A Colorado public defender who says she was attacked by her client in the Arapahoe County Detention Center during a one-on-one meeting in which the client was not handcuffed or shackled sued the sheriff’s office Monday over its handling of the incident.
Public defender Anna Schamberg alleged in the lawsuit that Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Office deputies should have handcuffed and shackled her client before allowing him to meet with her in a private room at the jail on June 21, 2023. The deputies were slow to help when she pressed a “panic button” during the alleged attack, the lawsuit alleged.
“The Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Office is vigorously defending itself against these claims and cannot comment further since the litigation is currently pending,” sheriff’s spokeswoman Ginger Delgado said in a statement Tuesday.
The incident two years ago began when Schamberg visited the Arapahoe County Detention Center in Centennial for a meeting with her client, a then-31-year-old man with a lengthy criminal record whom she’d represented for two years.
In prior visits, the man had always been restrained in four-point shackles — that is, his hands were restrained to his waist — but on this visit, deputies did not handcuff or shackle the inmate before he was allowed to go into a room alone with Schamberg.
He became angry during their meeting, Schamberg’s lawsuit alleges. When he picked up a computer and dropped it on the floor, she pressed a panic button in the room that should have summoned deputies for help, according to the lawsuit, but deputies did not intervene.
The client then struck Schamberg in the face twice, according to the lawsuit, and she pressed the button a second time. The client struck her a fourth time, then left the room as deputies neared, according to the lawsuit.
The Denver Post is not identifying the client because he was not charged with a crime in connection with the alleged attack. Delgado said the sheriff’s office did not investigate the incident because deputies did not receive a complaint about it.
The client should have been restrained for the duration of the meeting, Schamberg alleges in the lawsuit, and deputies should have been quicker to respond when she pressed the panic button. The lawsuit noted that public defenders are assigned clients, and do not choose who they represent.
Schamberg could not continue working in the jail after the attack and had to move to a different part of the state as she dealt with post-traumatic stress disorder and anxiety, the lawsuit alleges.
The public defender is seeking both a payout from the sheriff’s office and structural changes to policies and procedures. She’d like to see the jail install panic buttons that emit a noise when triggered, and thinks having such a button might have stopped her client’s actions.
Schamberg could not be reached for comment Tuesday and her attorney did not return a request for comment. A spokesman for the Colorado Office of the State Public Defender did not return a request for comment.
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