Justia Colorado Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

The issue this case presented for the Colorado Supreme Court's review centered on whether Respondent Roger Hill had a legally protected interest that gave him standing to pursue his claim for a declaratory judgment “that a river segment was navigable for title at statehood and belongs to the State.” To this, the Court concluded he did not: Hill had no legally protected right independent of the State’s alleged ownership of the riverbed onto which he could hook his declaratory judgment claim. Hill's favorite fishing hole was on a riverbed along the Arkansas River. The record owners of the land abutting the river were Mark Warsewa and Linda Joseph, who had a home overlooking the fishing hole. Hill alleged that for several years, he repeatedly attempted to fish there and Warsewa and Joseph chased him off the property, sometimes with force. Hill asserted the riverbed was not in fact owned by Warsewa and Joseph, but instead public land owned by the State of Colorado and held in trust for the people. In both federal and state proceedings, the State argued that it alone could decide whether and when to pursue its property rights and that Hill did not have standing to bring these claims. Hill appealed, arguing that the riverbed was public land as a matter of federal law, and invoking the equal footing doctrine: that the segment of the Arkansas River that traversed the subject property was navigable at statehood, and therefore title to the riverbed transferred to the State by operation of law when Colorado achieved statehood in 1876. Because the federal government did not own the riverbed, it could not have transferred its title to Warsewa and Joseph’s predecessors in interest. A division of the court of appeals upheld the trial court’s dismissal of the quiet title claim, concluding that Hill could not pursue the property rights of the State because he did not himself have any claim to title. The Colorado Supreme Court concurred and affirmed dismissal. View "Colorado v. Hill" on Justia Law

Defendant Cristobal Garcia, was found guilty of one count of attempted extreme-indifference murder, a form of first degree murder that requires that the defendant “evidenc[e] an attitude of universal malice manifesting extreme indifference to the value of human life generally.” Garcia argued on appeal that the court of appeals erred by holding that the trial court wasn’t required to define “universal malice” for the jury. Finding no reversible error, the Colorado Supreme Court affirmed the appellate court. View "Garcia v. Colorado" on Justia Law

This was one of several similar cases filed in the fall of 2020 by the owners of hundreds of commercial properties in eleven different Colorado counties seeking to compel the assessors in each of the counties to revalue their properties and lower their property tax assessments for the 2020 tax year. This matter involved the valuation of over 60 parcels of commercial property in Douglas County, Colorado. The taxpayers here—and in the other cases—contended that the pandemic and various state and local public health orders issued in response were “unusual conditions” that required revaluation of their properties under section 39-1-104(11)(b)(I), C.R.S. (2022). To this, the Colorado Supreme Court concluded the orders were not "unusual conditions:" COVID-19 was not a “detrimental act[] of nature,” and the orders issued in response to COVID-19 were not “regulations restricting . . . the use of the land” under section 39-1-104(11)(b)(I). Therefore, section 39-1-104(11)(b)(I) did not require the Douglas County property assessors to revalue the taxpayers’ 2020 property valuations. View "Educhildren v. City of Douglas" on Justia Law

This was one of several cases filed in Colorado in which commercial property owners have sued to compel the county assessor to revalue their properties and lower their property tax assessments for the 2020 tax year to account for the economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. This case concerned the valuation of commercial real property located in the City and County of Broomfield, Colorado. The taxpayers here—and in the other cases—contended that the pandemic and various state and local public health orders issued in response were “unusual conditions” that required revaluation of their properties under section 39-1-104(11)(b)(I), C.R.S. (2022). To this, the Colorado Supreme Court concluded the orders were not "unusual conditions:" COVID-19 was not a “detrimental act[] of nature,” and the orders issued in response to COVID-19 were not “regulations restricting . . . the use of the land” under section 39-1-104(11)(b)(I). Therefore, section 39-1-104(11)(b)(I) did not require the City and County of Broomfield Assessor to revalue the taxpayers’ 2020 property valuations, and it did not require the Board of Equalization to correct the Assessor’s valuations. View "Hunter Douglas v. City & County of Broomfield" on Justia Law

This was one of several similar cases filed in the fall of 2020 by the owners of hundreds of commercial properties in eleven different Colorado counties seeking to compel the assessors in each of the counties to revalue their properties and lower their property tax assessments for the 2020 tax year. This matter involved the valuation of 130 parcels of commercial property in Larimer County, Colorado. The taxpayers here—and in the other cases—contended that the pandemic and various state and local public health orders issued in response were “unusual conditions” that required revaluation of their properties under section 39-1-104(11)(b)(I), C.R.S. (2022). To this, the Colorado Supreme Court concluded the orders were not "unusual conditions:" COVID-19 was not a “detrimental act[] of nature,” and the orders issued in response to COVID-19 were not “regulations restricting . . . the use of the land” under section 39-1-104(11)(b)(I). Therefore, section 39-1-104(11)(b)(I) did not require the Larimer County property assessors to revalue the taxpayers’ 2020 property valuations. View "Larimer County v. 1303 Frontage Holdings" on Justia Law

This was one of several cases filed in Colorado in which commercial property owners sued to compel the county assessor to revalue their properties and lower their property tax assessments for the 2020 tax year to account for the economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. This case concerned the valuation of hundreds of parcels of commercial real property located in Jefferson County, Colorado. The taxpayers here—and in the other cases—contended that the pandemic and various state and local public health orders issued in response were “unusual conditions” that required revaluation of their properties under section 39-1-104(11)(b)(I), C.R.S. (2022). To this, the Colorado Supreme Court concluded the orders were not "unusual conditions:" COVID-19 was not a “detrimental act[] of nature,” and the orders issued in response to COVID-19 were not “regulations restricting . . . the use of the land” under section 39-1-104(11)(b)(I). Therefore, section 39-1-104(11)(b)(I) did not require the Jefferson County Assessor to revalue the taxpayers’ 2020 property valuations, and it did not require the Board of Equalization to correct the Assessor’s valuations. View " MJB Motel v. County of Jefferson" on Justia Law

Jacob Woodside committed two alcohol-related offenses in relatively quick succession. First, he pled guilty to the later-committed offense, which was sentenced as his first despite having occurred second in time. Afterward, he pled guilty to the earlier-committed offense and argued that it too should be sentenced as his first. The trial court disagreed, finding that Woodside’s prior conviction subjected him to second-offense penalties because “at the time of sentencing” he had a relevant “prior conviction,” despite the order in which the offenses occurred. The Colorado Supreme Court found that the plain language of section 42-4-1307(5)(a) C.R.S. (2022) imposed second-offense penalties when a defendant has a relevant prior conviction; it did not require that conduct underlying a second-offense sentence pre-date conduct underlying the first-offense sentence. The Court concluded the trial court properly determined that Woodside’s Weld County DWAI, though based on conduct pre-dating his Grand County DWAI, was a second offense subject to the penalties laid out in section 42-4-1307(5)(a). View "Colorado v. Woodside" on Justia Law

Under Colorado law, the required notice period for a landlord to give to a tenant before evicting the tenant was ten days. During the COVID-19 pandemic, however, Congress passed a law requiring a thirty-day-notice period for eviction from certain rental properties. The question this case presented for the Colorado Supreme Court was whether that thirty-day-notice requirement was still in effect or whether it expired along with other aspects of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (“CARES Act”). Looking at the plain language of the CARES Act, the Supreme Court concluded the federal thirty-day-notice provision is still in effect for covered properties. View "Arvada Village Gardens v. Garate" on Justia Law

Colorado’s Attorney General and the Administrator of the Colorado Uniform Consumer Credit Code (“UCCC”) (collectively, “the State”) sought to enjoin the respondent corporate entities and individuals that made up the career school known as CollegeAmerica (collectively, “CollegeAmerica”) from engaging in conduct that the State believed to be in violation of Colorado law. Specifically, the State contended that several aspects of CollegeAmerica’s marketing and admissions operations constituted deceptive trade practices under the Colorado Consumer Protection Act (“CCPA”) and that CollegeAmerica’s institutional loan program, “EduPlan,” was unconscionable under the UCCC. The Colorado Supreme Court concluded, as did the division below, that the State’s CCPA civil penalty claims were equitable in nature and thus CollegeAmerica was not entitled to a jury trial on those claims. The Court further concluded the division erred in remanding this case for a new trial without first assessing whether CollegeAmerica had, in fact, had a full and fair opportunity to litigate the issue of significant public impact and, if so, whether the evidence sufficiently established such an impact. Finally, the Court concluded the division correctly determined that CollegeAmerica’s EduPlan loans as a whole were not unconscionable, although the Supreme Court disagreed with the division’s conclusion that individualized evidence regarding the probability of repayment was necessary to establish unconscionability. View "Colorado v. Center for Excellence in Higher Education" on Justia Law

Petitioner Ari Liggett was charged with the first degree murder of his mother. Although Liggett pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity (“NGRI”), he was ultimately convicted. On appeal, Liggett argued: (1) the trial court violated his Fifth Amendment rights by ruling that the State could use psychiatric evidence derived from Liggett’s voluntary custodial statements to “rebut any evidence presented that [he] was insane at the time of the alleged offense,” even though police obtained those statements in violation of his Miranda rights; and (2) the trial court erred by permitting the State to subpoena and present privileged information from his nonphysician medical providers. The Colorado Supreme Court affirmed the conviction, finding that when a defendant presents psychiatric evidence supporting their insanity defense, they can open the door to the admission of psychiatric evidence rebutting that defense, even if the evidence includes the defendant’s voluntary but non-Miranda-compliant statements. Additionally, the Court held that § 16-8-103.6(2)(a), C.R.S. (2022)’s waiver of privilege as to “communications made by the defendant to a physician or psychologist” includes communications made to a physician’s or psychologist’s agents. Because the nonphysician medical providers who testified at Liggett’s trial made their observations as agents of Liggett’s physicians, the Court concluded Liggett waived the statutory privileges he shared with those providers. View "Liggett v. Colorado" on Justia Law