{"id":18465,"date":"2025-07-29T12:46:08","date_gmt":"2025-07-29T18:46:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/colorado-ag-weiser-sues-mesa-county-sheriffs-deputy-over-illegal-coordination-with-ice\/"},"modified":"2026-03-25T19:39:22","modified_gmt":"2026-03-25T19:39:22","slug":"colorado-ag-weiser-sues-mesa-county-sheriffs-deputy-over-illegal-coordination-with-ice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/colorado-ag-weiser-sues-mesa-county-sheriffs-deputy-over-illegal-coordination-with-ice\/","title":{"rendered":"Colorado AG Weiser sues Mesa County sheriff\u2019s deputy over \u2018illegal coordination\u2019 with ICE"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Body
Body camera footage shows a Mesa County Sheriff\u2019s deputy conducting a traffic stop of Utah student Caroline Dias Goncalves on June 5, 2025. Dias Goncalves was arrested by federal immigration authorities shortly thereafter. (Screenshot from Mesa County Sheriff\u2019s Office YouTube)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser said Tuesday that he had taken legal action against a Mesa County sheriff\u2019s deputy over an alleged violation of state laws prohibiting coordination between local police and federal immigration agents.<\/p>\n

The civil complaint, filed in Mesa County District Court, alleges that Investigator Alexander Zwinck \u201cintentionally violated Colorado law\u201d by sending messages to a Signal group chat<\/a> with federal law enforcement, leading to the arrest of a Utah college student last month. State law bars government employees, including law enforcement officers, from sharing information for the purposes of \u201cinvestigating for, participating in, cooperating with, or assisting in federal immigration enforcement.\u201d<\/p>\n

Caroline Dias Goncalves was detained by ICE in Grand Junction on June 5, shortly after being pulled over by Zwinck in a separate traffic stop, from which she was let go with a warning. Zwinck has been placed on leave amid an internal investigation<\/a> into whether the messages complied with state law and departmental policies.<\/p>\n

Body camera footage <\/a>released by the department at the time showed a traffic stop lasting nearly 20 minutes, during which Zwinck asked Dias Goncalvez, who was born in Brazil and brought to the U.S. by her parents as a 7-year-old, whether she was \u201cborn and raised\u201d in Utah, after noting she had \u201ca little bit of an accent.\u201d<\/p>\n

Weiser\u2019s lawsuit alleges that Zwinck sent a photo of Dias Goncalves\u2019 license to the Signal chat within minutes of pulling her over, and federal agents ran her information through \u201cseveral databases accessible only by federal law enforcement.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFour minutes later, a federal immigration officer informed Deputy Zwinck in the Signal Chat that the officer\u2019s searches revealed no criminal history. The immigration officer stated: \u2018Not seeing crim history, but I believe she has immigration issues. We are confirming,’\u201d the lawsuit says.<\/p>\n

Zwinck continued to communicate with federal agents throughout the traffic stop, during which he eventually asked Dias Goncalves to exit her vehicle and come to the passenger seat his patrol car while he did \u201cpaperwork,\u201d a move that Weiser\u2019s lawsuit characterizes as \u201cstalling.\u201d He then provided information about Dias Goncalves\u2019 vehicle and direction of travel, and told federal officers \u201cnice work\u201d after hearing she was detained.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese actions by the sheriff\u2019s deputy were for the sole purpose of immigration enforcement,\u201d Weiser said in a press conference in Denver. \u201cHe assisted federal immigration officers apprehending the driver after the routine traffic stop and where there was no relevant criminal activity.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dias Goncalves, a nursing student at the University of Utah with no criminal record, was then held at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in Aurora for 15 days before being released on bond, an experience she described as a \u201cnightmare.\u201d<\/a> The share of people taken into ICE custody despite having no criminal record has risen sharply<\/a> since January.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe was away from her home, her friends, her family, and she was filled with fear,\u201d said Weiser. \u201cThis action that happened to her was wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n

Weiser said his office\u2019s focus is on \u201cprimarily stopping this from happening again.\u201d As a civil action, the state\u2019s lawsuit could lead to an injunction, fines or other remedies through litigation, or the defendant could choose to enter into a consent decree agreeing to follow state law.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s going to be up to the sheriff\u2019s deputy how they approach this litigation, whether it\u2019s through consent or through an adversarial proceeding,\u201d Weiser said.<\/p>\n

To read more stories from Colorado Newsline, visit www.coloradonewsline.com<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

camera footage shows a Mesa County Sheriff\u2019s deputy conducting a traffic stop of Utah student Caroline Dias Goncalves on June 5, 2025. Dias Goncalves was arrested by federal immigration authorities shortly thereafter. (Screenshot from Mesa County Sheriff\u2019s Office YouTube) Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser said Tuesday that he had taken legal action against a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":18466,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[120,28,904,52],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-18465","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-colorado","tag-headlines","tag-immigration","tag-law-enforcement"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18465","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18465"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18465\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20604,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18465\/revisions\/20604"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18466"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18465"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18465"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18465"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=18465"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}