Colorado State Patrol troopers and local police violated state law by sharing information to help federal immigration agents in an encrypted group chat used for drug enforcement, the Mesa County sheriff alleged Wednesday.
Sheriff Todd Rowell released an administrative review of what happened before and after Mesa County Investigator Alex Zwinck pulled over a Utah college student on Interstate 70 near Fruita in June.
Zwinck shared information about Caroline Dias Goncalves in a Signal chat with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Homeland Security Investigations agents, who then used it to arrest Dias Goncalves a short time later. She was detained by ICE for more than two weeks.
Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser last week sued Zwinck, alleging the sheriff’s official knowingly assisted in federal immigration enforcement by sharing information about Dias Goncalves.
Zwinck and four other deputies and supervisors face discipline ranging from unpaid leave and reassignment to verbal counseling for their actions, Rowell announced Wednesday.
Dias Goncalves, 19, is a student at the University of Utah and immigrated to the U.S. from Brazil with her family when she was 7, later overstaying a tourist visa. She and her family have a pending application for asylum, according to the Salt Lake Tribune.
Zwinck pulled her over for following a semitrailer too closely and, after letting her go with a warning, shared her vehicle description and direction of travel with immigration officials after they said they were heading to his location, according to text messages released by the sheriff’s office.
After the federal agents confirmed they had detained her, Zwinck congratulated the agents on her arrest by texting “Nice work,” the records show.
Rowell said he could not release the full group chat because it was created by federal law enforcement, but called on federal officials to make it public.
“The group chat clearly shows Colorado State Patrol troopers, who are prohibited from sharing personal identifying information with ICE under SB 21-131 enacted June 25, 2021, and other local law enforcement agents, subject to SB 25-276, engaging in conduct similar to Deputy Zwinck’s,” Rowell said in the news release.
CSP no longer shares information
State troopers no longer share information in the Signal chat as of June 18, Colorado State Patrol Chief Matthew Packard said in a statement Wednesday.
“We respect Mesa County Sheriff Rowell’s corrective actions, but believe his judgments regarding the patrol are misinformed and premature,” Packard said.
The state patrol does not use Signal chats anywhere else in the state, Trooper Sherri Mendez told The Denver Post. Troopers use a secure messaging platform, Evertel, for instant messaging and do not use it with federal law enforcement partners.
The Eagle County Sheriff’s Office and the Vail Police Department also participated in the Signal chat with federal agents, according to the sheriff’s investigation.
Rowell also called for Weiser to either drop his case against Zwinck or file similar lawsuits against other state and local officials who have violated state law by sharing information with federal immigration officials – including Gov. Jared Polis.
Weiser has refused to speak with Rowell and did not notify the agency of the civil lawsuit, despite Mesa County keeping his office in the loop on the administrative review, Rowell said.
“As it stands, the lawsuit filed by the Attorney General’s Office sends a demoralizing message to law enforcement officers across Colorado — that the law may be wielded selectively and publicly for maximum political effect rather than applied fairly and consistently,” Rowell said.
A spokesperson for Weiser said other law enforcement agencies are also under investigation for “a pattern or practice of civil rights violations.”
“The Mesa County sheriff has a job to do to investigate and discipline his employees. The attorney general has a duty to enforce state laws and protect Coloradans and will continue to do so,” spokesperson Lawrence Pacheco said.
Mesa County sheriff takes responsibility
At the beginning of his statement, Rowell took full responsibility for the incident and apologized to Dias Goncalves.
“Based on our findings, the Mesa County Sheriff’s Office should not have had any role in the chain of events leading to Miss Dias Goncalves’s detention, and I regret that this occurred,” he said.
While sheriff’s office leaders had previously spoken with Homeland Security officials to ensure deputies would not be involved in immigration enforcement, “the administrative review showed that those lines of collaboration were crossed,” Rowell said.
Mesa County deputies were previously informed by command staff that they were not allowed to arrest anyone for a civil immigration detainer and should not call HSI or ICE if they arrested someone they suspected was not a U.S. citizen, according to records released Wednesday.
But the internal investigation showed Zwinck gave federal agents more information about the people he was pulling over after learning they wanted to detain them for civil immigration violations.
On June 3, two days before pulling over Dias Goncalves, Zwinck handcuffed someone at the request of a Homeland Security officer during a traffic stop.
On June 10, while giving federal agents the location where he stopped someone from Mexico who had potentially overstayed his visa, he told the agents, “Oh my gosh. We better get some (expletive) Christmas baskets from you guys,” according to the sheriff’s office.
Zwinck was placed on unpaid leave for three weeks, removed from the Western Colorado Drug Task Force and reassigned to a patrol team for violating sheriff’s office policies.
Deputy Erik Olson, who was also part of the Signal chat, was also put on unpaid leave for two weeks, removed from the drug task force and reassigned to a patrol team.
Sgt. Joe LeMoine was suspended without pay for two days, Lt. David Holdren received a letter of reprimand and Capt. Curtis Brammer was given verbal counseling.
Mesa County Sheriff’s Office staff have since received in-depth training on SB 25-276 and will receive additional training about state laws involving immigration, Rowell said.
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