District Attorney to retry Andrew Buen after narrow miss on murder charge

Andrew Buen will undergo a new trial.

After a jury deadlocked by one vote on a murder charge against Buen in the 2022 shooting death of Christian Glass, the 5th Judicial District prosecution team requested on Monday to retry him.

Fifth Judicial District Judge Catherine Cheroutes set the trial date for Aug. 12-30 with a motions hearing and pre-trial conference scheduled for Aug. 8.

Buen, a former Clear Creek County Sheriff's Office deputy, is the only of eight officers involved in Glass' death to face trial. Six others from five different jurisdictions have been charged with failure to stop the situation while it was happening and are still going through the court process. 

The fatal shooting, which gained national attention, occurred June 10-11, 2022, on a remote mountain road near Silver Plume just before midnight.

Glass had turned off of I-70 eastbound to avoid cars on the highway which he told the 911 dispatcher he thought were following him. He did a U-turn navigating the dark and got stuck in between two rocks.

He called 911 and Buen was one of the two officers who were first on the scene. The shooting was caught on police body cam video after officers tried in vain to get Glass out of the car and to roll his windows down for more than an hour. Buen broke a side window,  fired six bean bag rounds, tased and then shot Glass five times, killing him. 

Five jurors, including the foreperson, met with The Denver Gazette and its news partner 9News Sunday to speak out about the stalled verdict after the two-week trail and almost 25 hours of deliberation.

They said that they watched the police body-worn camera video of Glass' death five times during deliberations to make sure of their decision and that 11 of the 12 wanted to convict him of second-degree murder. Buen was convicted of reckless endangerment, a misdemeanor. 

Foreperson Kristi Englekirk said that she felt the lone holdout was convinced that Buen had just made a mistake and should not go to jail for Glass' death. Englekirk said that she'd like to see "more pointed" questions during jury selection next time to ensure against choosing "biased" jurors.