A Colorado immigration advocacy firm working with a Cheyenne-based investigator is suing the Laramie County Sheriff’s Office and Sheriff Brian Kozak, claiming the agency is obstructing justice by withholding important evidence in a deportation case.
Colorado-based immigration firm Lichter and Associates, and its Cheyenne-based investigator Kevin Lewis, filed the lawsuit complaint Tuesday in the Laramie County District Court.
It accuses the sheriff’s office of producing a report of an April 23 encounter and arrest that one Cheyenne Police Department records clerk called a “complete fabrication.”
It also accuses the sheriff’s office of withholding body camera and dash cam video of the incident, though the Mexican national involved in it, Mario Fabian Valenzuela Robles, allegedly needs that video to fight his ongoing immigration deportation case — and a federal wrongful detention case he’s waging in the U.S. District Court for Colorado.
Cheyenne-based attorney Drake Hill filed the suit on the plaintiffs' behalf. Hill is the husband of former Wyoming Superintendent of Public Instruction Cindy Hill and recently has also represented the right-leaning political group Honor Wyoming.
The lawsuit says that Lewis set out to investigate Valenzuela Robles’ law enforcement encounter and arrest, but met obstacles at nearly every juncture.
“This case presents a clear abuse of power and the violation of Wyoming statues by the Laramie County sheriff, Brian Kozak, and the Laramie County Sheriff’s Office, in willfully denying access to critical evidence material to immigration proceedings and (the habeas case),” says the complaint.
On Wednesday, Hill also asked Laramie County District Court Judge Peter Froelicher to recuse himself from the case, saying Froelicher represented the sheriff’s office when he was still a litigator.
Froelicher’s response, if he’s filed one, wasn’t in the public-facing court file as of Thursday.
The lawsuit seeks to levy public records violation fines against the sheriff’s office, and urges the court to declare the sheriff’s office violated the law.
First, The Detention
The complaint says Lewis sought to gather evidence on Valenzuela Robles’ case for the Lichter firm and on Valenzuela Robles’ behalf.
The sheriff’s office had detained Valenzuela Robles on April 23 “as part of a wider effort directed by Defendant Kozak,” says the complaint.
An order in Valenzuela Robles’ federal wrongful-detention case says he was detained starting about April 23, through at least May 27, after a Cheyenne police officer initiated a traffic stop on him because his taillights were “kind of dark” and his truck had “tinted windows.”
ICE agents were on scene within the span of time Valenzuela Robles took to provide his ID to the officer, he order says, adding that Valenzuela Robles asserts he was given a choice between $2,600 to return to Mexico or face ICE detention. He opted for detention, the order says.
The order recounts assertions by Valenzuela Robles that he’s lived in the U.S. for 20 years and has no criminal history, plus has three children who are U.S. citizens.
Next, The Investigator
Lewis went to the Laramie County Sheriff’s Office’s records department April 24 and encountered a paper sign saying it was closed, the complaint says.
Then he went to the Cheyenne Police Department to request records. An officer whose name Hill related by the uncertain spelling of “Mooske” searched for data of the detention and found none, reportedly.
The searcher also “said the computer system also showed the sheriff’s office records and there was nothing to be found there either,” wrote Hill.
The next Monday, April 27, Lewis took a written records request to the Laramie County Sheriff’s Office, the complaint says. There, a staffer told him Lewis needed to show he actually represented Valenzuela Robles to view the records, says the document.
Lewis sent that letter of confirmation two days later, according to the court file.
The complaint alleges that the staffer told Lewis they “still did not have a report” on Valenzuela Robles’ arrest or detention, and for Lewis to return in a couple days.
“In the meantime,” laments the complaint, “immigration proceedings that could lead to Mr. Valenzuela Robles’ removal were moving at a very fast pace and the records were vital to his defense.”
Lewis found the sheriff’s records office closed May 1, and returned three days later, the complaint says.
A staffer again said they lacked records, the document alleges. The staffer told Lewis to provide a birth date for Valenzuela Robles, reportedly.
The complaint claims the staffer said that there wouldn’t be arrest records if the detainee wasn’t booked physically into the jail; and that even if the Laramie County Sheriff’s Office provided a field “assist” to ICE, then ICE would be the custodian of that detainee.
Lewis asked for body and dash camera video, and the staffer allegedly said the office wouldn’t release such footage without a definitive identification of the subject. The complaint says that identification had already been provided.
Body and dash camera video fall into a special category under Wyoming public records law.
The keeper of that video shall deny release of that video except:
• Where the incident involves deadly force.
• Where the person asking for it is the “person of interest.”
• In response to a complaint against law enforcement personnel, and where the keeper of the video finds release is not contrary to the public interest.
• Or where “the interest of public safety” permits releasing that video.
The Part About Cheyenne PD
On May 21, says Lewis’ complaint, he visited the Cheyenne Police Department again and a staffer said CPD wasn’t involved in Valenzuela Robles’ arrest or detention.
So Lewis circled back to the sheriff’s office.
A staffer there gave Lewis a report “purporting to document the encounter, arrest and detention of Mario Fabian Valenzuela Robles,” says the complaint.
That report, the complaint alleges, “specifically indicated there was no body camera footage,” and the report detailed the identity of a CPD officer reportedly involved in the encounter.
Lewis went back to the police department to ask about any video the agency had from that incident, says the lawsuit. There, a Cheyenne PD staffer called “Tiffany” looked over the report and “in an emphatic manner declared the Defendants’ report to be a ‘complete fabrication,’” says the complaint.
In a Wednesday email to Cowboy State Daily, the Cheyenne Police Department acknowledged that the initial sheriff’s office report was flawed.
“Our records clerk was able to ascertain that the Cheyenne Police Department was not involved in the traffic stop on April 23,” wrote CPD spokeswoman Alexandra Farkas in the email. “The officer identified in the Laramie County Sheriff's Office report (P76) was off duty at the time. The report also incorrectly identified her as a male.”
Sheriff Responds
Laramie County Sheriff Kozak responded Thursday in a brief phone interview with Cowboy State Daily, saying this matter has been referred to the Laramie County Attorney.
Laramie County Attorney Mark Voss did not respond by publication to a Wednesday-afternoon phone message request for comment.
Kozak said in his own interview that when his office got Lewis’ request, “there was nothing that said this person was actually representing the immigrant,” and that the county attorney asked for that proof.
Lewis’ case filings say he provided that proof.
Kozak said, “We never received that. That’s just a major issue that’ll be resolved in the court hearing that’s coming up.”
As for the report, Kozak said the deputy made a mistake with it and corrected that mistake later — before the litigation was filed.
“That happens occasionally,” he said. "But the supervisors caught that and had the deputy correct it."
The Saga Continues
The complaint details more interactions between Lewis and records staff.
“Tiffany” told Lewis the sheriff’s office was rewriting the report.
Lewis was “stunned by the assertion” that the initial report had been a complete fabrication, says the complaint.
After the Laramie County Sheriff’s records office closed over the Memorial Day holiday, Lewis returned and asked about a new report.
This new report gave “a completely different narration of events,” says the complaint, “including a statement that body camera footage was recorded and stored with the Laramie County Sheriff’s Office, contradicting what the defendants had before repeatedly stated.”
Lewis kept asking to see the video.
A Lieutenant Haskins at the sheriff’s office told him he could watch it in person June 1.
Meanwhile, The Wrongful Detention Case
Valenzuela Robles was then waging a wrongful detention case and had won back the right to have a bond hearing, while immigration authorities had invoked a repeatedly-rejected legal mechanism to deny him that hearing.
U.S. District Court Magistrate Judge Kathryn Starnella, of Colorado, ordered immigration authorities to grant Valenzuela Robles a bond hearing no later than June 4.
Lewis’ lawsuit says that hearing was set for June 1, the same day he was to review body camera footage.
The timing, says the lawsuit complaint, “Ensured that no digital media would be available to assist in Mr. Valenzuela Robles’ defense and Mr. Valenzuela Robles’ position that the stop had been unlawfully conducted.”
Still, Lewis went to the sheriff’s office June 1, says the document. He was told Haskins would be sending him an email denying the opportunity to view the video, the complaint says, adding that Lewis never saw such an email.
Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.
