FELONY CASES WILL BE HARDER TO SUPPRESS

Prosecutors make changes in several counties.

Prosecutors in Arapahoe, Douglas, Elbert and Lincoln counties have implemented changes to reduce the number of felony cases that are suppressed from the public, and concede the process will help them learn just how many of the restricted cases they actually have.

The move is in response to a Denver Post investigation into suppressed court cases in Colorado that found hundreds of felony prosecutions — some of them for violent crimes — were kept from the public, and dozens of additional cases in which defendants were already convicted and sentenced.

Until The Post’s inquiry, district attorneys in the 18th Judicial District that includes the four counties had no idea just how many of their cases were kept under wraps, even though they had the most of any jurisdiction statewide.

But under a new policy issued by District Attorney George Brauchler, prosecutors cannot simply ask a judge to suppress cases, as had been the custom, but must first seek approval from the most-senior DAs and explain their rationale.

Suppressing cases had become so routinely approved that Brauchler’s office told The Post that it could not recall an instance where a judge denied one.

Under the new policy, the hope is that by October or November prosecutors will have a handle on just how many of their active cases are suppressed, according to an internal email shared with The Post that outlines the new procedures.

The Post determined Brauchler’s office had 115 active felony cases that were suppressed in the past five years — the most in Colorado — 87 of them in Arapahoe County. The 6th Judicial District that includes La Plata, Archuleta and San Juan counties had the next highest with 43 suppressed felony cases, though all of them were in La Plata County, The Post found.

But nearly all of the felony cases suppressed in La Plata County were opened to the public shortly after a defendant was arrested and appeared before a judge.

Not so in the 18th Judicial District, which also had another 56 suppressed cases in which a defendant was already convicted and sentenced. A suppressed case is restricted to the judge and the attorneys for both sides. No information from the case is available to the public and, until recently, the name of a defendant, the charges he faced and the next court date were not even available.

That’s changing, according to Rich Orman, senior chief deputy district attorney under Brauchler.

“If a ‘suppressed’ case results in a conviction, the attorney should consider whether suppression should continue,” Orman told his staff in a May 10 email. “In almost all circumstances, the answer should be that it should not continue … If the attorney thinks that suppression should continue, they should discuss with their (supervisors) and if they agree, seek the approval of a senior chief (district attorney) or above to maintain that suppression.”

Despite the local change, there are no court rules or laws limiting how or why a case can be suppressed in Colorado, a shortfall Orman said his office would like to see changed.

“We would absolutely support the establishment of a court rule or statutory standard and procedure on this question,” Orman told The Post.