Showing posts with label Colorado. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Colorado. Show all posts

Thursday, March 28, 2024

District Court Enters Final Order in Wedding Website Designer Case

As previously reported, last year the U.S. Supreme Court in 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis held that the 1st Amendment's free speech protection bars Colorado from using its public accommodation anti-discrimination law to require a wedding website designer to design websites for same-sex weddings in violation of her religious beliefs. Now in the case on remand, 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, (D CO, March 26, 2024), the Colorado federal district court entered a final Order in the case which provides in part:

ORDERED that the First Amendment’s Free Speech Clause prohibits Colorado from enforcing CADA’s Communication Clause to prevent plaintiffs from posting the following statement on her website or from making materially similar statements on her website and directly to prospective clients:  

I firmly believe that God is calling me to this work. Why? I am personally convicted that He wants me – during these uncertain times for those who believe in biblical marriage – to shine His light and not stay silent. He is calling me to stand up for my faith, to explain His true story about marriage, and to use the talents and business He gave me to publicly proclaim and celebrate His design for marriage as a life-long union between one man and one woman.  

These same religious convictions that motivate me also prevent me from creating websites promoting and celebrating ideas or messages that violate my beliefs. So I will not be able to create websites for same-sex marriages or any other marriage that is not between one man and one woman. Doing that would compromise my Christian witness and tell a story about marriage that contradicts God’s true story of marriage – the very story He is calling me to promote.

It is further ORDERED that defendants, their officers, agents, servants, employees, attorneys, and those acting in active concert or participation with them who receive actual notice of this order are permanently enjoined from enforcing:  

a. CADA’s Accommodations Clause to compel plaintiffs to create custom websites celebrating or depicting same-sex weddings or otherwise to create or depict original, expressive, graphic or website designs inconsistent with her beliefs regarding same-sex marriage; and  

b. CADA’s Communication Clause to prevent plaintiffs from posting the above statement on her website and from making materially similar statements on her website and directly to prospective clients.

Monday, October 23, 2023

Colorado Ban on Medication Abortion Reversal Violates Clinic's Free Exercise Rights

In Bella Health and Wellness v. Weiser, (D CO, Oct. 21, 2023), a Colorado federal district court issued a preliminary injunction barring the state from taking enforcement action under a law enacted earlier this year against an anti-abortion pregnancy center for offering and advertising its medication abortion reversal services. The court said in part:

Bella Health considers it a religious obligation to provide treatment for pregnant mothers and to protect unborn life if the mother seeks to stop or reverse an abortion.... The State Defendants have not contested that SB 23-190 burdens Bella Health’s religious practice. Indeed, it is not up to the State or the Court to second-guess the sincerity of Bella Health’s religious motivations or to suggest alternative means of satisfying Plaintiffs’ religious calling. 

The more difficult question is whether Section Three’s prohibition on abortion pill reversal is neutral and generally applicable. It is not for three reasons. First, the law treats comparable secular activity more favorably than Bella Health’s religious activity.... Second, the law contains mechanisms for exemptions that undercut the State’s expressed interests.... Third, the law’s object and effect is to burden religious conduct in a way that is not neutral.

Colorado Politics reports on the decision. [Thanks to Thomas Rutledge for the lead.]

Sunday, October 22, 2023

Christian Pre-School May Get State Aid Without Complying With Non-Discrimination Rules Which Violate Its Beliefs

In Darren Patterson Christian Academy v. Roy, (D CO, Oct. 20, 2023), a Colorado federal district court issued a preliminary injunction barring Colorado from excluding a private Christian pre-school from its Univeral Pre-School Program. The state requires participating schools to agree that they will not discriminate on the basis of gender, race, ethnicity, religion, national origin, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, citizenship status, education, disability, socio-economic status, or any other identity.” The court said in part:

... [T]he Department’s non-discrimination policy likely violates Plaintiff’s rights by interfering with the school’s selection of key employees in accordance with its religious convictions under the “ministerial exception.” ...

Second, Plaintiff has the right to expressive association which the State’s hiring rules likely violate.... The freedom to associate with others also includes the freedom not to associate with others if doing so would compromise the associating group’s expression of beliefs....

Third, the Department’s rules also force Plaintiff to choose between adhering to religious beliefs and risking exclusion from the program or complying with the Department’s rules. In the specific context of excluding religious schools from participation in educational benefits programs, the Supreme Court has thrice held that a state may not exclude religious observers from receiving otherwise available educational funding because of a school’s religious status or practice....

Plaintiff seeks to hire only coreligionists, and to continue internal policies related to gender distinctions rooted in religious beliefs. These polices violate the Department’s non-discrimination standards for participating preschools.... The First Amendment forbids imposing such a choice.

Fourth, the State’s rules are likely not neutral and generally applicable..... They allow both categorical and individualized exemptions that would undermine the government asserted interests, and thereby trigger strict scrutiny.... See Fulton v. City ...

Plaintiff is also likely to succeed on the merits of its Free Speech claim, at least to the extent that the state would require Plaintiff and its staff to use a student’s or employee’s preferred pronouns as a condition of participating in the program.

[Thanks to Eugene Volokh via Religionlaw for the lead.]

Friday, August 18, 2023

Catholic Schools Sue Over Rules for Inclusion in Colorado's Universal Preschool Funding

Suit was filed this week in a Colorado federal district court by the Catholic Archdiocese of Denver and two Catholic schools challenging the restrictions imposed on participation in Colorado's universal preschool funding program. The complaint (full text) in St. Mary Catholic Parish in Littleton v. Roy, (D CO, filed 8/16/2023) alleges that plaintiffs' free exercise and free speech rights were infringed by conditions that did not allow giving preference to Catholic families. Rules did allow preference for members of the church's congregation, but not for a broader religious preference. The complaint also alleged that the program's non-discrimination requirements prevent Catholic schools from requiring teachers. administrators and staff to abide by Catholic teachings on marriage, gender and sexuality; from considering whether a student or family has identified as LGBTQ; and from assigning dress requirements, pronoun usage and restroom use on the basis of biological sex. Becket issued a press release announcing the filing of the lawsuit.

Friday, June 30, 2023

Supreme Court: Web Designer's Free Speech Rights Allow Her to Refuse to Design Websites for Same-Sex Weddings

The U.S. Supreme Court today in 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, (Sup. Ct., June 30, 2023), in a 6-3 decision, held that the 1st Amendment's free speech protections bars Colorado from using its public accommodation anti-discrimination law to require a wedding website designer to design websites for same-sex weddings in violation of her religious beliefs. Justice Gorsuch's majority opinion says in part:

The Tenth Circuit held that the wedding websites Ms. Smith seeks to create qualify as “pure speech” under this Court’s precedents.... We agree....

Under Colorado’s logic, the government may compel anyone who speaks for pay on a given topic to accept all commissions on that same topic—no matter the underlying message—if the topic somehow implicates a customer’s statutorily protected trait.... Taken seriously, that principle would allow the government to force all manner of artists, speechwriters, and others whose services involve speech to speak what they do not believe on pain of penalty. The government could require “an unwilling Muslim movie director to make a film with a Zionist message,” or “an atheist muralist to accept a commission celebrating Evangelical zeal,” so long as they would make films or murals for other members of the public with different messages.....

Of course, as the State emphasizes, Ms. Smith offers her speech for pay and does so through 303 Creative LLC, a company in which she is “the sole member-owner.”... But none of that makes a difference. Does anyone think a speechwriter loses his First Amendment right to choose for whom he works if he accepts money in return? Or that a visual artist who accepts commissions from the public does the same? Many of the world’s great works of literature and art were created with an expectation of compensation. Nor, this Court has held, do speakers shed their First Amendment protections by employing the corporate form to disseminate their speech. This fact underlies our cases involving everything from movie producers to book publishers to newspapers....

In this case, Colorado seeks to force an individual to speak in ways that align with its views but defy her conscience about a matter of major significance. In the past, other States in Barnette, Hurley, and Dale have similarly tested the First Amendment’s boundaries by seeking to compel speech they thought vital at the time. But, as this Court has long held, the opportunity to think for ourselves and to express those thoughts freely is among our most cherished liberties and part of what keeps our Republic strong.

Justice Sotomayor, joined by Justices Kagan and Jackson, filed a dissenting opinion, saying in part:

A public accommodations law has two core purposes. First, the law ensures “equal access to publicly available goods and services.”...

Second, a public accommodations law ensures equal dignity in the common market. Indeed, that is the law’s “fundamental object”: “to vindicate ‘the deprivation of personal dignity that surely accompanies denials of equal access to public establishments.’”...

Time and again, businesses and other commercial entities have claimed constitutional rights to discriminate. And time and again, this Court has courageously stood up to those claims—until today. Today, the Court shrinks....

This Court has long held that “the First Amendment does not prevent restrictions directed at commerce or conduct from imposing incidental burdens on speech.”...

CADA’s Accommodation Clause and its application here are valid regulations of conduct. It is well settled that a public accommodations law like the Accommodation Clause does not “target speech or discriminate on the basis of its content.”... Rather, “the focal point of its prohibition” is “on the act of discriminating against individuals in the provision of publicly available goods, privileges, and services.”...

Petitioners remain free to advocate the idea that same-sex marriage betrays God’s laws.... Even if Smith believes God is calling her to do so through her for-profit company, the company need not hold out its goods or services to the public at large. Many filmmakers, visual artists, and writers never do....

The decision threatens to balkanize the market and to allow the exclusion of other groups from many services. A website designer could equally refuse to create a wedding website for an interracial couple, for example. How quickly we forget that opposition to interracial marriage was often because “‘Almighty God . . . did not intend for the races to mix.’”... Yet the reason for discrimination need not even be religious, as this case arises under the Free Speech Clause. A stationer could refuse to sell a birth announcement for a disabled couple because she opposes their having a child.... And so on.....

AP reports on the decision.

Thursday, June 22, 2023

Christian Pre-School Challenges Exclusion from Colorado State Aid Program

Suit was filed this week in a Colorado federal district court challenging requirements that Colorado has imposed on pre-schools in order for them to participate and receive funding in the state's universal pre-school program. The complaint (full text) in Darren Patterson Christian Academy v. Roy, (D CO, filed 6/20/2023), alleges in part:

9.... [T]he Colorado Department of Early Childhood ... is requiring religious preschools like Darren Patterson Christian Academy to forgo their religious character, beliefs, and exercise to participate in UPK.

10. The Department does so through two provisions that prohibit discrimination against any person based on religion, sexual orientation, or gender identity.

11. So even though the school welcomes all families and children, these provisions would force it to hire employees who do not share its faith and to alter internal rules and policies that are based on the school’s religious beliefs about sexuality and gender, including those that relate to restroom usage, pronouns, dress codes, and student housing during school expeditions and field trips....

Plaintiff contends that the requirements violate its rights under the federal Constitiuion's Free Exercise, Free Speech and Equal Protection Clauses. ADF issued a press release announcing the filing of the lawsuit.

Wednesday, June 21, 2023

Colorado Window to Bring Expired Child Sex Abuse Claims Is Unconstitutional

In Aurora Public Schools v. A.S., (CO Sup.Ct., June 20, 2023), the Colorado Supreme Court held that the Child Sexual Abuse Accountability Act 

is unconstitutionally retrospective [under Art. II, Sec. 11 of the Colorado Constitution] to the extent that it permits a victim to bring a claim for sexual misconduct based on conduct that predates the Act and for which previously available causes of action were time-barred.

The Act created a 3-year window during which victims could bring claims for any child sexual abuse that occurred between 1960 and 2022. In the case, plaintiffs sued a former high school coach and his school district for sexual abuse that occurred between 2001 and 2005. The court said in part:

The legislature was careful with S.B. 21-088 not to directly revive time-barred claims, which would plainly impair vested rights.... Instead, it created a three-year window to bring a new cause of action to accomplish the same ends. But the retrospectivity clause prohibits the legislature from “accomplish[ing] that indirectly, which it could not do directly.”...

... Our holding does not affect claims brought under the CSAAA for which the previously applicable statute of limitations had not run as of January 1, 2022.

AP reports on the decision.

Friday, June 02, 2023

Lawsuit Challenges Laws Restricting Abortion Clinic Sidewalk Counselors

Suit was filed yesterday in a Colorado federal district court challenging on free speech grounds a Colorado statute and a Denver ordinance that prohibit approaching a person within 8 feet of an abortion clinic or other health care facility "for the purpose of passing a leaflet or handbill to ..., or engaging in oral protest, education, or counseling with such other person." According to the complaint (full text) in Faustin v. Polis, (D CO, filed 6/1/2023):

Defendants’ ban on approaching women outside of abortion clinics to speak with them unquestionably discriminates based on the content—and even the viewpoint—of speech. On its face, the ban applies only to speech with a particular purpose and message: speech “for the purpose . . . of engaging in oral protest, education, or counseling.”... And it targets only that speech on one side of the abortion debate: speech “protest[ing] or counsel[ing] against” what Colorado euphemistically terms “certain medical procedures.”... Defendants’ ban is also content- and viewpoint-based due to the nature of its justification: protecting the “unwilling listener’s interest in avoiding unwanted communication” from pro-life speakers when seeking “access to a medical facility.”...

First Liberty Institute issued a press release announcing the filing of the lawsuit.

Saturday, April 15, 2023

Colorado Bars Abortion Pill Reversal; Suit Challenges New Law

Yesterday, Colorado Governor Jared Polis signed into law SB23-190 (full text). The new law makes it a deceptive trade practice to advertise that a clinic offers abortions, referrals for abortions or emergency contraceptives when it does not offer these services.  It also provides that it is unprofessional conduct for a healthcare provider to prescribe or administer medication abortion reversal, unless by Oct. 1 the state medical, pharmacy and nursing boards all have in effect rules finding that it is a generally accepted standard of practice to engage in medication abortion reversal.

On the same day the bill was signed, an anti-abortion Catholic healthcare clinic filed suit in a Colorado federal district court challenging the new law's provisions on medication abortion reversal as violating its 1st and 14th Amendment rights. The complaint (full text) in Bella Health and Wellness v. Weiser, (D CO, filed 4/14/2023), alleges that the law violates its Free Exercise rights because it is neither neutral nor generally applicable, saying in part:

[A]bortion pill reversal is nothing more than supplemental progesterone. And there are a multitude of off-label uses of progesterone, which has been widely prescribed to women—including pregnant women—for more than 50 years.

... Yet SB 23-190 makes no attempt to regulate—much less outright prohibit— the off-label use of progesterone in any other circumstance. That omission renders SB 23-190 not generally applicable.

The complaint also alleges that the law violates their free speech rights and patients' right to medical treatment.  According to Becket Law, the district court quickly granted Bella Health temporary emergency relief and set a hearing on a preliminary injunction while litigation proceeds for April 24. CPR News reports on the lawsuit.

Friday, January 27, 2023

Baker Cannot Refuse to Provide Non-expressive Cake to Transgender Customer

In Scardina v. Masterpiece Cakeshop, Inc., (CO Ct. App., Jan. 26, 2023), a Colorado state appellate court held that Masterpiece Cakeshop and its co-owner Jack Phillips violated the Colorado Anti-Discrimination Act when they refused a transgender woman's order for a pink cake with blue frosting.  The woman sought the cake to celebrate her birthday and her gender transition. The court said in part:

[A] proprietor may not refuse to sell a nonexpressive product to a protected person based on that person’s intent to use the product as part of a celebration that the producer considers offensive....

We conclude that creating a pink cake with blue frosting is not inherently expressive and any message or symbolism it provides to an observer would not be attributed to the baker. Thus, CADA does not compel Masterpiece and Phillips to speak through the creation and sale of such a cake to Scardina....

Masterpiece and Phillips argue, requiring them to make a cake that they know will be used to celebrate an occasion that their faith informs them is an affront to God’s design violates their right to freely exercise their religion.

In the context of providing public accommodations, however, a proprietor’s actions based on their religious beliefs must be considered in light of a customer’s right to be free from discrimination based on their protected status. The Supreme Court has long held that the Free Exercise Clause does not relieve a person from the obligation to comply with a neutral law of general applicability.... CADA is a neutral law of general applicability.... 

The Supreme Court has consistently held that the state has a legitimate, indeed compelling, interest in eliminating discrimination from public accommodations.,,, Thus, CADA is rationally related to a legitimate governmental interest. Accordingly, CADA may be enforced against Masterpiece and Phillips without violating their right to the free exercise of religion.

In a press release, ADF said that it would appeal the decision.

Wednesday, December 21, 2022

Court Upholds Conversion Therapy Ban

In Chiles v. Salazar, (D CO, Dec. 19, 2022), a Colorado federal district court rejected constitutional challenges to Colorado's ban on mental health professionals engaging in conversion therapy for minors who identify as gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, or gender non-conforming. In a suit brought by a licensed counselor, the court found no violation of plaintiff's free speech rights because the Minor Therapy Conversion Law regulates professional conduct rather than speech. Any speech that is affected is incidental to the professional conduct. The court also found no violation of plaintiff's free exercise rights, saying in part:

According to Ms. Chiles, the Minor Therapy Conversion Law is not neutral because it was “well-known” at the time the Colorado General Assembly enacted the Minor Therapy Conversion Law that conversion therapy was primarily sought for religious reasons.... Therefore, Ms. Chiles’ argument goes, the Minor Therapy Conversion Law impermissibly burdens practitioners who hold particular religious beliefs.... The Court disagrees. The Minor Therapy Conversion Law does not “restrict [therapeutic] practices because of their religious nature.”... [T]he Minor Therapy Conversion Law targets specific “modes of therapy” due to their harmful nature— regardless of the practitioner’s personal religious beliefs or affiliations.... [T]he Minor Therapy Conversion law targets these therapeutic modalities because conversion therapy is ineffective and has the potential to “increase [minors’] isolation, self-hatred, internalized stigma, depression, anxiety, and suicidality”....

Monday, December 05, 2022

Supreme Court Hears Arguments Today on Wedding Website Designer Who Opposes Same-Sex Marriage

Today the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in 303 Creative v. Elenis. In the case, the U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the application of Colorado's Anti-Discrimination Act to a wedding website design company whose owner for religious reasons refuses to create websites that celebrate same-sex marriages. The Court granted certiorari only on the question of "Whether applying a public-accommodation law to compel an artist to speak or stay silent violates the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment." Over 75 amicus briefs have been filed in the case.  The SCOTUSblog case page has links to them and to other filings in the case. The arguments will be broadcast live beginning at 10:00 AM at this link. SCOTUSblog has a preview of the arguments. I will update this post with links to the recording and transcript of the arguments when they become available later today.

UPDATE: Here are links to the transcript and audio of this morning's oral arguments.

Monday, October 03, 2022

Qualified Immunity Protects Defendants Who Denied Religious Exemptions From COVID Vaccine Mandate

In Jane Does 1-11 v. Board of Regents of the University of Colorado, (D CO, Sept. 29, 2022), a Colorado federal district court dismissed a number of claims by current and former students and employees of the University of Colorado who were denied religious exemptions from the University's COVID vaccine mandate. Some of the claims were dismissed on mootness and sovereign immunity grounds. Other claims were dismissed on qualified immunity grounds, with the court saying in part:

Given the unprecedented nature and global scope of the Covid-19 pandemic as well as its devastating impacts, the Court finds the allegations in the Complaint do not establish that these Defendants acted unreasonably in light of existing precedent and in the specific context of this case. Therefore, at a minimum, they did not violate Plaintiffs’ clearly established rights.

Friday, June 24, 2022

In Dispute Over Frozen Pre-Embryos, Wife's Religious Concerns Do Not Prevail

In In re Marriage of Olsen,(CO App., June 23, 2022), a Colorado state appellate court was called on to settle a dispute between a husband and wife over the disposition of their cryogenically frozen pre-embryos after their divorce. The wife wanted to donate the pre-embryos, now held by a fertility clinic, for implantation to another couple because of her religious belief that they are human lives. The husband wanted to destroy the pre-embryos to avoid procreation. A 2018 Colorado Supreme Court (In re Marriage of Rooks) in a somewhat similar case called for the balancing of various factors. Applying this precedent, the Court of Appeals awarded the pre-embryos to the husband, saying in part:

The district court erred by considering wife’s religious belief that the pre-embryos are human lives when weighting the first Rooks factor — the intended use of the party seeking to preserve the disputed pre-embryos.... 

The first Rooks factor simply asks what the party seeking to preserve the pre-embryos intends to do with them.... Does that party seek to implant the pre-embryos to achieve genetic parenthood or does that party seek to donate them? The first factor is not concerned with why the party prefers to preserve the pre-embryos over discarding them....

Although we are sensitive to wife’s concern that awarding the pre-embryos to husband will force her to participate in their destruction against her religious beliefs, the district court can enter orders to mitigate this concern. The district court can award husband the pre-embryos and authorize him to direct their disposal. Wife need not be involved in the process.... Because the decision will belong to husband, wife will not be compelled to do anything in violation of her religious beliefs, and therefore there is no Free Exercise violation. 

Thursday, June 09, 2022

Colorado Imposes Reporting Requirements On Health Care Sharing Ministries

Yesterday, Colorado Governor Jared Polis signed House Bill 22-1269 (full text) into law. The law requires health care sharing ministries to file detailed annual reports with the Commissioner of Insurance. Colorado Politics reports on the bill.

Tuesday, May 31, 2022

Certiorari Denied In Church's Challenge To Colorado COVID Restrictions

The U.S. Supreme Court today denied review in Community Baptist Church v. Polis, (Docket No. 21-1328, certiorari denied 5/31/2022). (Order List). In the case, the U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a district court's denial of a preliminary injunction in a free exercise challenge by two churches and one of their pastors to COVID restrictions imposed by the state of Colorado.  It similarly affirmed the dismissal of a challenge to the federal government's award of COVID relief aid to the state. (See prior posting.)

Tuesday, April 26, 2022

Waiver In Plea Agreement Precludes Appeal Of Ban On Possessing Antisemitic Material

In United States v. Holzer, (10th Cir., April 25, 2022), the U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals held that the appellate waiver provision in defendant's plea agreement precludes him from appealing Special Condition Nine of his supervised release which he contends infringes his freedom of religion, thought and expression. The court explains:

Defendant Richard Holzer was arrested and criminally charged after federal undercover agents determined that Holzer had taken substantial steps towards bombing a synagogue in Pueblo, Colorado. Holzer subsequently pleaded guilty, pursuant to a written plea agreement, to one count of intentionally attempting to obstruct persons in the enjoyment of their free exercise of religious beliefs through force, in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 247(a)(2) and (d)(3), and one count of maliciously attempting to damage and destroy, by means of fire and explosives, a synagogue, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 844(i). The district court sentenced Holzer to a term of imprisonment of 235 months, to be followed by a fifteen-year term of supervised release. The district court also ordered Holzer to comply with eleven special conditions of supervised release, including Special Condition Nine, that prohibits him from acquiring, possessing, or using any material depicting support for or association with antisemitism or white supremacy.

Wednesday, April 06, 2022

Colorado Governor Signs Reproductive Health Equity Act

 On Monday, Colorado Governor Jared Polis signed into law (signing statement) HB 22-1279 (full text), the Reproductive Health Equity Act which provides in part:

(1) Every individual has a fundamental right to make decisions about the individual's reproductive health care, including the fundamental right to use or refuse contraception.

(2) A pregnant individual has a fundamental right to continue pregnancy and give birth or to have an abortion and make decisions how to exercise that right.

(3) A fertilized egg, embryo, or fetus does not have independent or derivative rights under the laws of this state.

CNN reports on developments.

Tuesday, February 22, 2022

Supreme Court Grants Review In Case Of Website Designer Who Refuses Same-Sex Wedding Customers

The U.S. Supreme Court today granted review in 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, (certiorari granted, 2/22/2022) (order List). The grant of certiorari was limited to the question of "Whether applying a public-accommodation law to compel an artist to speak or stay silent violates the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment."  In the case, the U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the application of Colorado's Anti-Discrimination Act to a wedding website design company whose owner for religious reasons refuses to create websites that celebrate same-sex marriages. It said that the 1st Amendment allows the state to ban speech that promotes unlawful conduct, including unlawful discrimination. (See prior posting.) Here is the SCOTUSblog case page with links to briefs in the case.

Tuesday, February 08, 2022

Arrest Of Parishioners For Wrongful Eviction Did Not Violate RLUIPA

In Colorado Springs Fellowship Church v. City of Colorado Springs(D CO, Feb. 4, 2022), a Colorado federal district court dismissed  RLUIPA as well as 1st and 14th Amendment claims against the city and various law enforcement officials brought by a church and eight of its parishioners.  The church leased an apartment that was to be for the use of members who were in need of housing but could not afford to rent a habitable dwelling.  Amisha and Nicholas Gainer were identified as occupants of the Apartment in the lease. The church found that the Gainers had been acting in violation of the lease. Instead of following a formal eviction route, church members merely showed up at the apartment to move the Gainers out.  The Gainers threatened the parishioners with a gun and baseball bat.  The parishioners then retreated and called the police. When the police arrived, they arrested the parishioners, who now are suing. Dismissing plaintiffs' RLUIPA claim, the court said in part:

Defendants argue ... that their conduct ... has no relation to land use regulations and consequently does not fall within the scope of the statute....  Plaintiffs argue that the actions of the DAO and the CSPD were premised on the Plaintiffs’ failure to secure an eviction proceeding within the land use laws of the City..... Further, Plaintiffs argue that “leasing [the Apartment] (and all actions attendant thereto) were as much a part of its religious actions as a Sunday Service.”...

The Court finds that the Plaintiffs’ allegations do not implicate any land use regulations, as defined by the statute.