( – promoted by Colorado Pols)
Last October, Weld County District Attorney (and, dare I say, lackluster, Senate Candidate), Ken Buck, raided Amalia’s Tax Service in Greeley. He was looking for evidence that undocumented aliens were using other people’s social security numbers to file taxes and receive refunds.
The ACLU filed suit against Buck, as well as Weld County Sheriff, John Cooke, in January. They successfully argued that Buck’s search warrant violated the 4th Amendment by not detailing, particularly, the persons and items that were being sought.
Today, the Tribune, has revealed that this fight has cost taxpayers almost $100,000. And this does number does not include attorney’s fees related to the case’s pending Colorado Supreme Court appeal (and the likely appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court).
The whole business around this case has me confused. A few weeks ago, didn’t the U.S. Supreme Court rule that in order to successfully prosecute ‘identity theft’ against someone using another person’s social security number, the prosecution has to demonstrate that the offender actually knew the number was another person’s. If he simply makes one up, prints a face SS card, works under the number, he did not steal an identity.
So, the ACLU has successfully had “Operation Numbers Game” halted under the 4th Amendment. SCOTUS has said that the prosecution will have to prove intent w/re the identity theft charge, even if the ACLU loses on appeal. What’s Buck doing here?
Is this a taxpayer-funded campaign event?
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Sorry for leaving out the links. Sharon Dunn, in writing this (the link posted above) was a bit spun by Buck. Here’s a link to the FLORES-FIGUEROA v. UNITED STATES decision (PDF).
I suspect that if you read Colorado Statutes (you will have to click on ‘Colorado Revised Statutes, and then navigate to 18-5-902(1) – I couldn’t figure a link to it directly), you’ll see language that is strikingly similar to the Federal Statute for “aggravated identity theft” at the Federal level.
Call me crazy, but I don’t remember SCOTUS ever making a ruling on Federal language, and then claiming that identical language in a state statute was held to a different standard. I particular, I can’t imagine that anyone will find that “knowingly” means something different in a Federal context than in a Colorado statute.
My point, which I lazily failed to illustrate, is that b/c the state law is already so clear, Buck charged almost all his illegally acquired “suspects” with the lower-level criminal impersonation, rather than ID theft
but that’s not what the warrant was for. He could still run into problems with the SCOTUS ruling.
Buck’s in a bad situation. One he created for himself, while pandering to the basest and lowest form of Weld County republicans. Now the tax payers have to foot the bill for this “welfare queen’s” defense to the tune of what probably rise to a quarter million dollars.
Whatever happened to the old saying “when you’re in a hole, quit digging.”?
Personally, he’s the kind of red I want running for statewide office.