DENVER—An ethics complaint accusing a special prosecutor of grandstanding and of releasing unnecessary and salacious details in a case involving a Denver city attorney who killed himself has been dismissed.
The Colorado Supreme Court Office of Attorney Regulation Counsel said Tuesday it dismissed the complaint against Jefferson County District Attorney Scott Storey.
Storey had been prosecuting former judge and Denver City Attorney Lawrence Manzanares, who was accused of stealing a computer. Manzanares had said he bought the computer from a man in a parking lot and didn’t know it was stolen.
Manzanares shot himself June 22, hours after appearing in court to formally hear charges against him.
Manzanares’ friends had questioned prosecutors’ decision to hold a news conference publicly accusing him. They also questioned the need to mention in an arrest warrant affidavit that investigators found 2,080 images on the computer that were “sexually graphic, sexually overt, or were titled in a sexually explicit manner.”
Assistant Regulation Counsel Louise Culberson-Smith said there was not enough evidence to support disciplinary charges against Storey.
“Mr. Storey’s press conference statements and the arrest warrant affidavit itself made very brief reference to sexually explicit material that was allegedly found on and deleted from the laptop Mr. Manzanares was accused of stealing,” she wrote.
She said the information in the affidavit was needed to establish probable cause for the charges filed.
