A Clear Creek County District Court judge on Monday dropped the criminal charges filed against two gaming officers who were on scene the night 22-year-old Christian Glass was shot and killed by police, according to court records.
Colorado Division of Gaming officers Christa Lloyd and Mary J. Harris were two of six law enforcement officers charged with failing to intervene in the excessive force of another officer after Clear Creek County sheriff’s Deputy Andrew Buen shot Glass on June 10, 2022 .
The charges were dropped because the statute that mandates law enforcement officers intervene to prevent another officer from using unnecessary force doesn’t apply to gaming officers, according to court documents.
“The legislature needs to fix this loophole,” the attorney for Glass’ family, Siddhartha Rathod, said Tuesday. “It’s an unintended consequence of how the statute is written. And we need to demand better of our law enforcement officers.”
In the early hours of that June morning, Glass called 911 for help after crashing his car into an embankment in Silver Plume. He told dispatchers he needed someone to help move his car.
When officers responded — including Buen, a Georgetown marshal and police officer, an Idaho Springs police officer, a Colorado State Patrol trooper and the two Division of Gaming officers — Glass experienced a mental health crisis and refused to leave his car.
The seven officers on scene tried to coax Glass out of the car for an hour and nine minutes, eventually deciding to break the window and physically pull him out.
In the chaos that ensued, Glass grabbed a knife and officers shocked him with a Taser and shot him with beanbags in an attempt to force him to drop it. Instead, Glass twisted in the driver’s seat and thrust the knife toward an officer standing next to the shattered window behind him, prompting the deputy to shoot him.
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Buen was fired after being indicted in November 2022 and was convicted in April of misdemeanor reckless endangerment after a jury trial. But the jurors deadlocked on the more serious charges of second-degree murder and official misconduct.
A second jury trial has been scheduled to start in February to address those deadlocked charges, according to court records.
The other four officers involved — Georgetown Marshal Randy Williams, Georgetown police Officer Timothy Collins, Idaho Springs police Officer Brittany Morrow and Colorado State Trooper Ryan Bennie — have yet to be tried, court records show.
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