Chilling. Validating. Fair.

Those were just a few of the descriptors that Denver City Council members used Dec. 9 when they met with the independent monitor to discuss the 94-page report his office released the day before, an investigation the council unanimously called for his office to take on in June.

During the safety committee, members lauded the Office of the Independent Monitor for doing an “incredible job in an incredibly short period of time,” and zeroed in on ways they could further empower him as the watchdog of the city’s police and sheriff departments.

“I have asked our legislative counsel to begin looking at opportunities where we might legislatively help move this discussion forward,” safety committee chairman Paul Kashmann told Mitchell. “This might be a topic to bring to the [Budget and] Policy Committee at some point in the near future.”

One key barrier the OIM identified to council members is that his office lacks access to Axon Evidence, a cloud-based data storage and management system used by the police department that can hold swaths amounts of information, including body-worn video, in-car video, interview room video, photographs audio, documents and more.

Mitchell thinks that’s a problem that should be “rectified” — and an issue he’s talked “at length” about with Denver Police Chief Paul Pazen and other administrations before him.

A change adopted by the previous city council gave the independent monitor broad access to evidence within the police and sheriff departments, he explained, “so, as a legal matter, we’re probably entitled to have it, and we don’t have it.

“It’s time for that to change,” he said, as council members listened closely.

The Denver Police Department maintains that allowing the OIM access would “give access to all law enforcement sensitive information contained in that system, such as sexual assaults, homicides, etc.,” a spokesman told Colorado Politics in an email.

Several council members’ focus narrowed in on accountability.

“Who really is accountable when you have a line of 30 officers?” asked Councilwoman At-Large Robin Kniech. “Is our disciplinary policy clear enough and resilient enough … to hold higher-level supervisors accountable?”

Councilwoman Candi CdeBaca, who earlier this year sought to replace the police department with a peace force, echoed Kniech: “I see a lot of recommendations for how we make it better for next time, but what is your office recommending to hold people accountable for all of the policies that were not complied with this time around?”

Mitchell told the two that his office lacks disciplinary power, as written in the city charter, and held the opinion that the department’s use-of-force policy — which he noted is updated regularly — is “clear enough,” but that the question comes down to “what actually happens in practice.”

However, he told the committee, he would be willing to have a conversation about “what’s appropriate” when it comes to making disciplinary recommendations in his reports.

Kniech also asked if Mitchell had considered outlining policy recommendations related to DPD’s treatment of the media, in light of journalists who were injured by DPD during protests.

He told her his office did weigh whether to pursue that issue, but decided to “put a pin in that” until he saw the “fruits” of the ongoing investigations.

“I imagine it will be something we revisit and take another look at it,” he said, to which she said it was “critical” that he does.

Mitchell also warned council members of the “wave of litigation” headed straight for the city and the Denver Police Department. To date, at least three federal lawsuits have been filed, and the city has received notice of more than 50 additional claims.

Meanwhile, more than 50 investigations remain open within the Denver Department of Safety’s Internal Affairs Bureau.

Either late this month or in January, Pazen will meet with the council’s safety committee to discuss the report.

Councilwoman Amanda Sandoval also suggested the safety committee meet in February, once DPD has implemented the OIM’s 16 policy recommendations that they agreed to on Dec. 8. At the table, she recommended, there would be Mitchell, Pazen and Executive Director Murphy Robinson to discuss what the policy in practice will look like, a request Mitchell said he’d be “happy” to meet.

Nicholas Mitchell, Denver’s independent monitor, on Wednesday discusses with the City Council’s safety committee his investigation into the police department’s response to protests against racism and police brutality.

Courtesy of Denver 8 TV