ACLU sues Colorado Springs for “unjustifiable search" of housing advocacy nonprofit and home
By Robert Davis
The ACLU of Colorado filed a lawsuit on July 31 against the City of Colorado Springs, its police officers, and the Federal Bureau of Investigations for allegedly obtaining Facebook messages and other personal data from a housing activist and a nonprofit organization without a warrant.
Photo: Greg Bulla/Unsplash
In the lawsuit, which was filed in Denver’s district court, the ACLU alleges that Colorado Springs officers targeted Jacqueline “Jax” Armendariz Unzueta and the nonprofit Chinook Fund following a housing rights march in July 2021. The Colorado Springs Police Department arrested Unzueta and other activists during the march and charged them with minor violations. However, CSPD then used those minor charges to execute dragnet search warrants of the activists’ personal devices and Unzueta’s home, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit also claims that the CSPD did not have probable cause to search Unzueta’s devices or the Chinook Fund’s private information. Instead, the CSPD allegedly relied on the claim that organizers were using the devices to share messages and photos which ACLU of Colorado Legal Director Tim Macdonald argued would “eviscerate the Fourth Amendment” protections against unreasonable searches and seizures.
“The warrants targeting Chinook and Armendariz were part of a pattern and practice of unconstitutional actions intended to teach activists a lesson: Colorado Springs police would retaliate against political expression with dragnet warrants to chill free speech,” the lawsuit reads in part.
The Denver VOICE reached out to the City of Colorado Springs, CSPD, and the FBI for comments about the lawsuit, but did not immediately receive a reply.
The ACLU’s lawsuit is not the first time that CSPD has been ensnared in a legal battle over its policing tactics. In June 2020, a CSPD detective posed as an activist with the Chinook Fund and gained access to the organization’s internal chat groups, membership rosters, and email accounts, according to a report by the Colorado Springs Independent. The same thing happened at other left-leaning organizations like the local Democratic Socialists of America chapter, the Colorado Springs Tenants Union, and the Colorado Springs Mutual Aid and Solidarity Union.
CSPD officers also seem to have targeted the activists who participated in the march, according to the lawsuit. For example, one officer was caught on tape saying that the activists would get a “boot to the head” while another exclaimed “Just get on that bullhorn and be like, ‘Hey if y’all would like to see a parade and like to see these motherf****** to quit interrupting it, just handle that for us… stone ‘em all to death.”
“Our Constitution recognized the profound danger that these types of warrants would have on freedom and liberty and precluded them,” Macdonald said in a press release. “Indeed, these types of general warrants were common in the time of King George and helped lead to the American Revolution.”
“This case is about love for my community,” Unzueta said in a press release. “I hope CSPD will never again target, terrorize, and attempt to silence others as they did to me.”
You can read the full complaint by clicking here.