Colorado

Six additional law enforcement officers were criminally charged this week in connection with the police shooting of Christian Glass, the 22-year-old Boulder man who was killed by a Clear Creek County sheriff’s deputy after he called 911 for help in 2022.

Georgetown Marshal Randy Williams, Georgetown police Officer Timothy Collins, Idaho Springs police Officer Brittany Morrow, Colorado State Trooper Ryan Bennie and Division of Gaming officers Christa Lloyd and Mary J. Harris were all charged Thursday with failing to intervene in the excessive force of another officer. Williams is also charged with third-degree assault.

The six law enforcement officers are scheduled to make their first appearance in court on Dec. 12 on the new charges, which are all Class 1 misdemeanors.

Fifth Judicial District Attorney Heidi McCollum filed the new criminal charges the same day a former sergeant involved in the case, Kyle Gould, pleaded guilty to failing to intervene in the excessive force of another officer. He was sentenced to probation.

“Law enforcement officers must be held accountable for their actions when performing their trusted public service duties,” McCollum said in a statement issued Friday morning. “Yesterday, my office filed additional charges against each of the six other officers who were present June 11, 2022, for failing to intervene in the events and actions of Andrew Buen, which led to Christian Glass’ death.”

Gould and Andrew Buen, the Clear Creek County sheriff’s deputy who shot Glass, were until Friday the only two officers who faced criminal charges stemming from the June 2022 incident. Buen has pleaded not guilty to charges of second-degree murder, reckless endangerment and official misconduct. Both were fired after the incident, and Gould agreed to never again work as a law enforcement officer when he pleaded guilty Thursday.

Glass was experiencing a mental health crisis when he called 911 on the night of June 10, 2022, and asked for help because he’d crashed his car down an embankment in Clear Creek County. He told the dispatcher that he was afraid of “skinwalkers” and people chasing him.

Seven law enforcement officers responded and spent more than an hour trying to coax Glass out of the car while he was experiencing delusions and paranoia. Eventually, Buen called Gould, who was his supervisor, and Gould gave permission for the officers to break Glass’ window and pull him from the car, even though Glass was not suspected of a crime.

In the chaos that ensued, Glass grabbed a knife and officers fired a Taser at him and shot him with beanbags in an attempt to force him to drop it. Instead, Glass twisted in the driver’s seat and thrust the knife toward an officer standing next to the shattered window behind him, prompting the deputy to shoot him.

A grand jury later found Glass committed no crime and acted in self-defense before he was killed.

The involved agencies agreed to a $19 million settlement with Glass’ parents in May.

A Colorado hiker who was missing for months was found dead in late October, but his 14-year-old Jack Russell terrier was found alive and waiting by the hiker's side, according to reports from the area.

A hunter came across the body of 71-year-old Rich Moore in the Lower Blanco drainage basin on Oct. 30, according to reporting by 9News in Colorado. And Moore's white Jack Russell terrier, Finney, was found alive nearby.

The man who shot a Waffle House cook who had asked him to wear a mask or leave the restaurant during the 2020 COVID-19 restaurant mask mandate has been sentenced to over a decade in prison.

Arapahoe County District Court Judge Jacob Edson in November sentenced Kelvin Watson, 30, to 13 years in Department of Corrections custody after he pleaded guilty to attempted second-degree murder and a sentence enhancer for committing a violent crime with a weapon in the 2020 shooting in Aurora, the 18th Judicial District Attorney’s Office announced Wednesday.

Watson pleaded guilty earlier this month.

“While restaurants and stores are public places, businesses have the right to refuse service or ask customers to leave their establishment,” 18th Judicial District Attorney John Kellner said. “The defendant drove back to the restaurant and shot an innocent employee for no reason other than doing his job.”

Watson first went to the Waffle House in the 12800 block of East Mississippi Avenue about midnight May 14, 2020, according to a news release. He entered without a mask and employees told him he needed to have the mask on or they couldn’t serve him.

A waitress said Watson left and came back with a mask but wouldn’t put it on, according to the news release. When employees asked him to leave again, he pulled out a gun and threatened the restaurant cook.

He left again, and the incident was reported to police that morning, but about midnight the next day, Aurora police officers were called to a shooting at the Waffle House and found the cook who was threatened the night before shot in the stomach, according to the news release.

The cook identified Watson as the suspect, and staff noted he was a “regular” at the restaurant.

Police at the time said Watson returned and slapped the cook across the face when he was told again he was not going to be served. Watson shot the cook outside the restaurant as the cook ran to get away. The cook was later released from the hospital.

Following Watson’s release from prison, he will be placed on mandatory parole for three years, according to the news release.

Colorado authorities have “no obligation” to find a foster child who has run away and the child welfare cases of missing kids are often closed due to a lack of funding, according to a new report requested by lawmakers.

The state child welfare division, which is participating in the task force, told The Sun it does not have funding to “contract with investigators and apprehend young people,” but that counties often “make efforts to locate young people within existing resources.”

Twenty foster children exited the child welfare system by running away in the nine months from October 2022 to June, according to state data. Colorado has about 3,500 children living in foster families, residential treatment centers, and other placements.

Coloradans might have to say goodbye to verdant green medians full of grass if state lawmakers succeed in a plan to save water by banning new nonnative ornamental turf.

A bipartisan draft bill approved Tuesday by the Water Resources and Agriculture Review Committee would prohibit state government, local governments and homeowners’ associations from planting new nonfunctional turf, artificial turf or invasive plants on any commercial, industrial or institutional property beginning at the start of 2025.

The proposed ban would not apply to residential lawns.

The goal behind the proposed legislation is to reduce water use in the often drought-ridden state as Colorado becomes warmer and more arid. Nearly half of water used in cities and towns goes to watering lawns — most of which are planted with nonnative turf, said Lindsay Rogers, a policy advisor with Western Resource Advocates who testified on the draft bill during Tuesday’s hearing.

“Our new bill makes a simple change that will have major ripple effects,” Sen. Dylan Roberts, a Frisco Democrat, said in a news release. “By restricting the installation of grass turf in new developments and nonfunctional areas, we can significantly cut down on nonessential water use and ensure we’re using our water as efficiently as possible.”

The bipartisan bill is part of an ongoing effort in Colorado and across the drying West to reduce the amount of water-dependent grasses with plants that can thrive in the region’s climates with little or no extra watering. Though municipal water use makes up only 7% of Colorado’s annual average use — about 90% is used for agriculture — replacing ornamental grass is an impactful tool that reduces water use, Rogers said.

The bill defines nonfunctional turf as grass that is predominantly ornamental and serves no function. Common examples are road medians and strips of grass between a sidewalk and a street. The bill does not ban the use of grass on private residences or in places where it serves a purpose, such as parks, sports fields or playgrounds. “It’s ornamental, it’s purely aesthetic,” Andrew Hill, the government affairs manager at Denver Water, said during this week’s hearing.

Banning the installation of ornamental, nonnative grasses is much cheaper than replacing grass that’s already installed, said Greg Fisher, Denver Water’s manager of demand planning and efficiency.

“We really do need to make this change starting now,” he said.

The potential ban on artificial turf is meant to reduce negative impacts associated with it, including an exacerbation of the heat island effect, in which urban areas become hotter because artificial infrastructure reflects heat instead of absorbing it, as vegetation does. Artificial turf also can release chemicals into watersheds.

Colorado lawmakers in 2022 passed a bill that provided financial incentives to local governments, nonprofits and other entities to replace irrigated turf with more water-efficient landscaping. Several municipalities, including Aurora and Broomfield, have approved ordinances that restrict the use of ornamental turf or help pay to replace it.

The draft bill next will be reviewed by the Legislative Council. Four lawmakers — Roberts, Rep. Karen McCormick, D-Longmont; Rep. Barbara McLachlan, D-Durango; and Sen. Cleave Simpson, R-Alamosa — said they would sponsor the bill during the 2024 legislative session, which is set to begin Jan. 10.