Colorado’s second-highest court earlier this month overturned a string of organized crime and money laundering convictions out of Jefferson County due to prosecutors’ failure to present sufficient evidence proving the crimes.

A three-judge panel for the Court of Appeals applied recent Colorado Supreme Court precedent to conclude a criminal “enterprise” must have its own structure and not merely be a group of people who commit crimes together. Because Jacob Benjamin Woodyard’s jury did not address that distinction at the time of his trial, the panel ordered a redo under the new standard.

At the same time, applying a different Supreme Court case handed down since Woodyard’s trial, the panel determined law enforcement’s use of a pole-mounted camera to surveil Woodyard’s street for 49 days without a warrant did not violate his right to be free from unreasonable searches.

“Woodyard didn’t have a subjective expectation of privacy in the area surveilled. That area included a public street, a public sidewalk, and a small sliver of grass,” wrote Judge Jerry N. Jones in the Sept. 14 opinion. “Woodyard cites no authority holding that a person has a reasonable expectation of privacy in a public street or sidewalk.”

Woodyard is serving a 96-year prison sentence after jurors convicted him of violating the Colorado Organized Crime Control Act, distributing controlled substances, money laundering and drug possession. Law enforcement used wire taps and the pole camera on Woodyard’s cul-de-sac to show Woodyard’s participation in a drug distribution scheme, allegedly in connection with White supremacist prison gangs.

Two Supreme Court cases decided after Woodyard’s trial called into question the prosecution’s evidence. In September 2021, the justices ruled that Colorado Springs police’s use of a pole-mounted camera to continuously monitor a suspect’s home for three months without a warrant was unconstitutional.

The same day, the court also determined Colorado’s organized crime law requires proof that a criminal enterprise has a structure and an ongoing organization separate from the crimes themselves.

Despite Woodyard’s attempt to liken the pole camera in his neighborhood to the surveillance the Supreme Court found unconstitutional, the Court of Appeals’ panel was not convinced.

“I looked at the video,” said Judge Stephanie Dunn at oral arguments. “I did not see the house or the front door or anything of defendant’s.”

“It’s reasonable for him to expect there’s not gonna be cameras up in there to see who’s going out” of the neighborhood, insisted defense attorney Eric A. Samler.

The panel ultimately agreed that the camera, which did not depict Woodyard’s unit and instead monitored the public street and sidewalk leading up to his complex, did not invade his privacy. Therefore, police did not unlawfully “search” his home.

The organized crime convictions met a different fate. Although the evidence presented at trial satisfied Colorado law at the time, the Supreme Court’s latest interpretation meant Woodyard’s jury needed to evaluate whether his alleged drug distribution “enterprise” had the kind of structure and organization the court has deemed necessary.

Instead, the jurors did not even receive a definition of what an enterprise was.

“We agree with Woodyard that there was little or no evidence,” wrote Jones, “apart from the pattern of racketeering activity itself.”

The panel ordered a new trial for the organized crime charges.

Finally, the Court of Appeals addressed whether to overturn Woodyard’s convictions for money laundering. To be guilty under Colorado law, a person must “transmit” or “transfer” money in the commission of a crime. The vast majority of Woodyard’s charges, in contrast, showed that he received money in exchange for drugs, not that he transferred money.

The government attempted to downplay the literal meaning of “transfer.”

“This definition covers individuals, like Woodyard, who orchestrate transactions, generally through others, regardless of their role as supplier or recipient,” wrote Assistant Attorney General Frank R. Lawson.

As a matter of “basic grammar,” the panel responded, that was not true.

“In other words, it isn’t enough that the person charged was involved in a transfer,” explained Jones, “the person charged must have done the transferring.”

Because prosecutors failed to prove Woodyard was the one who transferred money illegally, it overturned eight of his money laundering convictions. Unlike the organized crime charges, the prosecution may not try him again.