judge charlotte sweeney
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Federal judge sanctions Pueblo for destroying evidence in lawsuit
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A federal judge imposed sanctions on the city of Pueblo last week after it disposed of a key piece of evidence shortly after the plaintiffs filed suit seeking damages for the destruction of their home. On June 25, 2022, a city bus crashed into David V. and Nancy M. Salama’s house. One year later, they…
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Federal judge blasts government for violating court order, confiscating man’s property
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A federal judge gave the government three hours on Friday to return the property of a man released from immigration detention, which it allegedly retained in violation of her previous order. “At its most benign, this failure is an unforced error of preventable dimension. At its worst, this is unjustifiable intransigence, where retention of Petitioner’s…
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Colorado’s federal judges slash motions backlog to lowest in years
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Colorado’s federal trial judges collectively had 37 motions in civil cases that had been sitting on their dockets for at least six months without a ruling, as of Sept. 30. That is the smallest backlog the state’s U.S. District Court has experienced since September 2017, before many of the current judges were even on the…
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Federal judge green-lights excessive force trial against Fort Collins officers
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A federal judge concluded last week that a jury will need to resolve whether two Fort Collins police officers violated a man’s constitutional rights by using excessive force after he refused to accept a citation. In a Jan. 21 order, U.S. District Court Judge Charlotte N. Sweeney analyzed the severity of plaintiff Andru Kulas’ alleged…
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Federal judge warns DOJ against raising repeatedly rejected arguments in immigration detention cases
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A federal judge in Colorado warned the U.S. Department of Justice on Monday against raising arguments that she and other judges have repeatedly rejected in cases challenging the lawfulness of immigration detentions. In a Jan. 26 order finding the government is wrongfully detaining a Cuban national without a bond hearing, U.S. District Court Judge Charlotte…
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10th Circuit to address resentencing of probation violators in rare all-judges hearing
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The Denver-based federal appeals court agreed on Thursday to hold a rare all-judges hearing to determine the proper procedure for resentencing a criminal defendant who has violated the terms of his probation. In the federal appellate courts, the vast majority of cases are decided in three-judge panels. Occasionally, the courts will vote to have all…
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Elizabeth School District dismisses challenge to book-ban injunction on eve of appellate arguments
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An Elbert County school district has dismissed its challenge to a judge’s injunction ordering it to return banned books to library shelves, days before the Denver-based federal appeals court was set to hear oral arguments this week. Although a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit formally dismissed the case…
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Federal judge opens new front in effort to increase magistrate judge handling of civil cases
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One of Colorado’s federal judges rang in the new year with a new effort to spread out the U.S. District Court’s civil caseload among its roster of magistrate judges. “NOTICE ENCOURAGING CONSIDERATION OF CONSENT,” Judge S. Kato Crews has written in docket entries across at least nine recently filed civil cases so far. “This district’s…
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Federal judge declines to dismiss claims against prison officials for seizure-related death
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A federal judge declined last month to dismiss the claims against numerous prison employees for a man’s in-custody death following several seizures and his repeated ingestion of liquified pain-numbing medication. The mother and minor children of Victor Esquivel sued the state’s corrections director, prison supervisors, corrections officers, medical employees and a medical staffing firm after…
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Divided 10th Circuit rules bank customer must arbitrate discrimination-related claims
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The Denver-based federal appeals court ruled on Monday that a mandatory arbitration clause in the fine print of a customer’s bank account agreement prohibited her from pursuing claims of racial discrimination in court. Jeanetta Vaughn filed suit against JPMorgan Chase after the manager of its South Buckley Road branch in Aurora called the police on…
