Colorado’s second-highest court reversed an Arapahoe County defendant’s assault convictions last week, concluding the trial judge neglected to define a key, ambiguous term for jurors.

Police officers arrested David Cristobal Aragon at a house party for allegedly violating a restraining order, but he had a series of seizure-like episodes that required transportation to the hospital. Once there, he continued to seize. Two officers later testified that Aragon swiped feces on them while they were assisting him.

Jurors acquitted Aragon of the alleged restraining order violation, but convicted him of assault against the officers. Prosecutors had charged him under the law that makes it a felony to cause a police officer or first responder to come into contact with feces or other bodily fluid with an intent to “infect, injure, or harm.”

At the time of Aragon’s trial, the Court of Appeals had recently issued a precedent-setting decision in another case involving a defendant who spat on police officers. The court determined the word “harm” was ambiguous, but the trial judge appropriately defined it to mean psychological or emotional harm that is “not fleeting or minimal in nature.”

The Colorado Supreme Court later revised the definition of “harm,” but Aragon argued that, at the time of his trial, the Court of Appeals decision made clear that then-District Court Judge Elizabeth A. Weishaupl needed to provide jurors with a definition of the vague term.

“In the jurors’ minds, the definition of ‘harm’ could have encompassed a host of meanings, including as little as psychological or emotional harm in the most ‘fleeting or minimal’ nature, which this Court rejected,” wrote public defender Kira L. Suyeishi.

She added that there was no evidence Aragon intended to infect, injure, or harm the officers under the current understanding of the term.

A three-judge Court of Appeals panel agreed.

“Aragon did not have the benefit of any definition of ‘harm,'” wrote Judge Sueanna P. Johnson in the April 2 opinion. As a result, “we cannot be sure that Aragon was not convicted by the jury under the legally incorrect standard.”

She acknowledged that the defense did not object to the absence of a definition for jurors at trial. But because the Court of Appeals’ precedential decision was in effect and a definition was necessary to prevent the law from being unconstitutionally vague, Weishaupl was obligated to provide a definition even without an objection.

The case is People v. Aragon.