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State Supreme Court agrees Denver officers lacked reasonable suspicion to detain man
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Two Denver police officers did not have reasonable suspicion of criminal activity when they boxed in a driver with their patrol car, the Colorado Supreme Court decided, deeming the officers’ actions an unconstitutional seizure under the Fourth Amendment. The decision on Monday upheld a lower court’s ruling that suppressed evidence from Alexander Brown’s February 2020…
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State employees do not have right to rescind their resignation, appeals court says
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State agencies do not have to honor an employee’s request to withdraw their resignation, the Court of Appeals has ruled. A three-judge panel for the appellate court considered whether the state constitution, which guarantees that employees in the Colorado personnel system hold their jobs “during efficient service or until reaching retirement age,” allows workers to…
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10th Circuit clarifies that crime victim reimbursement only covers victims’ costs
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Because federal law allows for crime victims to receive restitution for the expense of participating in legal proceedings, the representatives of deceased victims cannot be reimbursed for their own expenses, the federal appeals court based in Denver has decided. The United States government attempted to argue that Anthony Rivas, the son of Charlene Bailey, was…
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10th Circuit upholds age discrimination verdict against United Airlines
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There was sufficient evidence for a jury to find that United Airlines willfully violated federal age discrimination law by forcing two longtime flight attendants into retirement, the federal appeals court based in Denver concluded. United had sought to overturn the verdict from the 2018 jury trial by arguing there was no direct evidence of age…
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10th Circuit upholds seizure of Park County horses
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The federal appeals court based in Denver upheld the seizure of dozens of malnourished horses in Park County, finding that government officials had probable cause to suspect a violation of Colorado’s animal cruelty law. After a lower court judge dismissed his lawsuit last year, Mark Walker turned to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the…
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Appeals court overturns sex assault conviction following improper witness testimony
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A Douglas County judge mistakenly let an expert witness vouch for the credibility of a child victim, prompting the state’s Court of Appeals to reverse the defendant’s sexual assault convictions. Joseph Ramirez was sentenced to 16 years to life in prison based on his 2018 trial for allegedly repeatedly sexually abusing a child. There were…
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Despite wrong man on phone, appeals court upholds termination of father’s parental rights
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The Court of Appeals upheld an Adams County judge’s termination of a man’s parental rights, even though the man was not present and a different person – with his same name – was on the phone during the parental rights hearing instead. The caseworker in a child welfare proceeding learned that the child’s father was incarcerated,…
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State Supreme Court to take up case of sleeping juror
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The prosecution, defense attorneys and judge in a felony trial all noticed that a juror was repeatedly falling asleep, but the judge declined the defense’s request to “rouse him.” The state’s Court of Appeals later determined it could not review whether the sleeping juror compromised the defendant’s right to a fair trial because the defense…
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Supreme Court finds error in Eagle County’s valuation of luxury Vail resort
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Eagle County improperly included income from separately-owned condominium units when it estimated the property value of a luxury Vail resort, the Supreme Court decided on Tuesday. The county had valued The Lodge at Vail at roughly double what its owner, Vail Resorts subsidiary Lodge Properties, Inc., believed it was worth. The discrepancy stemmed from how…
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State Supreme Court grants Boulder immunity for defective sidewalk by 4-3 decision
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Local governments dodged a potentially massive liability for their defective sidewalks on Tuesday, as the Colorado Supreme Court ruled in a split 4-3 decision that the city of Boulder could not be sued for a misaligned portion of sidewalk that caused a woman to fall and injure herself. Colorado’s governmental immunity law generally prohibits liability…