Azhaunte Forrest is taking the Denver Police Department to federal court, claiming officers trampled his constitutional rights during a traffic stop on Colfax Avenue that a judge later tossed out entirely. After that ruling wiped out the criminal case, Forrest's attorney says his client was left with months spent in jail, no job, and no apartment. The new civil-rights lawsuit now asks a Denver jury to hold the department accountable and award unspecified restitution.
According to Denver7, court records show Denver Police Officers Emmett Hurd and Matthew Mullen pulled Forrest over on May 13, 2025, on Colfax for alleged stop-sign violations and a bad brake light. The officers searched his car and found what prosecutors described as an illegal weapon. Because Forrest is a convicted felon, he was criminally charged. Denver7 reports that the civil complaint challenging the stop was filed Monday.
Denver7 also reports that U.S. District Judge Nina Wang ruled on Jan. 20 that the officers lacked a lawful basis to stop Forrest in the first place and ordered all evidence and statements from the encounter excluded. Prosecutors then dropped the case. In her ruling, Wang wrote that the record undercut the officers' story. She noted there were no stop signs along the route they described and that body-worn camera footage "unequivocally depicts a bright red light" on the back of Forrest's car, undermining the claim of a defective brake light. Forrest's lawyer, David Lane, told the outlet that his client lost months of freedom, steady work, and housing, and that the lawsuit is about "accountability" rather than a dollar figure. Lane also said he believes the traffic stop was racially motivated.
How suppression and a civil claim fit together
When a court suppresses evidence under the Fourth Amendment, that ruling can gut a criminal case because illegally obtained evidence generally cannot be used at trial, a principle often called the exclusionary rule. The Legal Information Institute explains how suppression hearings work and why improperly seized evidence can be barred from court. A separate federal law, 42 U.S.C. § 1983, allows people to sue state and local officials for constitutional violations. That statute creates a civil path to damages or equitable relief when government actors, including police, use their authority to deprive someone of constitutional rights. The Legal Information Institute notes that § 1983 is the standard tool for those kinds of claims.
Policy context: discipline, oversight and low-level stops
The lawsuit lands in the middle of a broader fight over how Denver Police handle low-level violations. Recent city reporting from the Denver Gazette and Denverite has detailed the department's move to an Education-Based Development model that leans on training instead of traditional punishment for some lower-level officer misconduct. The shift has drawn fire from the city's independent monitor, who argues it dials down real accountability. Hoodline has also covered the push and the watchdog objections as oversight officials have pressed for more details about how the program actually works in practice. The Denver Gazette reporting describes the monitor saying her office is not getting the materials it needs to fully assess the new system.
Local court records add another layer of background on Forrest. Listings show he faced state-level proceedings last year in Adams County, helping to pin down the series of arrests and hearings that led up to the federal suppression ruling. The Colorado Judicial Branch's mid-2025 docket entries include a Forrest case on the calendar and related appearances. Colorado Judicial Branch records reflect that mid-2025 activity.
From here, the case moves into the slow, paperwork-heavy phase. The civil complaint will go through responses, discovery, and pretrial motions before any trial or settlement talks. Because civil-rights cases often take months or years, Forrest's lawsuit could trigger document discovery on department practices and sworn depositions of the officers involved, potentially surfacing the internal records and policies critics have been asking to see.
We will keep an eye on new court filings and oversight reactions as the lawsuit plays out alongside the city's debate over Education-Based Development and police accountability.
