Bullock v. Brooks.
2025 COA 6. No. 24CA0077. Civil Action for Deprivation of Rights—Peace Officers—Arrest—Probable Cause—Searches and Seizures—Warrantless Search Incident to Arrest—Municipal Ordinance—Constitutionality.
January 16, 2025
Denver Police Department (DPD) Officers Brooks, Paulsen, and Saunders attended a roll call briefing in August 2020 advising of planned protest activity near DPD headquarters that evening. The briefing informed officers that the protest had been planned on social media and that posts related to the protest called for people to bring weapons and attempt to take over police headquarters. Brooks and Paulsen were assigned to a motorcycle patrol near DPD headquarters that night. As he patrolled, Brooks saw several people in and around a Jeep parked about a block away from DPD headquarters handing out shields, helmets, respirator masks, and similar items. He then witnessed Bullock, wearing black and holding a baseball bat, emerge from nearby bushes and run across a parking lot with the bat toward the Jeep. Bullock alerted the others to the officers’ presence, and people rushed to get inside the Jeep. As the Jeep drove away, Brooks informed his supervisor, Saunders, of what he had seen. Saunders told Brooks and Paulsen to stop the Jeep and arrest its occupants. The officers conducted a traffic stop, took Bullock and the others into custody, and then searched the Jeep and seized several items, including some that Bullock owned. The Denver City Attorney’s Office charged Bullock with violating Denver Revised Municipal Code (DRMC) §§ 38-125 and 38-117(b). Bullock filed a motion to suppress, arguing that the police lacked reasonable suspicion to conduct the traffic stop and that the arrests and subsequent search were unsupported by probable cause. Bullock also moved to dismiss the charges, maintaining that the ordinances were unconstitutionally vague, both facially and as applied. The Denver County Court granted Bullock’s motion to suppress, and the prosecution dismissed the charges.
Bullock then sued Brooks, Paulsen, and Saunders under CRS § 13-21-131(1), alleging violation of their right to be free from unreasonable search and seizure by arresting and searching them without probable cause. Several months later, Bullock amended the complaint and filed a CRCP 56(h) motion seeking a determination that as a matter of law their arrest and subsequent search violated their constitutional rights. The trial court denied Bullock’s motion. The court also denied Bullock’s summary judgment motion, finding that the ordinance was not unconstitutionally vague, either facially or as applied. The case proceeded to trial, and the court ruled that defendants were entitled to a directed verdict on Bullock’s claim that the Jeep search violated their constitutional rights. The court submitted Bullock’s claim that the arrest was unconstitutional to the jury, which returned a verdict in defendants’ favor.
On appeal, Bullock argued that § 38-117(b) is unconstitutionally vague and, as a matter of law, an arrest under an unconstitutionally vague statute is itself unconstitutional. Even assuming that Bullock correctly characterized the county court’s suppression ruling as a declaration that § 38-117(b) is unconstitutionally vague, it does not follow that their arrest was unconstitutional for lack of probable cause. Rather, Bullock’s arrest was valid if it was supported by probable cause, which is a factual question for the jury. To show a violation of their civil rights, Bullock needed to prove by a preponderance of the evidence that their arrest and subsequent search were unlawful. Here, the jury found that Bullock did not meet this burden, and Bullock did not challenge that finding on appeal. Because the jury reasonably found that Bullock’s arrest was supported by probable cause, Bullock’s individual rights were not violated, without regard to whether the ordinances were unconstitutionally vague.
Bullock also contended that the trial court erred by admitting evidence that did not bear on whether defendants had probable cause to arrest them. Bullock asserted that evidence relating to previous Denver protests and the takeover of the Portland, Oregon police station was irrelevant and therefore inadmissible under CRE 401 and 402. Bullock filed a pretrial motion in limine to exclude evidence of other protest activity occurring on dates other than the date of their arrest. The trial court ruled that such conduct outside the City and County of Denver would not be admitted at trial, but it did not explicitly rule on whether evidence about previous protests within Denver would be admissible. At trial, over Bullock’s counsel’s objections, the court admitted substantial amounts of testimony from the defendants about what they had personally experienced during the protests in the weeks leading up to Bullock’s arrest as relevant and material under CRE 401 and 402, and not outweighed by CRE 403. The testimony covered events in Portland and was admitted to determine what a reasonable police officer would have thought on the night of the event and to demonstrate what risks DPD expected and sought to prevent on the night of Bullock’s arrest. These purposes directly serve the objectively reasonable inquiry used to determine the existence of probable cause, so the evidence was relevant and admissible.
Lastly, Bullock argued and defendants conceded that the trial court erred by entering a directed verdict on Bullock’s unconstitutional search claim. However, reversal is not required based on the conclusion that the trial court did not err by submitting the probable cause question to the jury, and Bullock did not argue on appeal that the evidence was insufficient to support the jury’s finding.
The judgment was affirmed.