[chris]

A Denver 911 dispatcher told four young men fleeing a road-rage confrontation to drive back toward the scene rather than wait in a neighboring city for police, and one of them was shot to death minutes later while the call was still connected, according to federal court records.

Jimma Pal Reat, 25, a refugee from what is now South Sudan, was riding before dawn on April 1, 2012, with his brothers Ran Pal and Changkuoth Pal and a friend, Joseph Kolong, when a Jeep Cherokee pulled alongside their car near West Tenth Avenue and Sheridan Boulevard. Men in the Jeep threw bottles, shattering a rear window, court filings state.

Ran Pal called 911 while driving and told operator Juan Rodriguez the group had made it safely into neighboring Wheat Ridge. Pal told Rodriguez at least six times over the next several minutes that he was injured, in shock and afraid to move, but Rodriguez insisted police could not respond unless the group returned to Denver, where the confrontation had started, according to the recording cited in the ruling.

About three minutes into the call, Pal turned the car around. Partway back, he told Rodriguez the men in the Jeep had displayed a gun. Rodriguez asked about the weapon's size and color, then directed Pal to stop at West 29th Avenue and Sheridan Boulevard, nearly 20 blocks from where the confrontation began, and to wait there with his hazard lights on.

No police had been sent when the Jeep reappeared minutes later and its occupants opened fire, the court record states. Reat was shot in the back and died before officers, who were dispatched about a minute after the shooting, could reach the scene.

Rodriguez was placed on leave immediately and fired the following month; Denver officials acknowledged he had violated call-taking protocol. Reat's family sued Rodriguez and the city, arguing he had knowingly sent Reat back into danger in violation of his constitutional rights. A federal judge allowed the claim to proceed, but the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals reversed that decision in 2016, ruling Rodriguez was shielded by qualified immunity because no prior case had established that a 911 operator could be held liable for such conduct. The U.S. Supreme Court declined to review the case in April 2017.

No one has ever been arrested in the shooting. Police said as many as four or five men may have been in the Jeep, but the case remains unsolved.