A late-night encounter in Fort Collins that started with a burrito and a trespass citation is now officially headed to a federal jury. A U.S. district judge has ruled that jurors, not a judge, must decide whether two Fort Collins police officers used excessive force in a 2021 Old Town arrest captured on body-worn cameras.
U.S. District Judge Charlotte N. Sweeney partially denied a bid by Officers Avery Hanzlicek and Kevin Park to end the case without a trial and set a jury trial date for July 2026. The lawsuit, filed by Andru Kulas, centers on a video that shows Park using pepper spray while Kulas was already restrained on the ground.
Judge Says Jury Should Sort Out What the Video Shows
In a Jan. 21 order, Sweeney refused to dismiss Kulas’ excessive-force claims, pointing to factual disputes that she said only a jury can resolve. She wrote that “Defendants’ characterization of Plaintiff’s supposed ‘threat’ does not overcome what the Officer Defendants’ body cam footage plainly shows.” The mix of claims that survived and those that were thrown out is detailed in the court record, available through Justia.
Old Town Call Turns Into Street Confrontation
The incident unfolded just before 2 a.m. on Aug. 29, 2021, after Officers Hanzlicek and Park responded to a report of people on a bar roof in Old Town and then encountered Kulas in the street. Body-worn camera footage shows Kulas holding a burrito and, according to the video, swatting at Park’s hand as the officer tried to hand him a trespass citation. The sequence of events and what the cameras captured have been described in detail by the Denver Gazette reporting.
Claims of Lasting Eye Damage and Dropped Charges
In his complaint, Kulas alleges that Park sprayed oleoresin capsicum (OC) directly into his eyes at very close range while he was face-up on the ground and partially restrained. His attorneys say the spray left him functionally blind for several days and with ongoing cloudy vision. Fort Collins police conducted an internal affairs review, and a citizens review board also examined the arrest. The department has said it will contest the lawsuit’s allegations.
On the criminal side, prosecutors eventually dismissed the trespass, obstruction, and resisting charges after Kulas completed a “better choices” class and community service, according to reporting from CBS Colorado.
Qualified Immunity Fight Narrows the Case
Sweeney’s Jan. 21 ruling trimmed the lawsuit but left the core excessive-force allegations intact. She rejected the officers’ qualified-immunity defense as a basis to end the case at this stage and allowed Kulas’ failure-to-intervene claim against Hanzlicek to proceed in connection with Park’s alleged use of force. At the same time, she granted summary judgment for the defendants on Kulas’ unlawful-arrest and municipal-liability claims. Those rulings, laid out in the written opinion available on Justia, narrow the upcoming trial to whether the force captured on video was reasonable under the circumstances.
Long Wait for a Jury and High-Stakes Video
Sweeney set the jury trial for July 2026, giving both sides many months to prepare witnesses, experts, and a frame for what jurors will see in the body-camera footage. Civil-rights attorneys say the outcome could hinge on how those split-second video clips are interpreted and how officer training and department policy are presented around the use of OC spray in that setting…