Colorado & Denver News

by Raj Chohan
DENVER (CBS4) ― Reality Check is the name of a new set of special reports by CBS4 reporter Raj Chohan. In the Oct. 12, 2006, Reality Check, Chohan analyzed a new attack ad against Bill Ritter criticizing his plea bargain record. His complete notes on the report lie below.

The new attack ad on Bill Ritter comes from the Beauprez campaign and continues the theme of criticizing Ritter's plea bargain record during his tenure as Denver's district attorney. In this case, the ad targets a plea bargain Ritter made with an illegal immigrant. The ad is somewhat confusing from a fact checking standpoint because the poster boy in this ad has multiple aliases.

AD STARTS:

CASE FILE, CARLOS ESTRADA MEDINA, ILLEGAL ALIEN, FELON, ARRESTED IN DENVER FOR DISTRIBUTION OF HEROIN.

COMMENTARY:

I'm not sure who Carlos Estrada Medina is, because the guy pictured in this ad was arrested in Denver under the name Walter Ramo. The Beauprez campaign says Ramo is one of about seven aliases Estrada Medina uses, but I haven't been able to independently confirm that claim. The Beauprez campaign says the information comes from a proprietary source which they can't reveal. I checked with the Denver DA's office and they have no other aliases on file for Walter Ramo, and couldn't conclusively confirm his name was actually Walter Ramo (source: Lynn Kimbrough, Denver District Attorney's office).

I also checked with the Colorado Bureau of Investigation, and ran several names through the CBI's statewide database, including Walter Ramo, and Carlos Estrada Medina. The only hit I found was on Ramo.

AD CONTINUES:

PROSECUTOR BILL RITTER PLEA BARGAINS DOWN TO AGRICULTURAL TRESPASSING

COMMENTARY:

The claim is true. Bill Ritter did plea bargain the drug charges down to felony trespassing on farmlands. I checked with the District Attorney's office to find out why. Spokesperson Lynn Kimbrough said the case had evidence problems.

What kind of problems? Before police arrested Ramo in 2001, he was spotted getting out of a car. Police arrested the driver of that car, and found him with drugs. The driver said he bought the drugs from Ramo. When police caught up with Ramo, they found he had no drugs, and no criminal record in Colorado. But the driver who told police about Ramo did have a criminal record. So prosecutors found themselves wondering who to believe.

So they sent Ramo to drug court, where Lynn Kimbrough tells me, the standard procedure would have been to refer Ramo's illegal immigration status to federal immigration authorities. Kimbrough could not confirm whether this happened in Ramo's case, just that it was policy at the time to do so. (source: Lynn Kimbrough, Denver District Attorney's Office).

I checked with federal immigration officials, ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement). ICE Spokesman Tim Counts told me there was no record of Walter Ramo, or Carlos Estrada Medina under the birthdate 11/02/79 in the ICE database. He pointed out several times, that this should not be construed as conclusive information, because a minor variation in spelling could have thrown off the search. Furthermore he could not discount the possibility that the names from the Denver DA's office may not have made it into the federal database. So, outside of a policy in place regarding Denver drug court, we have no independent confirmation at this point that Walter Ramo's name was in fact referred to INS in 2001-2002. The best we can conclude for now, is that, the case may have been referred to INS, and should have been, had the policy been followed.

On Jan. 22, 2002, Bill Ritter plea bargained the drug charges down to felony trespass on farmlands, and Ramo was sentenced to 2 years probation and drug treatment, after having already served 63 days in Jail. He eventually violated the terms of his probation, and left the state. (source: Lynn Kimbrough, Denver DA's office).

AD CONTINUES:

ESTRADA IS ARRESTED AGAIN FOR SEXUAL ABUSE OF A MINOR

COMMENTARY:

That's also true. That is if Estrada and Ramo are the same guy. Curiously it's not an easy thing to confirm. There was an arrest in San Francisco. The suspect, who used the name Eugene Estrada, was charged with sexual battery of a minor, and plea bargained to misdemeanor battery in 2003. (source: Debbie Menloh, spokesperson for San Francisco County District Attorney's Office).

The Beauprez campaign says Ramo and Estrada are the same guy. The San Francisco DA's office wasn't aware of the alias Ramo, and wouldn't send us a mug shot (because it's against policy there) so we might visually confirm it. Immigration and Customs Enforcement wasn't much help either. Spokesman Tim Counts said even if they did have some files on this guy, they couldn't tell me much about it because of privacy issues. And after running a few searches for me, Counts said they didn't have anything matching the names and birth dates I gave them. At this point it occurred to me that if Beauprez' information is correct, he must have some source with access to a federal database indexed by fingerprints. John Marshall of the Beauprez camp was unwilling to talk about his source, only calling the person proprietary.

But even if the two are the same, is the California arrest Bill Ritter's fault? Well, it's hard to blame him for the results of a separate case in California. Should Ritter have done more to make sure Ramo was deported? According to the DA's office, they did all they could do. Kimbrough believes they notified immigration enforcement at the time, but the Feds didn't follow up.

AD CONTINUES:

BILL RITTER'S BAD JUDGMENT ALLOWED FELONS WHO SHOULD HAVE BEEN DEPORTED, TO PLEA BARGAIN
THAT WAS RITTER'S POLICY, HOW MANY MORE OF THESE CRIMINALS WALK OUR STREETS NOW.

COMMENTARY:

What about the plea bargain? (Trespassing on farmlands) Could Ritter have gotten this guy on something more substantial? Arguably, he could have. But again, the DA's office says the case had evidence problems, and going to trial might have resulted in a verdict of not guilty. Other prosecutors I've talked to say plea bargains in cases like these are common, especially when there's no prior criminal history in the state. In the end, whether Bill Ritter made the right call on this case, is a matter of opinion.

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