{"id":23407,"date":"2025-02-21T00:15:24","date_gmt":"2025-02-21T07:15:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/ice-places-detainers-on-undocumented-inmates-at-the-montezuma-county-detention-center\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T22:35:24","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T04:35:24","slug":"ice-places-detainers-on-undocumented-inmates-at-the-montezuma-county-detention-center","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/ice-places-detainers-on-undocumented-inmates-at-the-montezuma-county-detention-center\/","title":{"rendered":"ICE places detainers on undocumented inmates at the Montezuma County Detention Center"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"The
The Colorado Department of Human Services has awarded Jail Based Behavioral Health Services Mental Health Expansion funding to five county jails, including the Montezuma County Detention Center.<\/span>The Journal file<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

Since mid-January, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has placed detainers on three undocumented inmates at the Montezuma County Detention Center.<\/p>\n

Detainers are also known as ICE holds, and they\u2019re two-part.<\/p>\n

They request an agency to notify ICE \u201cas early as possible\u201d before releasing an undocumented inmate and also ask the agency to hold the inmate for up to 48 hours after their release so that the Department of Homeland Security may \u201cassume custody in accordance with federal immigration law,\u201d according to ice.gov<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Detainer or no detainer, the inmates must serve the duration of their sentence.<\/p>\n

But to comply with the detainer, the Sheriff\u2019s Office will notify ICE when those inmates are released, said Montezuma County Sheriff Steve Nowlin.<\/p>\n

They will not hold inmates any longer than their sentence, and ICE agents are not allowed in the jail or courts to arrest the person of interest.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe can\u2019t violate federal law. If we know someone is in violation of a federal law, we can\u2019t harbor them here,\u201d Nowlin said. \u201cDenver is fixing to find that out, too.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ll never harbor criminals, no matter who they are,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\"Montezuma
Montezuma County Sheriff Steve Nowlin: \u201cI\u2019ll never harbor criminals, no matter who they are.\u201d<\/span>Jim Mimiaga<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Of the three inmates with detainers, one is still serving a sentence at the jail.<\/p>\n

One was released and arrested by ICE in Cortez. The other was released but had a warrant from Jefferson County, so they were taken to jail there, and the detainer followed them.<\/p>\n

Nowlin said he wasn\u2019t sure how many detainers the office has received from ICE in the past several years because they don\u2019t track it. \u201cThere\u2019s only been a few,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

He added that, as it stands, the Sheriff\u2019s Office is unable to ask an inmate where they\u2019re from, though he said that might change since Gov. Jared Polis said Jan. 24 that Colorado isn\u2019t a sanctuary state.<\/a><\/p>\n

Mancos Town Marshal Justen Goodall said that it\u2019s not the first time ICE has been in the area, though rumors of agents on Mancos Hill, for instance, are just that \u2013 rumors.<\/p>\n

In 2019, ICE made three arrests on detainers in Mancos.<\/p>\n

\"Mancos
Mancos Town Marshal Justen Goodall.<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Local and state law enforcement officials cannot make arrests solely based on such detainers, said Goodall.<\/p>\n

They can assist ICE when \u201ca true warrant is signed by a judge. A detainer is not.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nowlin added that Section 287(G) of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 makes it so local and state law enforcement can work with ICE.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis section of law authorizes the Director of ICE to enter into agreements with state and local law enforcement agencies, which permit designated officers to perform limited immigration law enforcement functions,\u201d according to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Nowlin said that the American Civil Liberties Union sued the Teller County Sheriff\u2019s Office near Colorado Springs for assisting ICE in immigration enforcement as part of its 287(G) agreement.<\/p>\n

The court recently ruled in favor of the Sheriff\u2019s Office.<\/a><\/p>\n

Goodall said that in 2019, \u201cthere was a misconception that we were assisting more than we were.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said that he \u2013 and any other local law enforcement officials \u2013 cannot interfere with ICE, but that he can \u201cmake sure citizens do not interfere, obstruct or strike a federal officer,\u201d because the minimum mandatory sentence for such an offense is five years.<\/p>\n

To be sure, President Donald Trump\u2019s executive orders \u201chave no bearing on state law enforcement\u201d and their duties haven\u2019t changed, Goodall said.<\/p>\n

He added that it \u201cdoesn\u2019t matter if you\u2019re a tourist in the U.S., here undocumented, or a citizen, when you\u2019re in the United States of America, you\u2019re under the protections of the Constitution,\u201d which are protections Americans often take for granted.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

past month, ICE has notified the Sheriff\u2019s Office of three detainers<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23408,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28,60,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-23407","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines","tag-montezuma-county","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23407","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=23407"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23407\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":78105,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23407\/revisions\/78105"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23408"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23407"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23407"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23407"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=23407"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}