Colorado Judge Questions Search Warrants

Sharon Dunn writes for the Tribune:

A Weld District Court judge is questioning the legality of search warrants issued in the cases against 1,300 suspected undocumented immigrants using fake identification.

Weld District Court Judge James Hartmann this week put a halt to further arrests in Operation Number Games — if the arrests are based on information found in the suspects’ federal tax returns — and he demanded some explanations before proceeding with the cases.

The operation targets more than 1,300 people suspected of gaining tax returns with false or stolen identities.

Authorities have so far arrested 37 people who filed tax returns with Amalia’s Tax Service, 1501 9th St., in Greeley. Last month, authorities seized two years worth of federally approved tax returns from the tax preparer’s office, claiming that the suspects gained as much as $2.7 million combined in tax returns based on false Social Security numbers. Suspects have been charged with identity theft, criminal impersonation or both.

In a court order in one of the cases, Hartmann ordered District Attorney Ken Buck to provide more information on the arrest warrants and provide a “memorandum of legal authority” detailing how the court would have jurisdiction in a matter involving federal tax returns.

“Federal tax return information in the possession of a tax preparer falls within the confidentiality mandates of the federal statute,” Hartmann wrote. “It appears to this court that the prosecution of this defendant, as well as numerous other persons now charged with state criminal offenses … as part of the investigation referred to by law enforcement as ‘Operation Numbers Game’ is based almost
exclusively on information contained in the federal tax returns seized during the search of Amalia’s.”

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