Commerce City to review proposed municipal sentencing and jury-trial changes

Commerce City Council is scheduled to hear staff presentations Sept. 28 on two draft ordinances that would cap some municipal-court sentences at state-law maximums and change when defendants can demand a jury, according to the study-session agenda. The agenda lists a study-session presentation, not an ordinance vote.

Draft Ordinance 2806 would add a ceiling to the city code’s general penalty provision: a sentence could not exceed the state-law maximum for a comparable misdemeanor or petty offense. The draft cites a Colorado Supreme Court decision requiring that limit when a city ordinance and state statute prohibit identical conduct.

In its December 2025 decision in People v. Camp, the court held that a municipality cannot impose a harsher penalty than state law allows for identical conduct. It distinguished offenses without an identical state counterpart, which remain subject to general municipal penalty limits. The draft’s recitals refer to identical conduct, while its proposed operative language refers to a “comparable” state misdemeanor or petty offense.

Draft Ordinance 2807 would remove the city’s waiver of imprisonment as a reason to deny a jury trial. Under the Colorado jury-trial statute, the municipal-offense exception turns on whether a counterpart state statute allows imprisonment. The draft would generally leave cases involving only civil or traffic infractions outside the jury-trial right when no comparable state offense carries possible jail. It retains an exception for defendants who were under 18 when the alleged offense occurred, while allowing a jury if state law otherwise provides for one. Defendants would still have to demand a jury under court rules.

Both drafts say they would take effect under Section 5.3 of the city charter if adopted.