A Clear Creek County District Court judge on Tuesday dropped the charges against three law enforcement officers involved in the 2022 killing of Christian Glass as part of a plea deal in which the officers agreed to undergo additional training and to participate in filmed interviews about Glass’ death.
Those interviews were compiled into a 25-minute training video about the incident, Fifth Judicial District Attorney Heidi McCollum said Wednesday.
“What I think we’re trying to do is to move forward in the most productive and meaningful way possible for everyone involved,” McCollum said. “And if we can take this awful, tragic event that never should have happened, and we can prevent it from happening even in one state, in one small town anywhere in the country, then this plea agreement with these three defendants will have been worth it.”
Idaho Springs police officer Brittany Morrow, former Georgetown police officer Timothy Collins and Colorado State Patrol trooper Ryan Bennie were each charged with a single count of failing to intervene in the excessive force of another officer in Glass’ death.
Prosecutors filed motions to dismiss the charges on Friday, and Judge Cynthia Jones granted the dismissals Tuesday, online court records show. The Clear Creek County District Court clerk’s office did not provide copies of the motions to The Denver Post before this story’s publication.
The 25-minute training video was filmed and produced with help from the Colorado State Patrol, McCollum said. Her office plans to distribute the video nationwide.
In the video, the three officers talk about what went wrong in Glass’ case, what they would do differently now, and the fallout, both personally and professionally, from the killing and the subsequent criminal charges, McCollum said.
As a condition of the dismissals, the three defendants also completed additional training on three topics: de-escalation, critical incidents and mental health best practices, she said.
Prosecutors initially charged all seven law enforcement officers who were at the scene when then-Clear Creek County sheriff’s deputy Andrew Buen shot and killed Glass on June 10, 2022, as well as a supervisor who was not present.
Buen was convicted of criminally negligent homicide and reckless endangerment in the killing and sentenced to three years in prison in April. The supervisor, former Clear Creek County sheriff’s Sgt. Kyle Gould, pleaded guilty to failing to intervene in 2023 and was sentenced to two years of probation.
The charges were subsequently dropped against five of the six other officers. Charges against two Colorado Division of Gaming officers were dismissed in 2024 because the state law that mandates law enforcement officers must intervene to prevent another officer from using excessive force doesn’t apply to gaming officers.
McCollum said Wednesday that Buen’s conviction on the lesser charge of criminally negligent homicide — rather than the second-degree murder charge prosecutors sought — weakened the case that the other officers failed to intervene in his actions.
She said the dismissals will allow the community to move forward.
“There’s an aspect of community healing that we want to take note of and acknowledge,” she said.
Siddhartha Rathod, an attorney for the Glass family, said Wednesday that the plea agreement and dismissals will bring the family some closure.
“Prosecutors thinking outside of the box is what we want,” he said. “Prosecutors who prioritize community safety over mere punishment should be commended. Not everyone needs to be put into shackles to ensure that the community will be safer. This agreement is a step in the right direction of ensuring safety for all of Colorado.”
Prosecutors have not sought a dismissal for former Georgetown Marshal Randy Williams, the sole remaining officer who continues to face charges in Glass’ death. He is charged with both failure to intervene in the excessive force of another officer and assault, both misdemeanors. His attorney did not return a request for comment Wednesday.
The deal offered to the other three officers was not on the table for him, McCollum said.
“We thought that his case was separately situated from these three defendants,” she said.
Colorado State Patrol Col. Matthew Packard said in a statement Wednesday that he, too, supported the legal outcome for the trooper involved in the killing.
“While I wish the process to arrive at this outcome would have been different, particularly in avoiding an unnecessary criminal charge against Trooper Bennie, I also understand the complexities involved,” he said in the statement. “Our agency will continue its efforts to learn and grow following our involvement in incidents as a part of our drive for continuous improvement.”
Buen shot Glass after the 22-year-old called 911 for help when his car got stuck on a rock in Clear Creek County. Glass, who had marijuana and amphetamine in his system, was experiencing a mental health crisis and told dispatchers he was afraid of “skinwalkers” and people chasing him.
Seven law enforcement officers responded to Glass’ 911 call and spent more than an hour trying to coax Glass out of the car while he was experiencing delusions and paranoia. Eventually, Buen decided to break Glass’ window and pull him from the vehicle.
When officers broke the window, Glass grabbed a knife and officers fired a Taser at him 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 Buen to shoot Glass five times. Glass then stabbed himself several times.
A 2022 grand jury investigation that was separate from the criminal prosecution found Glass committed no crime, acted in panic and self-defense before he was killed, and never actually came close to stabbing the officers.
The involved law enforcement agencies agreed to a $19 million settlement with Glass’ parents in 2023.
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