Edgewater police officer who berated, threatened suspects resigns from department

EDGEWATER, Colo. — Paul Perez, an Edgewater police officer whose treatment of suspects caused problems for prosecutors in multiple cases, has resigned from the department, 9NEWS Investigates has learned.

Perez submitted a two-sentence resignation letter and did not list a reason for his decision. Edgewater Police Chief Eric Sonstegard could not be reached for comment Tuesday.

A message left with Perez’s attorney was not immediately returned.

Multiple times over the past few years, body camera video captured Perez berating and threatening suspects. In one case, it showed him holding a gun to the back of a man’s head.

“I’m going to blow your f—— brains out if you move, you b—-,” Perez told the man in that incident.

In that case, prosecutors felt compelled to agree to a plea deal. In other instances, prosecutors dropped charges after watching Perez’s body camera video. In one incident, they dismissed the case entirely.

RELATED: For second time, Edgewater officer’s bodycam footage hurts prosecutors in criminal case

Perez had been with Edgewater for more than four years. Prior to that, he served with the Boulder County Sheriff’s Office. He was fired in 2019 for a series of incidents in which a commander found his dealings with suspects problematic.

In a particular, he was faulted for pulling guns on people who didn’t present a threat, for threatening to shoot a suspect and for holding his gun sideways – “gangster style.”

The Edgewater Police Department hired him a few months later.

In the case in which all charges were dropped, Perez confronted a man believed to be the primary aggressor in a bar fight. He wrote in a police report that a man approached him “in a threatening manner.” The officer, in turn, shot the man with a taser then shoved him “to avoid the situation from further escalating.”

The man fell and hit his head on the bar, causing an injury that required medical attention.

The man was originally charged with obstructing police, trespassing and criminal mischief.

Sonstegard previously told 9NEWS that he’d disciplined Perez by requiring additional training in de-escalation, ordering him to see the department’s psychologist and stripping him of his status as a field training officer for a year.

At the same time, Jefferson County District Attorney Alexis King ordered a review of body camera footage in all cases in which Perez was listed as a witness.

King also sent out what’s known as a “3.8 letter” to defense attorneys in all open cases in which Perez was a witness. The letter’s name refers to a section of the Colorado Rules of Professional Conduct for attorneys that requires prosecutors to “make timely disclosure to the defense of all evidence or information known to the prosecutor that tends to negate the guilt of the accused or mitigates the offense.”

Contact Kevin Vaughan with tips about this or any story at kevin.vaughan@9news.com or 303-871-1862.