du1-i-syn<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>The state appeals court in its opinion reversed Mitchell\u2019s conviction, sent his charges to a lower court for retrial and disqualified Judge Wilson from administering the case.<\/p>\n
The Court Executive\u2019s Office for the 6th and 22nd judicial districts appointed 22nd Judicial District Court Judge Todd Plewe to preside over Mitchell\u2019s case Nov. 19, 2018. But, unknown to defense attorneys at the time, the same office had assigned a case to Judge Wilson fewer than two weeks earlier in which Judge Plewe was the victim.<\/p>\n
In that case, law enforcement say a man \u201cthreatened Judge Plewe with dynamite and weapons and threatened his wife and children with bodily harm and death by the use of various weapons,\u201d court documents show.<\/p>\n
Defense attorneys say they didn\u2019t learn of Plewe\u2019s case before Judge Wilson until Feb. 25.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs Judge Wilson has the ability and discretion to sentence a man who has admitted to threatening Judge Plewe and his family to the Colorado Department of Corrections, there is an undeniable appearance of impropriety,\u201d defense attorneys wrote in a motion to recuse the court.<\/p>\n
Defense attorneys suggest Plewe\u2019s case before Judge Wilson could bias Plewe\u2019s interpretations of judicial conduct in the previous trial.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhether or not the matter before Judge Wilson concludes prior to Judge Plewe issuing any rulings in Mr. Mitchell\u2019s case, there will always be a taint that Judge Plewe has reason to reward or curry favor with Judge Wilson,\u201d defense attorneys wrote. \u201cThere is an appearance of a quid pro quo.\u201d<\/p>\n
Prosecutors said in a response to the defense attorneys\u2019 motion \u201cthat it might be \u2018reasonably inferred\u2019 that Judge Plewe has a reason, however far-fetched, to be biased or prejudiced against the defendant,\u201d District Attorney Christian Champagne wrote in a March 8 motion.<\/p>\n
Because of the uncontested nature of the motion, Plewe said in an order that \u201cmy obligation to follow precedent, my commitment to the public trust in the judiciary, and my unbending desire to uphold the rule of law \u2013 requires that I recuse and not refer the matter for a review hearing.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe parties to this case deserve finality,\u201d Plewe wrote.<\/p>\n
The case was assigned to Senior Judge McMullen, who has yet to rule on at least four motions filed by prosecutors and defense attorneys.<\/p>\n
bhauff@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mitchell sentenced to life in prison, but conviction was reversed<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":65854,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[133,168,28,131,867],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-65853","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-courts","tag-crime","tag-headlines","tag-homicide","tag-la-plata-county-courthouse"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65853","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=65853"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65853\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/65854"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=65853"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=65853"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=65853"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=65853"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}