedly close question” in which several factors “amply support Judge Varholak’s detention order.”

But he believed, under the Bail Reform Act, “there is a combination of conditions — most notably, home detention with location monitoring — that will reasonably ensure that Goldsmith will appear for his court dates and not endanger the community.”

Martínez elaborated that the government focused “so heavily on the strength of its evidence” that it did not acknowledge Goldsmith’s lack of criminal convictions. Moreover, the government did not argue why home confinement and GPS monitoring would be problematic, in light of probation officials’ recommendation made with knowledge of the allegations against Goldsmith.

Martínez ordered Goldsmith released to his mother in Texas, where his travel will be restricted and he will undergo monitoring. Goldsmith appeared in court on Sept. 18, where U.S. Magistrate Judge Cyrus Y. Chung approved his release with those terms.

The case is United States v. Goldsmith.