double jeopardy
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Colorado justices concerned about retrying defendant after jury signaled acquittal
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Some members of the Colorado Supreme Court appeared uncomfortable on Tuesday with allowing a criminal defendant to stand trial a second time after a Larimer County jury signaled it was deadlocked on some counts but had found him not guilty of the more serious charges. Omar Alexander Mena stood trial last summer for three counts…
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Appeals court decides violations of child custody orders may be prosecuted per child
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Colorado’s second-highest court concluded for the first time on Wednesday that a defendant may be charged with violating a child custody order based on the number of children affected, not the number of orders violated. Mesa County jurors convicted Tiffany Jean Wilson on four counts of violating a custody order. She drove off with her…
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Colorado justices find double jeopardy violation in woman’s conviction in ‘outlier’ case
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The Colorado Supreme Court on Monday rejected the prosecution’s argument that a woman’s Adams County trespassing conviction — which all parties believed was unconstitutional — should nevertheless stand because the violation was not obvious at the time of her sentencing. The constitutional prohibition on double jeopardy protects defendants from being prosecuted again for the same offense…
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‘Why are we here?’ Colorado justices skeptical of state’s push to uphold woman’s conviction
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Members of the Colorado Supreme Court on Tuesday struggled to understand why prosecutors remained opposed to overturning a woman’s trespassing conviction, even as both sides agreed the conviction would not stand under current law. The constitutional prohibition on double jeopardy protects defendants from being prosecuted again for the same offense following acquittal, but also from…
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Appeals judge urges lawmakers to revisit careless driving law
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Colorado’s second-highest court agreed on Thursday that state law only authorized a single criminal sentence for a man whose careless driving resulted in the deaths of two people, and not the two sentences a Larimer County judge originally imposed. Judge Steve Bernard, a member of the three-judge Court of Appeals panel that decided the case,…
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Colorado Supreme Court says Mexican acquittal did not bar man’s Mesa County murder prosecution
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Even though Mexico’s judicial system acquitted a man for a murder he committed in Mesa County, there was no prohibition against Colorado prosecutors also charging him for the offense when he returned, the state Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday. A jury found Rafael Aguilar Garcia guilty of murder in 2017, nearly three decades after he…
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Appeals court overturns Rio Blanco County convictions after judge’s wrongful order
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Although prosecutors in Rio Blanco County eventually secured convictions after bringing a man to trial three times, the state’s Court of Appeals has now wiped away the verdict because of a judge’s erroneous decision to declare a mistrial during the first set of proceedings. On appeal, defendant Edwin Richard Gereaux alleged a range of errors…
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State Supreme Court to scrutinize trial of man found responsible for 1991 double killing
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Although Timothy John Kennedy reportedly had no motive, left no conclusive DNA evidence at the crime scene, and could point to another suspect who was indisputably hatching a murder plot, an El Paso County jury convicted Kennedy in 2014 for an execution-style double homicide. But that trial, which took place after a judge overturned a…
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State Supreme Court gives green light to prosecutors for charging DUI defendants anew
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One year after the Colorado Supreme Court laid down a new standard for prosecuting felony drunk driving cases and prompted the reversal of dozens of convictions, the justices have now clarified that prosecutors may, in fact, seek to try those defendants again for driving under the influence. It does not violate the constitutional protection against…
