CLASH ONLY — No end to Aurora council skirmishes over Kilyn Lewis shooting

AURORA | A 10-month very public battle between Aurora city lawmakers and supporters of a Black man fatally shot by police during his arrest has devolved into personal attacks, a list of demands and frustration over regular hijinks affecting public access to political leaders.

 “It is just continuing to be dysfunctional, and dysfunction is not going to move Aurora forward,”  said Stephen Elkins, who said he has regularly attended city council meetings for months, until recently. Elkins is currently running for city council, he says in part because of this controversy. 

Last week, as they have for every city council meeting since June, family members, friends and supporters of Kilyn Lewis commandeered a portion of the city council meeting set aside for the public to address the dais on whatever topic they want. Members of what has become an entourage of activists then interrupted agenda items, pretending to speak to a matter under discussion as a ruse to circle back to Lewis’ death and related issues.

Lewis was fatally shot by Aurora SWAT officer Michael Dieck May 23, 2024 while police were attempting to arrest Lewis in an Aurora apartment parking lot. The arrest was linked to a Denver shooting of a homeless man, prompting charges of attempted murder against Lewis. Dieck shot Lewis as he was raising his hands over his head as SWAT officers were yelling at him, with a mobile phone in his right hand. During an investigation, Dieck said he thought the phone was a firearm.

Since then, friends, family members and activists have protested during, before and after Aurora city council meetings, sometimes shutting them down and spending hours speaking to or in front of the city council.

City lawmakers have increasingly restricted how the public addresses the city council without specifically targeting the Lewis coalition of about a dozen regular participants, including Auon’tai Anderson, a former Denver Public School board member. Anderson has been associated with a variety of controversial issues across the metro area for several years.

The two sides have competed in a game of cat-and-mouse contest for months, with city lawmakers trying to prevent the group from overtaking meetings, and the Lewis coalition making regular demands for attention and action.

The group began in June with demanding Dieck’s firing for what they say was the wrongful and racist shooting by the veteran Aurora cop. Each bi-weekly city council meeting, even when they’re held virtually and remotely, features demands and protests from the group.

City lawmakers have sometimes grumped and complained about the regular protests, but for the most part, it’s the Lewis coalition that does the talking.

Months after the shooting, the former Arapahoe County district attorney and a grand jury declined to seek criminal charges against Dieck, saying his actions were not outside the law. Weeks after that, Aurora’s new police Chief Todd Chamberlain said an internal investigation revealed Dieck broke no APD policies during the arrest and shooting, and that he would not pursue discipline in the case.

Since then, the Lewis coalition has made regular demands for a host of issues, but as of yet, family members have not filed a lawsuit against Dieck and the city for wrongful death. 

A new dust-up among city lawmakers and Lewis’ family supporters last week seemed to push the ongoing battle into a crisis, but it’s a quandary with few ways out, or forward, according to city officials and experts.

The phenomenon of recurring local government protest spectacles isn’t new, and it’s not limited to Aurora. “Meeting takeovers” have afflicted school boards, city councils and other local governments in Denver, across the state and across the nation. 

Aurora and Denver have both taken measures to restrict public commenting during meetings because of people “taking over the meeting.” Aurora got rid of the ability to call in for public comment, and more recently, took its “public invited to be heard” segment off the agenda. A new format precludes city staff, and it allows council members to attend virtually. The city also stopped broadcasting and recording it, as they do the rest of every city council meeting. And city lawmakers shortened the time for public comment to 40 minutes, allowing only two minutes per speaker. 

Much of this mirrors changes made by Denver, which has its public comment during a 30-minute “recess” between sessions, Robert Austin, the Denver City Council spokesperson, said. Denver does record their public comment and allows three minutes per speaker. But their general-public comment segment also is not part of the formal agenda. 

Possible changes

In Aurora, as in almost all other local governments, “public invited to be heard,” comment — or whatever a municipality wants to call that time where members of the public can talk about whatever they want to the city council — is not a legal requirement. 

“There is no requirement for governmental bodies across the U.S. to have a public comment period at government meetings,” Aurora city officials said. 

There are, however, a wide range of rules that can be applied for decorum, such as not calling out specific council members and refraining from obscenities. Aurora has those rules, and they’re regularly violated and overlooked during long, heated discourse that escalates above muted mikes, beeping alarms and banged gavels. 

Some city lawmakers say they’re ready for the nuclear option, ending the ability for the public to address the city council on whatever they like. City Attorney Pete Schulte, however, said the majority of city council does not want to eliminate Aurora’s “public invited to be heard.”

Even though the Lewis coalition has overrun or out-smarted every restriction made so far, a new impediment from Denver’s rule book that Schulte and Councilmember Danielle Jurinsky have mentioned is an enhanced “priority rule.” 

“Speakers shall be recognized to speak in the order of registration by priority level,” Denver City Council rules state. Priority speakers are city residents and those who have not addressed the council in 90 days.

In recent weeks, however, many residents outside of the Lewis coalition have stopped coming to council meetings, so it’s unclear whether prioritization would have any effect on who gets to speak. And it does not address other behaviors the group regularly uses, like shouting or chanting from the audience.

Elkins, a regular attendee, said he stopped showing up because he would get heckled by the protestors or have multiple people in the group cough loudly over him while he spoke, even though he was not saying anything in conflict with the group.

Just turning off the public comment period isn’t enough, however. While these sessions are not legally required, public hearings on some ordinances and other city agenda items are required, said Schulte. The commenting time can be cut down, and there is no state rule that sets a minimum. Aurora charter also has no minimum time requirement, Schulte said. Currently, Aurora rules allow 3 minutes maximum, but they can be reduced by the mayor during a meeting if there are multiple speakers. 

“It has to be enough time for the person to speak on the subject matter of the public hearing,” Schulte said. 

During Monday’s meeting, comments during public hearings and agenda items were infiltrated by three of the Lewis coalition, who offered their regular comments about Kilyn, sometimes couched in zoning or other pretense. The stunt extended the time of the meeting and visibly frustrated council members and city staff.

This was after a larger group of Lewis’s family members and other protesters walked to the lectern on the floor of the city council chambers and had Lewis’s mother, LaRonda Jones, speak for the majority of “public invited to be heard,” rather than her allotted 2 minutes.

“We will not be moved or removed,” Lewis’s mother, LaRonda Jones, said Monday.

Jones, who lives in Georgia, demanded more accountability from the city council and said she wants them to take concrete action in her son’s case. 

“You have highly disrespected my family as well as myself,” Jones said. “No compassion shown at all, none.”

Defining “accountability” for the larger issue of police reform and requests regarding the case of Lewis’ shooting have not been well defined after all these months.

The group is regularly critical of the Aurora Police Department, which was forced into a consent decree to enact a wide range of police reforms over five years. The decree was imposed almost two years before Lewis’ fatal shooting after the Colorado Attorney General found “patterns and practices” of APD using excessive force, especially against people of color. The most infamous of deaths APD is accused of wrongdoing involved that of Elijah McClain. McClain was arrested in 2019 while walking home from a convenience store unarmed, accosted by Aurora police and then overdosed with ketamine during his subduction. 

The Lewis group regularly makes public demands for “justice” for Kilyn and other people of color they say are victims of Aurora Police.

MiDian Holmes, spokesperson for the group, said that justice for Lewis begins with city council being more visibly accountable for pursuing results from the consent decree reforms.

As for conversations from the dais or after meetings, members of city council have previously said that because Lewis’s family members have hired a lawyer and hinted at a lawsuit, city lawmakers are not allowed to call and talk to the family. City council members have regularly pointed out they have no authority to reopen the case or fire Dieck. Beyond that, they say they don’t know what else the group wants from them.

“If you’re tired of hearing about my son’s name, you will continue to hear Kilyn Lewis’ name until we get justice,” Jones said. “ No justice, no peace.”

When the three protestors, Holmes and Lewis’s brother, Kiawa Lewis, and Anderson, infiltrated the public hearings last Monday, it was not in protest of meeting changes but in demand of city council pushing for the larger issue of police reform, Holmes said. 

“They don’t have any business until they’re in the business of justice,” Holmes said.

In the last meeting, March 10, Mayor Mike Coffman threatened to move city council meetings to virtual status again if the disruptions continue. Later, in a social media post, Councilmember Danielle Jurinsky again warned that virtual meetings are still an option.

City Council members would need to have a majority vote to make that happen, unless there is a security threat, and city officials will not disclose what constitutes one. They can go to virtual mode for three to eight meetings, but the Aurora charter would require them to meet at City Hall twice a month, Schulte said.

A list of demands

Faced with the regular question of “what do they want?” the group’s spokesperson offered a list to the Sentinel.

Much of the demands focus on police reform and restructuring the police department, especially creating truly independent oversight boards or mechanisms. Much of their request is already spelled out in the consent decree with Aurora police. Other demands have long been under discussion with a variety of civil rights groups. 

“They need to, as a council, ensure that they are leveraging their leadership and their platform to make sure that these oversight community members and these oversight boards are, in fact, feasible, instructive, and they have a binding responsibility back to the community,” Holmes said.

What the group is demanding

• Provide answers to open questions from the consent decree progress report, specifically regarding Kylan’s shooting, which was referenced as a tier-three issue.

• Sponsor an immediate review of all officers, identifying those with histories of excessive force to ensure transparency about officers with problematic records. They want these police personnel records and a report made public.

• Establish a permanent, independent civilian review board with full authority to monitor, investigate, and make binding recommendations for officer-involved shootings. Current review panels are considered performative and ineffective.

The NAACP is in the process of working to establish a civilian review board, and Mayor Mike Coffman told the Sentinel he is working closely with Omar Mongomery, NAACP president, to make that happen.

“If impossible leadership is not something that you are courageous enough to do, then step aside,” Holmes said during Monday’s meeting. “It really is truly about making sure that this doesn’t happen to someone else.”

Beyond frustration

City staff, police, lawmakers and spectators say the bi-weekly melodrama is exhausting.

“It’s just this unfortunate stalemate, and what’s happening is you’re seeing both signs because they’re tired, frustrated, angry, or all of the above, and that’s when the personal attacks and accusations start, and it’s not moving the needle for anything that anyone wants to do,” Elkins said. 

Whether it’s council members making rude comments about Lewis — Denver and Aurora police have repeatedly pointed out Lewis had a criminal record and faced charges of attempted murder in the May 2024 Denver shooting —  or protesters going to the lecterns to launch profanity-laden scoldings, the situation continues to worsen, now, even after the meetings.

The Lewis group was especially critical of Jurisky during the meeting last week, calling her a “ring leader” and announcing that they’ll work to oppose her re-election bid this fall.

Jurinsky said the protest group has lied about her, saying she was “sick of hearing about Kilyn Lewis” during a city council meeting Feb. 10. 

Jones accused Jurinsky of saying she was sick of hearing about Lewis during that meeting, according to a meeting recording. Jurinsky said that the group protesting at every meeting was getting out of control, and it was making it so that Aurora residents couldn’t speak about other concerns.

Holmes told the Sentinel that this was compounded by Jones watching other news reports where Jurinsky said she wanted to hear other residents’ concerns, and Jones interpreted it as her implying Lewis’s death was not as genuine or important as Aurora residents. 

In Jurinsky’s post on X, she said that the group “raised a call to boycott her business,” after one person in the group yelled at one point that people should stop going to her Aurora bar business. This was not a group demand and happened during the unrecorded “public invited to be heard.” 

She also said in the post that the group told her father, “don’t die.” Anderson told the Sentinel that he did say that to a man who was coughing in the council chamber audience while he was speaking. Anderson said he did not know it was Jurinsky’s father. 

In the post, Jurinsky also said that one of the people told her, “They know some people who want to do some things to me because I’m cute.” 

Kilyn’s brother, Kiawa, said, “I know a couple people that like you. I know a couple people that’d like to do some things to you, too. I’m just saying, they think you’re cute. They think you have a business. They think you have it all down, but honestly, you’re a wolf in sheep’s clothing.”

Kiawa told the Sentinel his meaning was taken out of context, and he never meant a threat in what he said.

“To be clear, my comment was never about anything personal; it was about the political reality,” he said in a text. “When I used the term ‘cute,’ I was referring to the way the councilwoman presents herself as innocent or adorably unassuming; it had nothing to do with looks or attraction. The phrase ‘what they want to do to her’ speaks directly to the active efforts to push her off the board.”

Kiawa said his concerns about the city council go beyond his regular comments and that he genuinely prays for city council members regularly during meetings.

“It’s important to recognize that I have consistently approached this council with grace and integrity, even in the face of deep personal loss,” he said in the text. “Any attempt to twist my comment into something inappropriate is a distraction from the real issue, the political pressure and the ongoing efforts to silence voices and remove individuals who challenge the status quo.” 

About a month ago, Anderson and Coffman got into a verbal row in council chambers when Coffman addressed Anderson about a student who committed suicide in a Denver Public School while Anderson was the school board president. Anderson had lobbied to remove School Resource Officers for harassment of students of color, and Coffman blamed Anderson for the removal of the officers who could have stopped the student with the gun. 

Schulte also posted on X, accusing the group of looking for a payout, and that their statements during the meeting prove it. Different members of the groups have said that this is not about money at all. During the meeting, Holmes said she was telling city staff that they should make room in the budget for Lewis’s family, and if not them, then the next family they will need to pay out.

“Yes, every officer-involved shooting resulting in death is a tragedy,” Schulte said in the post. “I made it clear that in the Lewis case, the officer acted lawfully, and my office will defend the actions of the Aurora Police Department. Gone are the days when the City will default to writing a check to those who just simply ‘claim’ misconduct.”

Holmes said that the protests at the meetings have never been about money, which was separate from whether the family would pursue a lawsuit.

Aurora has paid tens of millions of dollars in wrongful death settlements to families of those fatally shot or injured by Aurora police. At $15 million, the Elijah McClain wrongful death settlement was one of the largest in state history.

“In our system, in our society, in this country, money is a metric of justice,” Holmes said. “And why wouldn’t they be afforded the opportunity to seek every single legal remedy that they have access to, and shame on anyone who smiles at that or sees that as problematic. We have to make sure that we’re focused on the right part of the problem. The problem is that Kilyn is dead. He should be alive.”

Holmes said the protests are solely about them wanting more transparency and change to prevent these issues from happening to other families in the future. 

Neither side of the battle, however, have indicated they’ll blink first, or what they’ll do next to get the upper hand.