People v. Chilleen.

2026 COA 69. No. 24CA1428. DUI—Prior Convictions—Bifurcation—Motion for New Trial—Limiting Instruction.

September 17, 2026

Chilleen was traveling in his pickup truck with Murphy in the front passenger side and Davis in the back seat when he had a rollover accident. Murphy was ejected from the vehicle and killed, and Davis suffered a broken neck. Chilleen was found two hours later walking away from the scene. He told police he didn’t call 911 because he didn’t have phone service, but responding officers were able to make and receive calls at the accident scene. Chilleen also told officers that Murphy had been driving with Chilleen in the passenger seat and Davis in the back seat. Davis claimed that Chilleen had been driving. Chilleen had a blood alcohol content over the legal limit. Chilleen was charged with multiple offenses, including felony driving under the influence (DUI) based on three prior DUI convictions. He moved pretrial to bifurcate the DUI charge from the other counts, arguing that evidence of his prior DUI convictions would be inherently prejudicial at trial. The trial court denied the motion and later gave the jury a limiting jury instruction to alleviate possible prejudice. Chilleen was convicted of vehicular homicide, leaving the scene of an accident resulting in serious bodily injury and death, vehicular assault, DUI, and safety belt violations. Chilleen filed two motions for a new trial, arguing in the first motion that the prosecutor made improper arguments regarding his prior convictions during closing. In the second motion, he argued that he was entitled to a new trial based on newly discovered evidence. The court denied both motions.

On appeal, Chilleen challenged the trial court’s denial of his motion to bifurcate the felony DUI charge from the other charges. Chilleen’s argument was based on alleged prejudice that resulted from the court’s pretrial decision and the prosecutor’s misconduct. But whether error occurred concerning the pretrial motion is separate from whether prejudice later resulted from the court’s decision. In People v. Kembel, 2023 CO 5, ¶ 38, the court recognized that an appropriate limiting instruction can ensure that the jury does not consider evidence of a defendant’s prior DUI convictions for an improper purpose. Accordingly, the trial court did not abuse its discretion in denying the bifurcation motion.

Chilleen also contended that even if the trial court’s decision not to bifurcate was correct, he was prejudiced because the jury could not separate the facts applicable to each separate count, and the limiting instruction was insufficient to cure the prosecutor’s improper closing argument. Even assuming that the trial court erred by overruling Chilleen’s objections to prosecutorial misconduct and permitting the prosecutor to suggest that Chilleen had a propensity to commit DUI, any prejudice was outweighed by overwhelming evidence of Chilleen’s guilt. Therefore, the trial court properly denied Chilleen’s motion for a new trial based on the failure to bifurcate and prosecutorial misconduct.

Chilleen further argued that the trial court erred by denying his motion for a new trial based on newly discovered evidence. Chilleen maintained that Davis gave unexpected trial testimony that he had frequently driven Chilleen’s truck to haul horses and that the last time he drove it was likely the day before the accident. Even accepting that the defense could not have anticipated Davis’s testimony through pretrial investigation, Chilleen was aware that whether Davis had recently driven his vehicle was going to be an issue at trial. Because the evidence claimed as new was within Chilleen’s knowledge and available to the defense before trial, Chilleen failed to meet his burden of showing that the new evidence was discovered after the trial and that the defense made diligent efforts to discover the evidence before and during trial. Accordingly, the trial court did not err.

The judgment was affirmed.