Murder trial of former Greenwood Village officer starts Tuesday
The trial of a former Greenwood Village Police officer charged with second-degree murder in the November 2021 shooting death of an Aurora teenager begins Tuesday with jury selection today in the 18th Judicial District.
Adam Holen, 38, faces a charge of second-degree murder in the death of Peyton Blitstein, 17 on Thanksgiving Eve 2021.
Holen had resigned from the force just weeks before, prosecutors said.
The night of the attack, Blitstein was in a car with four other teens when witnesses say a truck started following them. The car’s driver, a 16-year-old girl, told her mother that the man driving the truck pulled up beside them in the 4900 block of South Addison Way and complained that they were driving recklessly.
The controversial attack, caught on a neighborhood doorbell camera, showed Holen pull up alongside the car in his truck.
On the doorbell video, someone yelled, “This is not your neighborhood,” and an argument ensued.
The driver, a girl, got out of her car and ran to the steps of her house, calling for her mother. Behind her on the street in front of her home, the doorbell video showed an altercation which quickly got out of hand.
Aurora Police investigators said Holen had taunted the teens from his truck by brandishing a handgun at them from the driver’s seat through the front windshield.
In question is whether Holen cocked his gun before he left the front seat of the truck, Blitstein’s father, Todd, told The Denver Gazette.
The disturbing footage showed the former officer open the door of his truck and run around the back, circling toward where Blitstein and another teen were standing.
According to the arrest affidavit, Blitstein shot first, hitting Holen in the hip. But then Holen allegedly emptied his handgun of bullets and Blitstein fell to the ground, the video footage showed.
The mother of the teen who was driving, Amber Roseborough, told The Denver Gazette at the time that when she opened the front door of her home, “the shots were happening.”
She ran down her front steps and attempted to revive Blitstein as police officers pulled up and ordered Holen to put his hands up, the video showed.
Roseborough called 911, but by the time help arrived, she said, the teen was dead.
The hearings have been tense between the families of Holen and Blitstein. At the pre-trial conference Friday, Blitstein said that Holen pointed a sign at him on which was scrawled a hand-written message “Jesus is King.”
Opening statements could begin as early as Tuesday afternoon in a trial which is scheduled for seven days in Arapahoe County’s Division 408 courtroom.
FILE PHOTO: Peyton Blitstein’s family talks with 18th Judicial District Attorney’s Chief Deputy Christopher Gallo about the upcoming murder trial of his accused killer. Adam Holen has been charged with second-degree murder in the case.
A gazebo at Aurora’s Triangle Park is decorated with photos and a wreath dedicated to 17-year-old Peyton Blitstein, who was shot and killed Nov. 24, 2021.
Adam Holen
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