staff report
DENVER — Two high profile members of the judicial system in Trinidad and Walsenburg took back some of the complaints they have made against Third Judicial District Attorney Frank Ruybalid during a hearing on the future of his law license last week in Denver.
According to published reports, Dariel Weaver of the state public defenders office in Trinidad, testified she had actually received information from Ruybalid’s office she had previously told district judges she had not received.
Ruybalid was the subject of a two-day hearing last week regarding a charge of violation of probation. He was placed on probation after a plea agreement was made last year where he admitted, in some cases, discovery of evidence, which in some cases could mitigate charges or exonerate criminal defendants, had not been given to defense attorneys at all or in a timely manner.
Weaver’s testimony came on the second and final day of a hearing in front of William Lucero, the Colorado Supreme Court’s presiding disciplinary judge. He oversees cases in which official complaints of misconduct have been filed against attorneys. The hearing was set because the Colorado Supreme Court’s Office of Attorney Regulation Counsel contends Ruybalid’s license should be suspended for six months on grounds he violated probation that William Lucero, the Colorado Supreme Court’s presiding disciplinary judge imposed in January 2015. The agency investigates and prosecutes attorneys for allegedly committing professional misconduct.
In Weaver’s testimony, she also said that she didn’t notify the district attorney that she hadn’t received information he or his deputy prosecutors were required to provide to her. Instead, she and other defenders typically asked judges to dismiss cases on grounds that they hadn’t received it.
Ruybalid’s probation was imposed after he pleaded guilty of professional misconduct committed in 2010-13. The violations were failure to provide information to defenders and failure to properly supervise some subordinate prosecutors.
Also testifying for the attorney regulation agency against Ruybalid was Third Judicial District Chief Judge Claude Appel. Appel has been a critic of Ruybalid’s performance, including stating in a court decision this year that Ruybalid had committed a pattern of willful misconduct by allegedly not providing the information in numerous cases over the years. Under cross-examination by the district attorney, Appel said he may have included cases that he should not have included when he reached that conclusion. Appel told Judge Lucero his three-page list of cases that were a basis for part of his conclusion about willful misconduct was based on the fact Ruybalid had dismissed numerous criminal cases due to not having provided the information.
Ruybalid said last Thursday he had made “inadvertent mistakes” in some cases, but didn’t willfully withhold information from defense attorneys. The lame-duck DA said the problem sometimes could have been resolved if defenders had notified him that they hadn’t received the information.
Colorado prosecutors are required to provide the information without defenders having to ask for it.
Erin Kristofco, the Colorado Supreme Court’s Office of Attorney Regulation Counsel attorney prosecuting Ruybalid on the alleged probation violation, told Judge Lucero, “The people of the 3rd Judicial District require better.”
