10th Circuit denies immunity to Denver detectives who coerced teenager's false murder confession [View all]

Four Denver law enforcement officers may be sued for the coerced confession of a cognitively-impaired 14-year-old boy, resulting in false information that led to his wrongful conviction for murder, the federal appeals court based in Colorado ruled on Friday.

A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit upheld a strongly-worded lower court decision that rejected the attempts of three detectives and a lieutenant to point fingers at each other to escape civil liability. Key to the outcome was the the U.S. Supreme Court's precedent in Franks v. Delaware, which established that warrants are invalid when they are based upon knowingly or recklessly false statements relevant to guilt.

Lawrence Rubin Montoya, the panel agreed, had plausibly claimed that, had all the false information in support of his arrest been removed, it would have failed to implicate him in a crime. Because the Denver officers had all participated in the events that led to his arrest warrant, they were liable.

"Mr. Montoya specifically alleges three detectives coerced a false confession for use in an arrest-warrant affidavit. That readily satisfies Mr. Montoya’s burden to allege their personal participation in the Franks violation," wrote Judge Veronica S. Rossman in the June 3 order.

https://www.coloradopolitics.com/courts/10th-circuit-denies-immunity-to-denver-detectives-who-coerced-teenagers-false-murder-confession/article_5579a68c-e38b-11ec-8e14-8b9402ed0d02.html