Justice Delayed is Justice Denied
Pamela Carty and Courtney McDonald celebrate their victory shortly after the case was dismissed.
7 months, 22 days. That is how long Power Law had a client in custody on a Denver “investigatory hold.” For those who may not know, in Denver, the police department (not the District Attorney or the courts) can issue a hold on a person without anything more than a suspicion of criminality. If the person is out of custody, that person can be arrested. If the person is already in custody, this suspicion can be used to keep them in custody.
This practice has long been critiqued by the defense community. A person’s arrest often wreaks havoc on their life. They can lose their job, their housing, their medical care, and it creates significant family concern and sometimes strife. Not to mention that arrests are often physically dangerous, particularly for minority groups. This practice is also an example of extreme governmental overreach. It should chill every Denver resident to know that, at any time, if a police officer merely suspects you of a crime, you (or a loved one) can be arrested and held for an indeterminate amount of time.
When Power Law found out about this hold for this client, we went into action. We called and emailed (and re-called and re-emailed) every court, every prosecuting agency, and finally, every law enforcement agency we could think of to get this hold lifted. Or, at the very least, get the Denver Police Department to file the case into a court so that our client could move forward.
For 7 months and 22 days, despite promises of help, nothing happened.
Despite this inaction by Denver, we continued to work hard on behalf of our client, favorably resolving his cases in other jurisdictions. Finally, he was due to be released, but the Denver hold was still there.
When our client appeared in Denver, the same District Attorney’s office that had promised help in getting the case going asked for a cash or surety bond due to the seriousness of the allegations. We were then able to present the many instances where the DA, but particularly DPD, had failed to act. The Denver court, to their credit, remarked that if this case was so serious, then it should have been filed sooner and gave our client a personal recognizance bond. One victory achieved.
Our next action was to file a Motion to Dismiss for Failure to Prosecute. This type of motion is rarely used and even more rarely granted, but our facts were so egregious, it was the right thing to do. For this client, who lost out on getting any kind of global resolution and spent so long in jail, the delay was prejudicial and harmful. Also, for anyone who may find themselves in this position, it is in unconscionable that the entities that we trust to enforce the laws would be so careless with a person’s freedom.
Today, June 9, 2022, the District Attorney confessed our motion and dismissed this case with prejudice (meaning that it cannot be refiled). Our client is free and able to resume his life – a huge victory after nearly eight months in jail.
Hat’s off and big congratulations to Pamela Carty, Partner, who turned her frustration into a winning legal strategy. Big kudos also to Courtney McDonald, our amazing paralegal, who helped substantially on the Failure to Prosecute Motion.
We are glad that the Denver District Attorney did the right thing, but we will continue to fight injustice where we see it and with everything we have.