News & Commentary

In an April 12, 2012 news release, the ACLU of Colorado announced it has submitted a detailed complaint to Denver Police Chief Robert White and the Denver Office of the Independent Monitor today, requesting a formal investigation of unreasonable and abusive use of force and other misconduct in policing Occupy Denver demonstrations at Civic Center Park last fall. The complaint calls for Chief White to ban on the use of pepper ball guns for crowd control.Focused primarily on events that occurred October 29, 2011, the complaint traces police overreaction to a misguided and irresponsible decision to forcibly enforce a minor ordinance that prohibits erecting tents in city parks. The ACLU asserts that Denver police violated their own crowd control policies (as well as common sense) by needlessly antagonizing a large crowd of mostly peaceful demonstrators, prompting a confrontation that escalated in intensity and severity.In the ensuing confrontation – documented in the ACLU complaint with photographs, video, and excerpts from police reports – Denver police responded with abusive use of batons (knocking nonviolent demonstrators to the ground); needless destruction of personal property; and the unjustifiably hazardous shooting of pepper ball guns into crowds.“Shooting pepper balls into a crowd of demonstrators, especially a crowd of moving people, is reckless and extremely dangerous,” explained Mark Silverstein, ACLU Legal Director. “The Boston police learned this several years ago, when a police pepper ball hit a bystander in the eye and killed her. We call on Chief White to forbid police from firing these dangerous weapons into crowds of persons who are exercising their First Amendment rights.”A copy of the ACLU’s complaint will also go to the United States Department of Justice, which is still considering the ACLU’s call —made last year in a detailed 26-page letter -- for a federal investigation of the Denver Police Department’s pattern of civil rights violations. Denver has resisted that call, maintaining that its police department can adequately investigate allegations of police misconduct.

As witnessed by a Westword item from October, Mayor Michael Hancock and Denver's business and outreach communities have spent months discussing and debating a push to ban overnight camping on public property. Now that the issue is reportedly scheduled to be addressed in a City Council committee meeting on Tuesday, the topic is sparking criticism from other quarters.

     Under pressure from the ACLU of Colorado and local community activist groups, the Roaring Fork School Board unanimously voted to enter into an agreement urging the police departments of the Roaring Fork Valley to exercise “extraordinary discretion” before assigning a school resource officer (SRO) to additional police work that may implicate the immigration status of a student’s family. The agreement recognizes that assigning SROs to law enforcement work in which “a student’s family immigration status may come into question . . . may diminish the necessary trust the SROs have worked so long to build with the student and family.”

On Monday, the 2012 Martin Luther King Day Holiday, the ACLU Race To Justice Coalition called on Denver City Council to demand a start to the process of bringing a new Independent Monitor to the city..

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On behalf of a satiric internet publication, The Howling Pig, and its publisher Tom Mink, the ACLU of Colorado announced today that after three trips to the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, a $425,000 settlement finally ends a marathon legal battle over free speech that began on this date eight years ago, when Greeley and Weld County authorities showed up at Mink’s home with a warrant to search for evidence of “criminal libel.”

To resolve an ACLU of Colorado lawsuit filed earlier this year alleging racial profiling, biased policing, and illegal search of a residence, Denver agreed to a settlement that provides for new police policies, new training for officers, and payment of $20,000 to the ACLU’s clients.

The ACLU of Colorado announces our support of the second annual Colorado Gives Day – an initiative to increase philanthropy in Colorado through online giving to Colorado charities. Once again presented by Community First Foundation and FirstBank, Colorado Gives Day is a 24-hour period on Dec. 6 to “give where you live” by making online donations on Community First Foundation’s online giving resource, GivingFirst.org. As a profiled charity on GivingFirst.org, The ACLU of Colorado will participate in this initiative.

The ACLU of Colorado received complaints that on Sunday morning November 13, at the first court appearance of Occupy Denver protesters who were arrested the night before, Magistrate John Hoffman refused to allow reporters and members of the press to bring paper, notebooks or any type of writing utensils into the courtroom. Westword reporter Kelsey Whipple reported that she was forbidden to take notes during the court proceeding. http://blogs.westword.com/latestword/2011/11/occupy_denver_arrests_bond.php. In a November 16 letter to Presiding Judge John John Marcucci, the ACLU of Colorado protested this violation of First Amendment rights. For more information, visit https://www.aclu-co.org/case/judge-marcucci-aclu-re-paper-pens.