Tag: murder
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A jail death in Denver raises questions about intake policies — and how a man with a violent history kept getting released early
On June 30, deputies from the Denver Sheriff Department responded to an overnight call for help in the agency’s Downtown Detention Center. They found a man — later identified as 34-year-old Vincent Chacon — unresponsive in his cell, where he was pronounced dead, the police said in a news release. Police investigators later said the…
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Federal judge dismisses claim of falsified testimony against El Paso County coroner employee
A federal judge on Tuesday dismissed a lawsuit from a man who was tried and acquitted of his girlfriend’s 2021 murder, and who subsequently accused a witness of fabricating evidence to make him seem guilty. Joseph Hunnicutt stood trial twice in El Paso County for the killing of Alison Cantrell. At the first trial in…
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Appeals court addresses defendant’s request to get property back 3 years after Supreme Court laid out process
Almost three years after the Colorado Supreme Court clarified how a convicted defendant may ask law enforcement to hand over his seized property, the state’s second-highest court found an El Paso County judge wrongly denied the man’s request to return certain items. Jurors convicted James Woo in 2018 for the murder of Julie Tureson in Colorado…
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Barry Morphew posting $3 million bond
Barry Morphew, in jail on murder charges in the death of his wife, is in the process of posting bond, his attorney confirmed. But he remains in an Alamosa County jail as he waits to be fitted for a GPS ankle monitor and to finalize details with a local bondsman. His attorney, David Beller, confirmed…
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Colorado justices say judge had no grounds to order defendant to turn over info to prosecution
The Colorado Supreme Court agreed on Monday that a trial judge had no authority to order a defendant to give the prosecution a preview of what his expert witness would say at a hearing to challenge his murder convictions. In contrast to direct appeals of criminal convictions, defendants may pursue postconviction relief in the trial courts for…
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Colorado justices say child welfare workers not required to give Miranda warning before interrogating parents
The Colorado Supreme Court ruled on Monday that child welfare workers are not required to give a Miranda warning to parents before interrogating them in custody, even if the interview or the notes will later be shared with prosecutors and used against the parent at trial. Miranda warnings, named after the landmark U.S. Supreme Court…
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Colorado Supreme Court to review case of spiritual leader found guilty of child abuse
The Colorado Supreme Court announced on Monday that it will review whether the Court of Appeals correctly overturned a woman’s felony convictions for child abuse resulting in death due to an inadequate jury instruction. Hannah Marshall, 8, and Makayla Roberts, 10, were discovered dead and decomposing in a vehicle located on Frederick “Alec” Blair’s Norwood farm…
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Appeals court orders new Weld County murder trial after judge refused to give self-defense instruction
Colorado’s second-highest court on Thursday decided a Weld County judge should have instructed jurors to consider whether a man accused of murder acted in self-defense, given that some evidence at the crime scene supported that theory. Jurors convicted Kenneth James Hoschouer III in 2021 of murdering his friend, Christopher Grau, at Grau’s residence in Firestone two years…
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A tattoo, the N-word, a different crime: Colorado justices hear appeal of former death row inmate
Almost 20 years after the murders of a young couple in Aurora, the Colorado Supreme Court heard the appeal of the man convicted of orchestrating the killings and who now alleges numerous errors pervaded his trial. Arapahoe County jurors convicted Robert Keith Ray for the 2005 slayings of Javad Marshall-Fields and Vivian Wolfe. He received…