The Mesa County sheriff’s deputy who shared with federal officials information about a Utah college student he pulled over, leading to her arrest by immigration agents, is on administrative leave.
Investigator Alexander Zwinck pulled over 19-year-old Caroline Dias Goncalves on June 5 on Interstate 70 near Loma because she was following a tractor-trailer too closely, according to the sheriff’s ofice.
Zwinck let Dias Goncalves go with a warning, but he shared information about the traffic stop in a Signal group chat used by local and federal law enforcement for drug trafficking.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents arrested Dias Goncalves a short time later in Grand Junction and took her to the Denver Contract Detention Facility in Aurora, where she has been detained for two weeks.
Dias Goncalves, who attends the University of Utah, came to the U.S. from Brazil with her family when she was 7 and overstayed a tourist visa. She has a pending asylum application, according to the Salt Lake Tribune.
An immigration judge granted bail in Dias Goncalves’ case, and she is expected to be released in the coming days, her attorney said Wednesday.
Zwinck was put on leave while the sheriff’s office investigates the incident, the agency said in a statement Thursday. Colorado law prohibits local law enforcement from working with federal agents on civil immigration enforcement.
Mesa County officials are reviewing messages in the Signal group chat to make sure sheriff’s employees followed agency policy and state law.
“This includes, but is not limited to, working to understand if and when Mesa County Sheriff’s Office employees were made aware that the information shared for drug interdiction efforts was being utilized for immigration enforcement,” the sheriff’s office said in a statement.
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