GREELEY, Colo.—Weld County has paid attorneys almost $100,000 to defend the district attorney and sheriff in a lawsuit stemming from an identity theft investigation against suspected illegal immigrants, and officials say the tab will continue to rise because of pending appeals.
The costs arise from an American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit claiming District Attorney Ken Buck and Sheriff John Cooke were wrong to seize thousands of income tax records from a Greeley tax preparer who catered to Latinos.
Buck and sheriff’s investigators say they took the tax records because up to 1,300 immigrants were allegedly filing tax returns using false or stolen identities. More than 70 people were charged in the case, and some pleaded guilty to charges of identity theft and criminal impersonation until the cases were halted last month because of legal challenges.
Last month, District Judge James Hiatt ruled in favor of the ACLU, saying the search was illegal because the tax records are confidential under federal law. Buck and Cooke are appealing that ruling, and an earlier ruling by District Judge James Hartmann, who also said the records are confidential.
Weld County Attorney Bruce Barker said officials have not received a bill for how much it has cost to appeal the rulings, but noted that one set of attorneys is charging the county $160 an hour and another about $192.50 an hour.
Everyone who earns income in the U.S. is required to pay taxes regardless of legal status.
Buck has staunchly defended the investigation, saying illegal immigrants are violating U.S. law by being in the country in the first place.
Buck responded to the ACLU lawsuit by selling T-shirts that read, “The ACLU Sued My District Attorney & Sheriff.” On the back, the shirts say, “Weld County Standing Up For Americans.”
He said the proceeds would go to help the county pay for the lawsuit.
Don Warden, Weld County’s director of finance and administration, said Buck’s T-shirts raised $2,010.
Cooke said investigators were right to investigate the immigrants who were filing taxes.
“I don’t know what price tag you put on doing the right thing,” he said. He added that the county is “testing legal ground.”
The National Immigration Law Center in Los Angeles has said the investigation was the first time law-enforcement officials used tax records to try to prosecute illegal immigrants.
Immigration attorneys have said that although the people charged may have been using Social Security numbers that weren’t theirs to work, they were not using those numbers to file taxes. Instead, the immigration attorneys have said the people were using Individual Taxpayer Identification Numbers, which the Internal Revenue Service issues to people without Social Security numbers for tax-filing purposes.
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Information from: Greeley Daily Tribune,
