Police identify ‘cases of interest’ to release online

Colorado Springs Independent: Want to dive into police reports about a high profile incident? The Colorado Springs Police Department has started a new service that will allow citizens to study redacted police reports.

Called Cases of Interest, the site now includes only four incidents: the Halloween shooting in which Noah Harpham killed three people before being gunned down by police; the case of Ryan Brown, who’s black and was pulled from his car by police for no apparent reason in March 2015, the Taco Bell shooting in which a man was killed by a citizen, and the Springs Creek Juvenile Detention Facility riot.

Missing are the Planned Parenthood shooting last November, a case that’s pending after a judicial finding that accused shooter Robert Dear isn’t competent to stand trial, and Officer Tyler Walker who left the department after an internal affairs investigation of his slamming to the ground of Alexis Acker in Memorial Hospital’s emergency room. A video of the incident went viral after the Independent posted it on July 15, 2015. The city paid $100,000 to settle the case earlier this year. The matter wasn’t investigated by police until Acker threatened to sue in 2014. Walker was not fired as a result but rather left on his own accord.

It’s unclear who decides which incidents constitute a “case of interest,” but it’s fair to say the police make that decision.

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