Week of Sept. 21, 2026: RTD Police Officer Lies About Assault and Falsely Arrests Man Sleeping on Light Rail Train
Welcome to our weekly sum-up. Every Monday we send out a short summary of the last week’s officers that have landed on Colorado’s Peace Officer Standards and Training public database of law enforcement misconduct and actions. These actions from POST are not necessarily only those that have happened in the last week, but those that have been added, and consist of any other context we could find. Additionally are officers with otherwise obvious misconduct from around the same time.
This week we have officers terminated for being up to four hours late to a shift multiple times, and others who used a "derogatory term" for a password that was enough to get them fired — the agency hasn't responded yet to specify what that term was.
Connor Theobald (CO-722-527)
- Terminated for cause as a deputy with El Paso County Sheriff’s Office on Aug. 31.
- El Paso County SO did not respond to a Sept 22. request for relevant documents before publishing.
Sources:
- POST Database
Jonathan Allendorf (CO-116307)
- Terminated for cause as an officer with University of Colorado Boulder Police Department on Aug. 3.
- Formerly with Mountain Village Police Department, El Paso County Sheriff’s Office and Castle Rock Police Department.
Sources:
- POST Database
Trevor Branam (CO-513-503)
- Resigned while under investigation as an officer with Canon City Police Department on Aug. 26.
- Canon City PD denied documents related to the investigation Branam resigned under. According to the agency, the investigation is still ongoing.
- Hired January 2025
Sources:
- POST Database
Humberto Guzman (CO-1468-3014)
- Resigned while under investigation as a deputy with Douglas County Sheriff's Office on Aug. 31.
- Douglas County SO did not respond to a Sept. 22 request for relevant documents before publishing.
Sources:
- POST Database
Matt Hill (CO-281-421)
- Terminated for cause as a noncertified detention deputy with Garfield County Sheriff's Office on Aug. 21.
- Used a derogatory term as an access password for Garfield County internal email and computer systems. Found to have violated internal policy “Conduct Unbecoming,” the cause of his termination.
- Multiple incidents of Hill being up to four hours late for his shifts, at one point sleeping through a mandatory training regarding a new Taser system.
- Originally hired in 2021, resigned in January 2025, rehired in March 2025.
Sources:
- POST Database
- Garfield County Sheriff’s Office
Patrick Canvasser (CO-025-518)
- Resigned in lieu of termination for cause as a noncertified detention deputy with Logan County Sheriff's Office on Sept. 1.
- Neither Logan County nor Logan County Sheriff’s Office responded to a Sept. 22 request for relevant documents before publishing.
- Hired August 2025
Sources:
- POST Database
Wilfred Europe (CO-113014)
- Terminated for cause as a sergeant with Adams County Sheriff's Office on Aug. 28
- Adams County SO did not respond to a Sept. 22 request for relevant documents before publishing.
- Shot and killed 40-year-old Adams County resident in a traffic stop in February 2012. Adams County District Attorney Don Quick found that Europe was justified in his shooting that November.
- Shot and killed a dog in January 2013 responding to a call at the wrong address. District Attorney for the 17th Judicial District Dave Young did not press charges.
- Shot and killed a 19-year-old man in December 2017 while on patrol. District Attorney for the 17th Judicial District Dave Young did not press charges.
Sources:
Robert Nye (CO-136951)
- Terminated for cause as a noncertified detention sergeant with Garfield County Sheriff’s Office on Aug. 21
- According to a summary of the internal affairs investigation that led to his termination, Nye violated internal policy of “Conduct Unbecoming” by using his personal cell phone while on duty and additionally allowed an unnamed subordinate to do the same and “neglected to perform additional supervisory duties.”
- According to a disciplinary notice, in July 2025 Nye shared “information that may be sexual in nature and inappropriate in a professional work environment” about a Silt Police Department officer with a subordinate detention deputy.
Sources:
- POST Database
- Garfield County Sheriff’s Office
Ryan Colley (CO-4794-9978)
- Subject of a criminal charge as a certified deputy with Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office on Sept. 21
- According to court dockets, Colley was arrested Sept. 9 on domestic violence-related charges of harassment through insults, taunts or challenges, menacing and child abuse knowingly or recklessly without injury
- Douglas County Courts did not respond to a Sept. 21 request for an arrest affidavit before publishing.
- Hired March 2013.
Sources:
- POST Database
- Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office
Officer updates:
Records that must come directly from a law enforcement agency are not required to be released within three business days, as it is with CORA requests to municipalities. Sometimes an officer is added to the database later in the week, and there isn’t time for records requests to come before the newsletter has to be sent out. Sometimes the records we get back are resumes or job applications without much more information, but sometimes they are documents that do lend more important details. Whenever any of these updates come in, we’ll put them here.
Devin Cooper (CO-102-506)
- Resigned while under investigation as an officer with Colorado Springs Police Department on Sept. 6.
- Hired April 2025
- Updates: Internal Affairs reports
- According to a summary of an internal affairs report, Cooper was sworn in and testified in a Department of Revenue hearing in his official capacity on June 17. He testified with the wrong case report and provided details for a different case. The defense attorney requested the case be dismissed due to “officer incompetence.” According the summary, Cooper responded with “Well if I'm no longer needed here, I'll just leave."
- According to CSPD, this internal affairs investigation was not the investigation he resigned under as that one is still ongoing and so they denied the records to Blue Surveillance.
Nathan Scudder (CO-138761)
- Terminated for cause as a certified deputy from Weld County Sheriff’s Office on April 25
- Updates: Termination letter
- According to the termination letter, Sheriff Steve Reams terminated Scudder because he believed that his “past negative performance would create a situation that retaining [Scudder] would be negligent for the constituents of Weld County...”
- He refers to multiple instances of Scudder “simply deciding not to document calls for service that have a criminal nexus leaving these victims with no recourse for justice under the law.”
- Reams also states that Scudder was recommended for termination in 2019 for similar reasons and because he “performed below standards for approximately 2 years despite several intermediate steps to include performance reviews and routine check-ins,” but Reams did not support the termination then.
- Reams stated in the letter that “there is no doubt that you have the knowledge and opportunity to do this job, you simply lack the proven desire.”
Evan Graff (CO-112-214)
- Pleaded guilty to amended charge of disorderly conduct on Aug. 17
- Previously reported on here
Alejandro Alvarado (CO-715-003)
- Resigned while under investigation as an officer with the Denver Regional Transportation District Police Department on July 16
- Updates: Internal affairs files, resignation letter
- According to an internal affairs report, Alvarado and another officer woke up a person sleeping on the light rail train on July 6. Alvarado claimed at the scene and in his report that the person swung a closed right fist within two feet of his face and swung a left fist “in the fashion of a jab” while rising to his feet.
- The report states that this doesn’t match the camera footage, along with other descriptors by Alvarado including when the person was standing versus sitting and how far away they were.
- The report describes the bodycamera footage showing the person “startled awake,” waving the two officers away and then assumed a “defensive stance” while seeming “disoriented,” before realizing they were officers and complying with their commands. Alvarado arrested the person for a felony charge of second degree attempted assault on a peace officer.
- The internal affair report concludes that Alvarado “misrepresented material facts” regarding the alleged assault and “provided false or misleading statements both on scene and in his official report.”
- The charge was dropped, and Alvarado was found to have violated six internal policies regarding performance, conduct and “constitutional requirements.”
- Alvarado had sent a resignation letter to RTD Police Department on July 1, stating his last day to be July 15, due to accepting a job offer from another agency out of state.
