Justia Constitutional Law Opinion Summaries

The State sought review of whether the trial court erred in suppressing evidence. Specifically, whether defendant Bernard Shoen’s encounter with police, during which he confessed to possessing a controlled substance, was consensual or whether it constituted an impermissible seizure under the Fourth Amendment. The Colorado Supreme Court concluded the encounter was consensual. Accordingly, the Court reversed the trial court’s order suppressing Shoen’s statements and the evidence seized from his truck, and remanded to that court for further proceedings. View "Colorado v. Shoen" on Justia Law

Parish Carter was charged with two counts of first degree murder, bribing a witness, conspiracy to commit first degree murder, intimidation of a witness, and unlawful distribution of a controlled substance, all in connection with the drive-by shooting deaths of Javad Marshall-Fields and his fiancée Vivian Wolfe, the week before Marshall-Fields was to testify in a prosecution of Carter’s stepbrother, Robert Ray, for an earlier murder. Carter was acquitted of first degree murder and of bribing a witness but convicted of conspiracy to commit murder and the remaining charges. He was sentenced to 48 years for conspiracy and to consecutive lesser terms of incarceration for his other convictions, for a total sentence of 70 years. Carter petitioned for review of the court of appeals judgment affirming his conviction of conspiracy to commit first degree murder. With regard to a videotaped interrogation by the police, the district court denied a motion to suppress the defendant’s statements, rejecting all of his Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment claims, including his assertion that he had not been adequately advised of his right to have an attorney present during interrogation; and it denied the defendant’s motion to limit access to that videotape during jury deliberations. In a fractured opinion, in which all three members of the division of the court of appeals wrote separately, the appellate court affirmed with regard to both of these assignments of error. Because the Miranda advisement of the defendant reasonably conveyed that he had a right to consult with counsel, both before and during any interrogation by the police, and because the district court did not abuse its discretion in permitting the jury unrestricted access to both a video recording and transcript of the defendant’s custodial interrogation, the Colorado Supreme Court affirmed the court of appeals. View "Carter v. Colorado" on Justia Law

The State appealed an appellate court’s judgment reversing Priscilla Rock’s convictions for second degree burglary and theft, relating to a break in and her ex-boyfriend’s parents’ house. Defendant conceded that she entered the house without authorization, but testified that she did so for the purpose of locating a memory card containing digital pictures of her son, whose father is the ex-boyfriend. She further testified that after she failed to locate the memory card in the house, she took the items from the home to hold them as “collateral,” in hopes of compelling her ex-boyfriend to deliver the memory card to her later, without ever intending to permanently keep these items from their owners. The prosecution, however, presented evidence that the defendant sold and gave away some of the items. The trial court denied Rock’s request for an additional, lesser-included-offense instruction on second degree criminal trespass, on the ground that second degree criminal trespass was not an included offense of second degree burglary. The court of appeals reversed, concluding that in denying Rock’s request, the trial court erred and that the error was not harmless with regard to either of Rock’s convictions. Because second degree criminal trespass was not a lesser included offense of second degree burglary under the strict elements test, the Colorado Supreme Court reversed the judgment of the court of appeals is reversed. View "Colorado v. Rock" on Justia Law

In a combined opinion, the Colorado Supreme Court addressed whether sexual offenders had to bear the cost of their victims’ forensic medical examinations as criminal restitution. The General Assembly authorized recovery of “extraordinary direct public . . . investigative costs,” courts of appeals have disagreed as to whether the cost of a victim’s SANE (Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner) examination was “extraordinary.” As both a medical and investigative response to a sexual offense, a SANE exam necessarily performs dual roles: as a valuable tool for collecting sexual-assault evidence; and also as a patient-centered medical procedure sensitive to victims’ treatment needs, conducted by medical personnel, and limited to the scope of victims’ informed consent. The Supreme Court concluded the hybrid nature of these exams rendered them (and their resulting costs) extraordinary, and the state may recover those costs as restitution. The Court thus affirmed the judgment of the court of appeals in Colorado v. Teague, No. 10CA2358 (Colo. App. Nov. 27, 2013) (not published pursuant to C.A.R. 35(f)), and reversed the judgment of the court of appeals in Colorado v. Rogers, 2014 COA 110, __ P.3d __. Accordingly, the Court reinstated the district court’s restitution award in Rogers. View "Teague v. Colorado" on Justia Law

The issue presented for the Colorado Supreme Court’s review in this case was whether it was reversible error for a trial court in a criminal case to provide the deliberating jury with “unfettered and unsupervised access” to a crime scene video and a video of a police interview of defendant Ignacio Ray “Mike” Rael. A unanimous division of the court of appeals concluded that the trial court did not err in either regard. The Supreme Court agreed with the result reached by the appellate court, namely, that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in allowing the jury unfettered access to the two videos during deliberations. In the Court’s view, the jury was entitled to access the non-testimonial crime scene video because that video did not present the same risk of undue emphasis as do videos documenting witnesses’ out-of-court, testimonial statements. The Court also concluded based on the longstanding rule that a defendant’s confession was not subject to the same limitations during deliberations as the out-of-court statements of other witnesses, that the jury was entitled to access the interview video. View "Rael v. Colorado" on Justia Law

Petitioners Scott Smith and D. Michael Kopp, both registered electors, appealed the actions of the Ballot Title Setting Board (“Title Board”) regarding the setting of the title and ballot title and submission clause for Proposed Initiative 2017–2018 #4 (“Initiative #4”). Issues for the Colorado Supreme Court’s review were: (1) Initiative #4 contained a single subject; and (2) whether the Supreme Court had authority to review an abstract prepared and submitted to the Title Board as required by section 1-40-105.5, C.R.S. (2016). The Court concluded: (1) the initiative indeed contained a single subject (the limitation of housing growth in Colorado); and (2) section 1-40-107 authorized the Court to review such an abstract. View "In the Matter of the Title, Ballot Title and Submission Clause for 2017" on Justia Law

The State appealed the reversal of Kalani Opana’s conviction for second degree murder, in the shooting death of one of his housemates. The district court instructed the jury as to the use of deadly physical force in defense of one’s person. In consideration of the statutory definition of the term “deadly physical force,” which limited the applicability of the term to “force, the intended, natural, and probable consequence of which is to produce death,” the court of appeals determined that there was adequate evidence produced at trial for the jury to have found that Opana used physical force not rising to the level of “deadly” physical force, and it concluded that in this case the failure of the trial court to instruct the jury, sua sponte, on the use of physical force generally amounted to plain error. The Colorado Supreme Court concluded the court of appeals misconstrued the definition of “deadly physical force,” and when that statutory term is properly construed, the evidence at trial did not support an instruction on self-defense predicated on the use of other-than-“deadly” physical force. The court of appeals was accordingly reversed, and the case remanded for consideration of the defendant’s remaining assignments of error. View "Colorado v. Opana" on Justia Law

In 2006, Guy Lucero was convicted by jury for multiple offenses arising from a drive-by shooting. He was tried as an adult. The trial court sentenced Lucero to consecutive term-of-years prison sentences for each count, aggravated as crimes of violence, resulting in an aggregate sentence of eighty-four years. The court of appeals affirmed Lucero’s convictions and sentences on direct appeal. In 2010, the U.S. Supreme Court held in Graham v. Florida, 560 U.S. 48 (2010), that the Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution prohibited the imposition of a life without parole sentence on a juvenile non-homicide offender, concluding that states must “give defendants like Graham some meaningful opportunity to obtain release based on demonstrated maturity and rehabilitation.” Subsequently, Lucero filed a motion pursuant to Rule 35(b) of the Colorado Rules of Criminal Procedure seeking reduction of his sentence. As relevant here, Lucero argued that his sentence must be reduced under Graham to meet constitutional standards, because an eighty-four-year sentence imposed on a juvenile carried the same implications as a sentence of life without parole. The trial court denied the motion; the court of appeals affirmed. The Colorado Supreme Court determined "Graham" and "Miller" did not apply here, and therefore, did not invalidate Lucero's aggregate term-of-years sentence. The Court also rejected Lucero’s argument that the court of appeals erred in treating his claim as one under Rule 35(c). View "Lucero v. Colorado" on Justia Law

In 2000, Atorrus Rainer was convicted by jury on two counts of attempted first-degree murder, two counts of first-degree assault, one count of first-degree burglary, one count of aggravated robbery, and crime of violence. He was seventeen at the time of the charged offenses, and he was charged as an adult. Rainer was sentenced to forty-eight years for each attempted murder charge, thirty-two years for each assault charge, and thirty-two years each for the charges of burglary and aggravated robbery. The sentences for the two counts of attempted murder were subsequently ordered to run concurrently, as were the sentences for the two counts of assault, resulting in an aggregate sentence of 112 years. Following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Graham v. Florida, 560 U.S. 48 (2010), which categorically banned sentences of life without parole for juveniles who were not convicted of homicide, Rainer moved the district court to vacate the sentence, arguing that his aggregate term-of-years sentence was the functional equivalent of life without parole and therefore unconstitutional under "Graham." The district court denied the motion. On appeal, the court of appeals reversed, concluding that, because Rainer would be eligible for parole at about age seventy-five, thus ineligible for parole within his expected lifetime, he had no meaningful opportunity to obtain release and was unconstitutional under "Graham" and the subsequent case of Miller v. Alabama, 132 S. Ct. 2455 (2012). The Colorado Supreme Court determined "Graham" and "Miller" did not apply here, and therefore, did not invalidate Rainer's aggregate term-of-years sentence. View "Colorado v. Rainer" on Justia Law

In 1995, Cheryl Armstrong was convicted by jury on two counts of second-degree murder under a complicity theory. She was sixteen at the time of the charged offenses, and was tried as an adult. Armstrong was sentenced to forty-eight years in prison on each count, to be served consecutively, resulting in an aggregate sentence of ninety-six years. Following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Graham v. Florida, 560 U.S. 48 (2010), which categorically banned sentences of life without parole for juveniles who were not convicted of homicide, Armstrong moved the district court to vacate the sentence, arguing that her aggregate term-of-years sentence was the functional equivalent of life without parole and therefore unconstitutional under "Graham." The district court denied Armstrong’s motion. On appeal, the court of appeals affirmed, concluding that, because Armstrong will be eligible for parole at about age sixty, she has a meaningful opportunity to obtain release, and her sentence thereby complied with "Graham" and the subsequent case of Miller v. Alabama, 132 S. Ct. 2455 (2012). The Colorado Supreme Court determined "Graham" and "Miller" did not apply here, and therefore, did not invalidate Armstrong's aggregate term-of-years sentence. View "Armstrong v. Colorado" on Justia Law