Opinion ID: 6337521
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Lyall Litigation and Settlement

Text: Encampments of people experiencing homelessness have proliferated throughout Denver. In response, Denver banned unauthorized camping on public or private property. See Denver, Colo., Code § 38-86.2. The Denver Defendants enforce the camping ban in the following ways. The Denver Department of Public Health and Environment (“DDPHE”) can issue an “area restriction,” which “temporarily restricts activities that could occur in a specified area” to allow officials to remediate public health hazards. App. Vol. X at 2270. The Department of Transportation and Infrastructure (“DOTI”) assists DDPHE in “cleaning locations that are subject to . . . area restrictions.” App. Vol. IV at 807. DOTI can also independently conduct large-scale “encumbrance removals,” where it clears and cleans an area “to make sure that the public right-of-way is accessible to all Denver residents.” App. Vol. X at 2110. These activities are colloquially known as homeless sweeps.3 In 2016, people affected by these sweeps filed a class action against Denver and certain city officials in the United States District Court for the District of Colorado. See Lyall v. City of Denver, 319 F.R.D. 558, 562 n.2 (D. Colo. 2017). The Lyall plaintiffs 3 The Denver Defendants object to the term “sweeps,” believing it has a “negative connotation” and “elides the distinction between area restrictions ordered by DDPHE with large-scale encumbrance cleanups conducted by DOTI.” Aplt. Br. at 8 n.6. However, this is the term used by the district court and by most witnesses in the record. We are mindful of the distinction between area restrictions and large-scale encumbrance removals and treat them as distinct activities when appropriate. 5 Appellate Case: 21-1025 Document: 010110679283 Date Filed: 05/03/2022 Page: 6 alleged, inter alia, that Denver’s “policies, practices and conduct violate [p]laintiffs’ right to due process of law under the Fourteenth Amendment.” Lyall Amended Complaint at 33, Lyall, 319 F.R.D. 558 (No. 1:16-cv-2155), ECF No. 54. The Lyall Amended Complaint specifically claimed the sweeps “are conducted without notice or with inadequate notice and in a manner that prevents [p]laintiffs and [p]laintiff [c]lass from retrieving their property.” Id. at 7. The Lyall Amended Complaint then described sweeps from October 2015, December 2015, March 2016, July 2016, and August 2016, in which Denver allegedly violated the Lyall plaintiffs’ procedural due process rights. For example, in October 2015, Denver Police and Public Works staff swept an encampment located in a park. The Lyall plaintiffs alleged the defendants “seized and destroyed personal property belonging to [the plaintiffs] without providing notice or the required procedural safeguards as to how this property could be retrieved.” Id. at 20. Property, including “military records, identification, blankets, clothing and a wheelchair,” was “taken and indiscriminately thrown into Denver Public Works’ dump trucks.” Id. Importantly, the Lyall Amended Complaint stressed Denver’s sweeps amounted to a coherent and multi-year “policy and custom of raiding areas where homeless people are trying to survive and intentionally taking and destroying their property.” Id. at 6; see also id. at 19 (“Defendant’s taking and destruction of property was foreseeable as [d]efendants had performed it on numerous prior occasions. The sweeps had become a custom of the City of Denver.”). 6 Appellate Case: 21-1025 Document: 010110679283 Date Filed: 05/03/2022 Page: 7 The parties in Lyall settled in February 2019, shortly before trial. The district court then entered a Final Judgment stating, “this civil action and Complaint are dismissed as settled and the case will be closed.” Lyall Final Judgment at 1, Lyall, 319 F.R.D. 558 (No. 1:16-cv-2155), ECF No. 226. The Lyall settlement agreement sets forth detailed protocols for Denver’s future enforcement of the camping ban and releases a broad range of city parties from present and future liabilities. The agreement’s relevant provisions are discussed infra.