DENVER — A Colorado appeals court ruled that former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters must be resentenced, finding that the trial judge improperly weighed her protected speech when imposing her original nine-year prison term. The Colorado Court of Appeals upheld Peters' conviction in a 74-page ruling but sent the case back to a lower court for a new sentencing hearing.

"The trial court obviously erred by imposing sentence at least partially based on Peters' protected speech," Judge Ted Tow wrote. The appeals court said the lower court judge should not have considered Peters' continued promotion of election fraud claims when sentencing her in 2024.

Peters is serving a nine-year prison term after a Mesa County jury convicted her of three counts of attempting to influence a public servant and one count each of conspiracy to commit criminal impersonation, first-degree official misconduct, violation of duty, and failure to comply with the requirements of the secretary of state. She had used the security badge of a local man to allow an associate of Mike Lindell to copy the Dominion Voting Systems election computer server during a 2021 software update.

Peters' lawyers said she had sought to preserve election data and determine whether any outside actor had accessed the system during ballot counting, and that she did not want the information made public.

Lawyer John Case, representing Peters, said he would likely ask at resentencing for Peters to receive credit for the approximately 540 days she has already served to allow her release. "Tina Peters was punished for words that she used to criticize our insecure and illegal voting system," Case said. "The decision affirms that people are free to speak what they believe in Colorado as well as the rest of the United States of America," he added.

In a separate portion of the ruling, the appeals court rejected the notion that the president has authority to pardon state crimes. President Donald Trump announced a pardon for Peters in December. In February, Trump said Colorado was suffering a big price for refusing to release her. The U.S. Justice Department intervened in Peters' bid to be released while her state appeal was considered, and the federal Bureau of Prisons tried to have her transferred to a federal prison.

"We have found no instance where the presidential pardon power has been stretched in such a way as to invade an individual state's sovereignty," the appeals court said. The court said the presidential pardon has no impact on the state's case against Peters.