On March 28, 2002, the plaintiffs, the American Friends Service Committee, along with the ACLU and other activist organizations, filed a class action lawsuit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, and under federal regulations in the United States Court for the District of Colorado, Denver Division against the City and County of Denver. The plaintiff, represented by the ACLU and private counsel, asked the court for injunctive and declaratory relief, claiming that their First and Fourteenth Amendment rights had been violated, as well as violations of federal regulations and the state constitution. Specifically, the plaintiffs claimed that the maintenance of "Spy Files" on leftist groups in Colorado for lawful, peaceful, non-criminal activities and falsely labeling the groups "criminal extremist" was a violation of the constitutional rights of its members to petition the government for redress of grievances, the freedom of association, and a misappropriation of federal funds in electronically storing this information.

On March 11, 2002, the ACLU published the partial contents of leaked "Spy Files" that the Denver police had been maintaining on several organizations and individuals. The ACLU petitioned the Mayor of Denver to investigate take four specific actions to stem the dissemination and expunge the Spy Files. The Mayor held a news conference in which he claimed that the Spy Files resulted from an overly broad interpretation of the City's policy on the maintenance of criminal intelligence.

The city's policy mirrored a federal regulation (28 C.F.R § 23.20) that prohibited the police from maintaining criminal intelligence electronic records that would violate citizens' constitutional rights, absent (1) a direct relationship to criminal conduct, and (2) a reasonable suspicion that the individual is involved in criminal activity.

The disclosed records detailed the protest activities of individuals not only in Colorado, but lists of protest and political beliefs of persons from outside the state. The Spy Files also labeled several organizations as criminal extremists (notably including the American Friends Service Committee, which was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1947). The plaintiffs alleged that this information was false, that the organizations were not criminally extremist, and that there were statements of the political beliefs of the members that the City had misconstrued were defamatory. Most importantly, the plaintiffs claimed that criminal intelligence files were being maintained on them for lawful activity that was not connected to criminal conduct.

Defendantes moved and were permitted to remove the case to the United State District Court for the District of Coloradoon April 16, 2002. Thereafter, the defendants filed a motion to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction, which was denied by the Court (Magistrate Judge Craig Shaffer) on October 17, 2002.

On April 17, 2003, the case was settled without class certification being determined. In the settlement agreement, the City of Denver agreed to adopt a more specific and detailed policy (included in the Clearinghouse collection as Appendix to Settlement Agreement), and to review and purge all criminal intelligence files in violation of the new policy. The city also agreed to furnish copies to all individuals and organizations on which the city maintained criminal intelligence files. Lastly, the city agreed to contact entities to which it had distributed copies of the criminal intelligence files and notify them of the purge. Compliance of the agreement was subject to an audit for a two-year period.

On August 05, 2004, the Court (Judge Edward Nottingham) ordered that the City pay the plaintiffs attorney's fees in the amount of $469,018.63. The case was dismissed with prejudice thereafter.

Blase Kearney - 07/09/2012


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