2016 Colorado Revised Statutes
Title 13 - Courts and Court Procedure
Habeas Corpus
Article 45 - Habeas Corpus - General Provisions
§ 13-45-101. Petition for writ - criminal cases

(1) If any person is committed or detained for any criminal or supposed criminal matter, it is lawful for him to apply to the supreme or district courts for a writ of habeas corpus, which application shall be in writing and signed by the prisoner or some person on his behalf setting forth the facts concerning his imprisonment and in whose custody he is detained, and shall be accompanied by a copy of the warrant of commitment, or an affidavit that the said copy has been demanded of the person in whose custody the prisoner is detained, and by him refused or neglected to be given. The court to which the application is made shall forthwith award the writ of habeas corpus, unless it appears from the petition itself, or from the documents annexed, that the party can neither be discharged nor admitted to bail nor in any other manner relieved. Said writ, if issued by the court, shall be under the seal of the court, and directed to the person in whose custody the prisoner is detained, and made returnable forthwith.

(2) To the intent that no officer, sheriff, jailer, keeper, or other person to whom such writ is directed may pretend ignorance thereof, every writ shall be endorsed with the words "by the habeas corpus act". When the writ is served by any person upon the sheriff, jailer, or keeper, or other person to whom the same is directed, or brought to him, or left with any of his underofficers or deputies at the jail or place where the prisoner is detained, he or some of his underofficers or deputies, upon payment or tender of the charges of bringing the said prisoner, to be ascertained by the court awarding the said writ and endorsed thereon not exceeding fifteen cents per mile and upon sufficient security given to pay the charges of carrying him back if he is remanded, shall make return of the writ and bring, or cause to be brought, the body of the prisoner before the court which granted the writ and certify the true cause of his imprisonment within three days thereafter, unless the commitment of such person is in a place beyond the distance of twenty miles from the place where the writ is returnable; if it is beyond the distance of twenty miles and not above one hundred miles, the writ shall be returned within ten days and, if beyond the distance of one hundred miles, within twenty days after the delivery of the writ, and not longer.