Peo v. Eastman

── Peo v. Eastman ── Court: Colorado Court of Appeals Date: April 16, 2026 Category: General 22CA1421 Peo v Eastman 04-16-2026 COLORADO COURT OF APPEALS Court of Appeals No. 22CA1421 Weld County District Court No. 20CR461 Honorable Marcelo A. Kopcow, Judge The People of the State of Colorado, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Kevin Dean Eastman, Defendant-Appellant. JUDGMENT AFFIRMED Division III Opinion by JUDGE DUNN Harris and Moultrie, JJ., concur NOT PUBLISHED PURSUANT TO C.A.R. 35(e) Announced April 16, 2026 Philip J. Weiser, Attorney General, Jacob R. Lofgren, Senior Assistant Attorney General, Denver, Colorado, for Plaintiff-Appellee Megan A. Ring, Colorado State Public Defender, Joseph Paul Hough, Deputy State Public Defender, Denver, Colorado, for Defendant-Appellant ¶1 Kevin Dean Eastman appeals his convictions for two counts of first degree murder, two counts of tampering with a deceased human body, and two counts of tampering with physical evidence. He contends that reversal is required because the district court erred by (1) denying his motion to suppress evidence gathered from a tracking device installed on his car and (2) admitting other act and hearsay evidence. We affirm. I. Background ¶2 For several years, Eastman and Heather Frank were in an on- and-off relationship. But in late December 2019, Frank ended the relationship. According to Eastman, before this breakup, they “treat[ed] each other bad,” and he was physically abusive. ¶3 Shortly after the breakup, Frank met Scott Sessions and the two exchanged messages suggestive of a budding relationship. ¶4 On February 8, 2020, Eastman went to Frank’s apartment in Greeley. Eastman said that when he got there, Frank told him she had a date that night. That same evening, a message was sent from Frank’s Facebook account inviting Sessions to come over. Sessions said he would be there soon. 1 ¶5 A few days later, on February 10, Sessions’s partially burned body was found in Pingree Park. An autopsy showed that before he was set on fire, Sessions’s jugular vein had been slashed. The trajectory of the neck wound along with limited defensive wounds were consistent with an ambush from behind. ¶6 Investigators quickly learned about the messages between Sessions and Frank. And a review of Sessions’s cell phone records confirmed that he was “in and around” Frank’s apartment the evening of February 8. The phone records also showed that Sessions’s phone stopped signaling early the next morning. ¶7 Continued investigation also uncovered Frank’s relationship with Eastman. A review of his cell phone records confirmed that Eastman was also “in and around” Frank’s apartment the evening of February 8. Cell phone records also showed that early the next morning, Frank’s and Eastman’s phones travelled together away from Greeley and toward the Pingree Park area. ¶8 Four days after the discovery of Sessions’s body, and after seeing Eastman’s car parked outside Frank’s apartment, investigators obtained a warrant to place a GPS tracking device on 2  Eastman’s car. They also placed a surveillance camera outside Frank’s apartment. ¶9 On the evening of February 15, the surveillance camera showed Frank and Eastman leave in Eastman’s car. Investigators then tracked Eastman’s car to his employer’s property and to some stops around that property. ¶ 10 The next morning, an officer went to the property, where he saw a smoke plume and Eastman tending a fire near a burn pit. Concerned that Eastman was tampering with or destroying evidence related to the Sessions homicide, the officer followed Eastman to a gas station and arrested him. Officers then searched Eastman and found, among other things, a fixed-blade knife, tw