The Arizona man who caused millions in damage to the Colorado Supreme Court building last year was sentenced Friday to eight years in prison.
Brandon Olsen shot out one of the Ralph L. Carr Colorado Judicial Center’s first-floor windows and broke in shortly after 1 a.m. on Jan. 2, 2024. He was fleeing from a car crash at 13th Avenue and Lincoln Street, Denver police said.
Olsen, who had driven from Arizona to Denver after taking fentanyl pills and smoking multiple bowls of meth, believed he was being chased by either a cartel or smoke monsters, Deputy District Attorney Heather Olin said during Friday’s sentencing hearing.
Once inside, the man stole keys from a security guard at gunpoint, Olin said. Olsen then lit three fires on the seventh floor and fired his gun several times inside and through windows, causing an estimated $35 million in damage to the Denver building.
“This was a traumatic event for many, and is still very much ongoing,” Olin said Friday. “…This is a crime of the utmost seriousness due to the location it occurred, the amount of people that were affected, and the extremely large financial loss suffered that will ultimately be borne by the taxpayers.”
Olsen’s defense attorney, Kathy Sinnott, said the incident was “the result of a profound psychiatric break.”
“He experienced a full-blown psychotic episode in which he genuinely believed he was being pursued by evil forces,” Sinnott said.
Olsen believed the fires would “illuminate the spirits” and that the building was “harboring those forces,” Sinnott said. When he reached the roof and saw law enforcement surrounding the building, he peacefully turned himself in, she added.
The building’s sprinklers extinguished the flames, but caused significant water damage to the courthouse. After nearly 10 months of repairs and cleaning, the Colorado Supreme Court building partially reopened in October.
“This should not have happened,” Olsen said before the court on Friday. “I wish I would have found the sober community and embraced it a long time ago and mitigated some of these things.”
Olsen took a deal and pleaded guilty in July to one count of arson, a felony, court records show. The plea deal dropped four other charges from his case, including criminal mischief, aggravated robbery, a second count of felony arson and a weapons charge.
Throughout the judicial process, Olsen pursued sobriety, Sinnott said. He enrolled in the jail’s medically assisted treatment program and joined a sober living program in Aurora after posting bail in 2024. He then continued in outpatient services and therapy through Denver Health.
“This case is a dramatic example of the terrible damage done to our community by illegal drug use,” Denver District Attorney John Walsh said in a video posted by his office. “At the time of this incident, Olsen was heavily addicted to and using both fentanyl and methamphetamines. Those addictions led to his actions, which included threatening two people’s lives, causing tens of millions of dollars in damage to the Colorado Supreme Court building and severely disrupting the work of many Colorado government agencies, a disruption that continues to this day.”
Denver District Court Judge Jay Grant sentenced Olsen to eight years in prison, the minimum sentence stipulated by the plea agreement. He could have sentenced Olsen to up to 14 years.
“What you did on Jan. 2 was terrifying and profoundly damaging,” Grant said. “The sentence is a consequence of those actions … but this sentence does not define you as a person.”
“Mr. Olson, you cannot undo what happened at the Ralph Carr Judicial Center, but you can choose to live the rest of your life in a way that makes amends by staying sober, by continuing the hard internal work you’ve started and by using your experience to reach people who are where you once were,” Grant continued.
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