Few accusations reshape a life as quickly as a sex offense allegation, and many people in Lakewood learn an investigation exists only when detectives arrive with a warrant for a phone or laptop. The state can spend months building the file before anyone tells you it is open, and by then the record of what you said, sent, or handed over is already fixed.
Shazam Kianpour & Associates has defended sex offense allegations in Colorado courtrooms for over two decades, including cases that began as online messages and cases that turn on a single disputed account. Mr. Kianpour graduated with honors and was top of his class in criminal law. A criminal defense lawyer in Lakewood brought in during the investigation stage can control what reaches the district attorney and begin testing the evidence before any charge is filed.
Colorado groups these offenses under Title 18 of the criminal code, and they run from misdemeanors to felonies carrying consequences for the rest of your life. Sexual assault falls under C.R.S. 18-3-402 and unlawful sexual contact under C.R.S. 18-3-404, either of which can be charged as a misdemeanor or a felony depending on the alleged circumstances. Internet-based allegations have their own statutes, including internet luring of a child under C.R.S. 18-3-306 and internet sexual exploitation of a child under C.R.S. 18-3-405.4. Failure to register as a sex offender is charged separately under C.R.S. 18-3-412.5.
Many felony sex offenses fall under the Colorado Sex Offender Lifetime Supervision Act, which requires an indeterminate prison sentence with a fixed minimum and a maximum that can reach life. Registration is a separate consequence from the sentence, and certain convictions can never be sealed from your record. Allegations involving a minor sit at the most serious end of that range and are prosecuted aggressively.
Lakewood has no courthouse of its own for state criminal matters. These charges are filed in the Jefferson County Combined Court in Golden and prosecuted by the First Judicial District Attorney’s Office. The Lakewood Police Department typically opens the local investigation, though internet-based cases frequently involve a multi-agency task force and can draw federal interest depending on where the data and the parties were located.
That multi-agency posture matters, because it changes both the volume of evidence and the number of hands the evidence passes through before trial. Allegations arising inside a household are also common, and a case that opens as a domestic violence charge can widen into a sex offense investigation with very little warning.
Most internet-based allegations rest on data rather than eyewitnesses, and that cuts in both directions. Investigators build the case from chat logs, account records, IP address assignments, and forensic images of seized devices, and every one of those links has to be proven rather than assumed. Our attorneys treat the digital chain as the primary battleground.
Some of the issues we examine in a Lakewood sex crime case include:
Motive and context matter as well. These allegations sometimes surface during custody disputes, breakups, or after a report made under pressure, and the timeline around a first disclosure can be as important as the disclosure itself. Because the consequences here are permanent, the goal is usually to attack the charge at its weakest link rather than accept the first offer the state puts on the table.
These are the cases where the identity of your attorney matters most, and our firm is built to handle them without passing your file around. Mr. Kianpour, Eric Chenoweth, and the rest of the team have worked together for more than a decade, review each other’s work, and treat every case as a shared responsibility rather than one lawyer’s assignment.
Mr. Kianpour began his career as a government state defender, so he knows how these files get assembled before a defendant ever sees them. He has tried a wide variety of traffic, misdemeanor, and felony matters, including sex assault cases, and has developed an extensive network of relationships within the Colorado criminal justice system. He is a member of the Colorado Bar Association, the Denver Bar Association, the American Association for Justice, and the Colorado Criminal Defense Bar. The attorneys who would handle your case are the ones you meet at the outset.
Our office sits in Denver, roughly 15 minutes from Lakewood via I-70 West, and we appear in Jefferson County courts regularly. Discretion is part of the job in these matters, and we handle them with that in mind from the first phone call forward.
Not without a lawyer present. Detectives investigating these allegations frequently make contact before any charge is filed, and the interview is itself evidence collection. You are entitled to decline and to have counsel involved. Declining to speak is not an admission of anything, and the pre-charge window is often where a case is most winnable.
Not automatically. The prosecutor decides whether to proceed, and the state may continue on digital records, forensic evidence, or third-party statements even after a recantation. A recantation is still significant and can change the trajectory of a case considerably, particularly when the timeline around the original report has problems.
Registration under C.R.S. 16-22 applies to most sex offense convictions in Colorado and operates separately from any prison or probation sentence. Some offenses require lifetime registration, while others allow a petition for removal after a set period. Because registration is often the consequence clients care about most, it should be evaluated before any plea is considered.
Under the Colorado Sex Offender Lifetime Supervision Act, many felony sex offenses carry a sentence with a fixed minimum and a maximum that can extend to life. Release depends on completing treatment and satisfying the parole board rather than serving a set number of years. That structure is why the specific charge the state files, and whether it can be reduced, matters so much.
Criminal charges do not wait for convenient timing, and a sex offense investigation moves whether or not you are participating in it. The decisions made in the first days after contact from law enforcement can determine what evidence exists, what statements are on the record, and how much room your attorney has to work with later.
At Shazam Kianpour & Associates, P.C., we treat these matters as urgent and confidential from the outset. Our 22+ years in Colorado criminal law, a dual prosecution and defense background, and more than 10,000 cases handled set us apart from larger firms where you may never speak directly with your attorney. Reach out through our contact form to schedule your consultation, and we will begin evaluating the evidence without delay.
Written by
Shazam KianpourDenver Criminal Defense Attorney & Founder, Shazam Kianpour & Associates, P.C. — Over 10,000 criminal and traffic cases handled across Colorado.
