The forced medication of a man charged with killing three and wounding nine in a mass shooting at a Colorado Springs Planned Parenthood remains in legal limbo, giving the defense a chance to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Earlier this month, the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals granted Robert Dear’s team of public defenders a 90-day hold on an order requiring him to take psychiatric medication so he can participate in his defense.
If the U.S. Supreme Court receives a request to accept the case, the filing states the forced medication of Dear remains on hold until the high court decides whether to take up the case and if they do, it would remain on hold until they decide whether Dear can be forcibly medicated.
John Suthers — former Colorado U.S. Attorney, state attorney general and mayor of Colorado Springs — told CPR News “very few” such petitions end up being accepted by the Supreme Court. Suthers said this so-called interlocutory appeal is the defense’s attempt to create a case within a case regarding Dear since it questions the legality of requiring him to take psychiatric medication.
Still, it must be resolved before a court can determine whether Dear is competent to finally stand trial in the nearly nine-year-old case.
“In many cases, you can’t appeal a case until there’s a conviction, and then the question is whether the conviction is reversed as a result of the appeal,” said Suthers. “But, there’s certain types of cases where it really doesn’t make sense to do that because in many ways the motion is determinative of the outcome.”
Dear has repeatedly insisted on representing himself at trial, yet has been found mentally incompetent to do so after a delusional disorder diagnosis. In September 2022, Federal Judge Robert E. Blackburn ruled Dear could be forcibly medicated after prison psychologists testified the drugs could make it possible for him to understand the charges against him. An appeals court upheld that decision this June.
The man convicted of killing 10 people at a Boulder grocery store was also forcibly medicated ahead of — and during — his trial in Boulder in September. He stayed at the Colorado Mental Health Institute in Pueblo because he initially was deemed incompetent to proceed for almost three years, but is now heading to prison.
