Tag: weld county
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Colorado justices confirm water-related enterprises may condemn private property
The Colorado Supreme Court confirmed on Monday that water-related enterprises have the legal authority to exercise the governmental power of eminent domain over private property. An enterprise is a government-owned business that provides fee-based services. In 1993, lawmakers authorized the creation of “water activity enterprises” to provide a secure water supply for residents. The enterprises…
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Colorado Supreme Court clarifies restraining order violations can always support burglary charge
The Colorado Supreme Court’s majority ruled on Monday that a violation of a restraining order can also serve as a basis for finding a defendant guilty of burglary. Under state law, a person commits second-degree burglary by unlawfully entering or remaining in an occupied structure with the intent to commit “a crime against another person…
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Colorado justices skeptical of challenge to water enterprises’ eminent domain power
Members of the Colorado Supreme Court appeared receptive on Wednesday to the notion that water-related enterprises have the legal authority to exercise the governmental power of eminent domain over private property. An enterprise is a government-owned business that provides fee-based services. In 1993, lawmakers authorized the creation of “water activity enterprises” to provide a secure…
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Remembering Colorado’s Flight 629
Half-a-century before 9/11 and decades prior to the explosion of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, there was United Airlines Flight 629. The sabotage of The Denver Mainliner was America’s first confirmed targeting of a civilian aircraft and it happened over a southwestern Weld County sugar beet field. The six square miles of farmland…
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Colorado justices, 5-2, say police money used for drug deals not subject to crime victim restitution
The Colorado Supreme Court, by 5-2, ruled on Monday that the state’s crime victim restitution law does not obligate defendants to repay law enforcement agencies for unrecovered money they use to buy drugs undercover. The government maintained the restitution law authorized the repayment of “buy money” because it was either “money advanced by law enforcement…
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6 found dead at Weld County dairy operation
Facebook Twitter WhatsApp SMS Email Print Copy article link Save Six people were found dead Wednesday evening at a dairy operation in Weld County, according to a Southeast Weld Fire District news release. Fire crews were dispatched to the dairy operation in the 32000 block of Weld County Road 18, just east of Keenesburg, at…
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Appeals court says no automatic cross-examination of witnesses whose probation ends by trial
If a person was serving a probationary sentence at the time they witnessed a crime, but their probation ended by the time they testified at trial, the defense does not have the right to let jurors hear about that witness’s connection to the prosecution, Colorado’s second-highest court ruled on Thursday. A three-judge panel for the…
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Colorado Supreme Court tells Weld County to follow state redistricting law
Weld County must comply with the state law governing how boards of county commissioners are to draw their districts, and the county needs to adopt new maps by next year’s election, the Colorado Supreme Court ruled on Monday. Following the 2020 census, it was undisputed that Weld County did not follow the procedures for how…
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Colorado Supreme Court attempts to restore order in Weld County cases after botched cell phone search
The Colorado Supreme Court issued a pair of orders on Friday attempting to end the turbulence after an accidental disclosure of confidential defense information to the prosecution affected multiple Weld County criminal cases. District Court Judge Vincente G. Vigil has struggled to contain the fallout from a botched cell phone search that resulted in hundreds…
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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…