Vincent Chácon was a non-violent man booked into the Denver jail for a minor offense. Instead of going home to his friends and family, Mr. Chácon left the Denver jail as a corpse. He was murdered because Denver and Denver Sheriff Department officers placed an extremely violent and dangerous man, high on methamphetamine, into his cell and then ignored his cries for help as that man strangled him to death. Not only were Denver’s actions negligent, they were callous and deliberately indifferent. They violated Mr. Chácon’s constitutional rights.
This week, Vincent’s mother, Angela Hernández, filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the City and County of Denver in the United States District Court for the District of Colorado to hold the City accountable for her son’s death.
Denver classified Vincent as a Level 4, medium-security detainee. He posed a danger to no one. It classified Roybal-Smith as a Level 1, maximum-security inmate, the most dangerous designation in its jail. Denver’s classification system exists to keep dangerous inmates away from vulnerable people in its custody. But, Denver did the opposite and locked the two men in a single cell together.
Denver requires its deputies to check on the people in its custody at least every thirty-five minutes. The night Vincent was killed, Denver’s own records do not reflect a single welfare check on his cell. A man held two cells away heard Vincent crying out for help for over an hour. Still, no one came. Only after Roybal-Smith banged on the cell window after fatally strangling Mr. Chacón did a deputy open the door, and by then Vincent was already dead.
Then, Denver tried to tell Vincent’s family that he had died by choking on an apple, despite the obvious evidence that he had been strangled. But the Denver Office of the Medical Examiner definitively ruled Vincent’s death a homicide caused by asphyxia from external compression of the neck. Put simply, Vincent was strangled to death. Denver later “investigated” itself and concluded that not one of its employees had violated a single policy.
Vincent’s death was not an aberration. Denver recorded three in-custody deaths in 2022, five in 2023, and five more in 2024, and the jail was on pace for nine in 2025. For more than a decade, Denver’s own auditor and independent monitor have warned that its jail is dangerous and that its deputies fail to protect the people in their care.
“Something is profoundly wrong when a night in the Denver jail becomes a death sentence,” said Mari Newman of Newman | McNulty. “Over and over again, we have had to sue Denver for its deliberate indifference to the safety of the people in its custody. It has been almost two decades since Denver Sheriffs ignored Emily Rice as she cried out in pain all night long, bleeding to death alone in her cell, but nothing has changed. Vincent Chacón was being held on $750 warrant for a non-violent offense. Instead of allowing him to work through the system and then go home to his friends and family, Denver locked him in a cell with a man it knew to be a dangerous, maximum-risk, repeat offender, high on methamphetamine. For over an hour, Denver sheriffs ignored Vincent’s cries for help as he was strangled to death by the man they had locked in his cell. Then, when Vincent was dead, Denver did what it always does: it circled the wagons, blamed the victim, and cleared itself of any wrongdoing. We demand accountability.”
“Vincent cried out for help for nearly an hour, and no one came,” said Andy McNulty of Newman | McNulty. “This is not the first time Denver has let someone die in its jail, and unless something changes, it will not be the last. Denver has been warned again and again, by the courts, by its own auditor, and by its own independent monitor, that its jail is broken. Its response has been to cut oversight and protect the deputies instead of the people in its custody. Being locked in the Denver jail should not be a death sentence. We intend to make Denver answer for what it did to Vincent.”
The lawsuit, Estate of Vincent Chacón, et al. v. City and County of Denver, et al. was filed late last night in the United States District Court for the District of Colorado. It brings claims for deliberate indifference in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and Article II of the Colorado Constitution, along with claims for negligence. Angela Hernández brings the case individually and on behalf of the Estate of her son.
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