Justia Colorado Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

The City of Lakewood, Colorado enacted a business and occupation tax on certain telecommunications providers in 1969, which initially applied only to utility companies maintaining a telephone exchange and supplying local service within the city. Following changes in state and federal law promoting competitive neutrality and prohibiting barriers to entry, the city amended its tax ordinances in 1996 and again in 2015. The 1996 amendment expanded the tax to cover all providers of basic local telecommunications service, including some cellular services, while the 2015 amendment further broadened the scope to include all cellular and wireless voice service providers. Lakewood did not seek voter approval before enacting either amendment.After Lakewood audited MetroPCS California, LLC and assessed more than $1.6 million in unpaid business and occupation taxes, MetroPCS sued in the Jefferson County District Court. The district court granted summary judgment to MetroPCS, ruling that both the 1996 and 2015 Ordinances constituted "new taxes" under Colorado's Taxpayer's Bill of Rights (TABOR), and thus required advance voter approval. The court found the ordinances expanded the tax to previously untaxed providers and services, generating revenue that was not merely incidental or de minimis. Lakewood’s arguments that the ordinances simply clarified or updated the existing tax and did not produce significant new revenue were rejected. The district court declared both ordinances void and unenforceable for lack of voter approval.The Supreme Court of Colorado reviewed the case directly. Applying de novo review, it affirmed the district court’s judgment. The Court held that both the 1996 and 2015 Ordinances imposed new taxes within the meaning of TABOR, as they expanded the tax base to include new classes of providers and services, and the resulting revenue increases were not incidental. Because Lakewood failed to obtain voter approval prior to enacting these ordinances, both were held void and unenforceable. The Court remanded the case for consideration of MetroPCS’s request for appellate fees and costs. View "MetroPCS Cal., LLC v. City of Lakewood" on Justia Law

This case revolves around the question of whether a search for internet-related evidence that extended to a previously unknown basement apartment was reasonable, even though the apartment was not specified in the warrant. The police had obtained a warrant to search a property after receiving information that child pornography had been downloaded to a particular IP address associated with that address. The property appeared to be a single-family home. However, during the execution of the warrant, the police encountered Kevin Matthew Dhyne, who lived in a basement apartment on the property and used the same internet access as the rest of the house. The police searched Dhyne’s apartment and found sexually explicit material involving children on his laptop.The trial court agreed with Dhyne's argument that the search violated the U.S. and Colorado constitutions because the warrant was not specific to his basement apartment. However, the court denied Dhyne’s motion to suppress the evidence, reasoning that even if the officers had not searched his apartment in conjunction with the original warrant, they would have executed the same search later that day under a warrant specific to the basement apartment, and the evidence would therefore have inevitably been discovered. Dhyne was convicted of two counts of sexual exploitation of a child.The Colorado Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court’s denial of the suppression motion, though it did so by upholding the search rather than by applying the inevitable discovery exception. The court of appeals agreed that for a multi-dwelling unit, separate dwellings normally require separate, specific warrants. However, the court justified the search of Dhyne’s apartment based on the shared use of the IP address.The Supreme Court of the State of Colorado affirmed the outcome, holding that the warrant's reference to the property's "[h]ouse, garage, and any outbuildings" was sufficiently specific because there were no outward indicators that the basement apartment existed. The court also held that the execution of the warrant was reasonable in this specific scenario, where the warrant was for all buildings on the property and the defendant told the police that he lived in the basement and used the IP address that provided grounds for the search. View "Dhyne v. People" on Justia Law

Qwest Corporation and the Colorado Public Utilities Commission (PUC) appealed a district court's judgment in favor of the Colorado Office of Consumer Counsel (OCC) that reversed the PUC's decision setting the maximum rate for certain telephone services. Upon review, the Supreme Court concluded that the PUC regularly pursued its authority because it considered all of the statutorily-mandated factors and its decision is supported by substantial evidence. The Court therefore reversed the judgment of the district court. View "Ofc. of Consumer Counsel v. Pub. Utils. Comm'n" on Justia Law