Wolf v. Brenneman.
2024 COA 71. No. 21CA0111. Grand Juries—Witnesses—Absolute Immunity—CRCP 54—Appellate Jurisdiction.
July 11, 2024
Brenneman and Selby decided to build a hotel and private residences (the project) and created several limited liability entities for the project’s management and operation. They hired Wolf to help manage the project. Brenneman and Selby initially owned nearly 100% of the project, but they ran into financing problems and obtained cash investments from Marcos in return for his ownership interests in the limited liability entities. Eventually, Marcos’s investments in the project amounted to a majority interest, with Brenneman’s and Selby’s interests reduced to around 1%. Marcos took over the project from Brenneman and Selby and hired Wolf as a project manager. Subsequently, attempting to recoup their investment, Brenneman and Selby unsuccessfully tried to get Wolf to buy out their interests in the project. Brenneman and Selby accused Wolf of engaging in self-dealing, which resulted in an indictment against Wolf on charges of theft and conspiracy to commit theft. After the indictment, Brenneman and Selby provided information for a front-page story on the project by Westword that included quotations from Brenneman and Selby accusing Wolf of “fraudulent theft” and “steal[ing] from [them].”
A jury acquitted Wolf of all criminal charges, and Wolf filed an action against Brenneman and Selby for malicious prosecution, abuse of process, false imprisonment, and civil conspiracy, based on their statements to the district attorney and their testimony before the grand jury; and for defamation of character, based on their statements to Westword. Brenneman and Selby moved to dismiss, and the district court determined that Brenneman and Selby were, as a matter of law, absolutely immune from liability on all but Wolf’s defamation claim. The district court dismissed all claims except the defamation claim and certified its order as a final judgment for purposes of appeal under CRCP 54(b), and a court of appeals division dismissed the appeal for lack of jurisdiction. The Colorado Supreme Court vacated the dismissal and remanded for the court of appeals to determine if it had appellate jurisdiction after applying the correct test for evaluating the validity of a CRCP 54(b) order. The court then determined that the district court’s CRCP 54(b) order vested it with appellate jurisdiction.
On the merits, Wolf contended that the district court erred by finding Brenneman and Selby immune from civil liability for allegedly providing false testimony, as complaining witnesses, before a grand jury; and for lying to a law enforcement officer to instigate or procure a false criminal prosecution, and thus dismissing all but the defamation claim. The court held that all witnesses who testify before a grand jury, including complaining witnesses, have absolute immunity from civil liability based on that testimony, so the district court properly dismissed Wolf’s claims to the extent they were based on Brenneman’s and Selby’s grand jury testimony. As to Brenneman’s and Selby’s statements to the district attorney, CRS § 16-3-202(4) affords private citizens who act in good faith immunity from civil liability for reporting the commission or suspected commission of a crime to law enforcement. But people who report a crime in bad faith do not have immunity for their actions, and here Wolf’s allegations encompass a claim that Brenneman and Selby were not acting in good faith when they made their statements to the district attorney. Accordingly, the district court erred by granting absolute immunity to Brenneman and Selby for statements they made to the district attorney in reporting Wolf’s alleged criminal activity.
The judgment dismissing Wolf’s claims was affirmed to the extent the dismissal was based on grand jury testimony. The judgment was reversed to the extent the dismissal was based on Brenneman’s and Selby’s communications to the district attorney. The case was remanded for further proceedings.
The full opinion is available at https://www.coloradojudicial.gov/system/files/opinions-2024-07/21CA0111-PD.pdf.