The governor's race was thrown into a frenzy Friday when the Colorado Bureau of Investigation began probing whether Bob Beauprez's campaign illegally accessed an FBI criminal database for attack ad ammunition.
At the heart of the controversy is the question of how the Republican congressman's campaign obtained information that his opponent says is highly restricted and only available to law enforcement.
"Your campaign broke the law," an angry Bill Ritter told Beauprez during a debate taped at Fox 31 News in Denver on Friday.
Ritter accused the congressman of getting someone to improperly obtain information from the FBI's National Crime Information Center database for use in an ad criticizing his handling of a plea-bargain for an illegal immigrant offender while Ritter was Denver's district attorney.
At Ritter's urging, CBI spokesman Lance Clem said the agency will investigate whether Beauprez's campaign violated state and federal law.
Beauprez denied any wrong-doing and accused Democrat Ritter of trying to switch the subject from his record of granting plea-bargains that the congressman contends allowed immigrants - both legal and illegal - to avoid deportation.
"This is a bait and switch," Beauprez said. "He's trying to divert off the point. He's supposed to preserve the public safety and I don't believe he did."
Beauprez said his campaign had nothing to hide, adding, "We'll go through the file, we'll demonstrate we got our information legally."
CBI guards the security of the highly restricted FBI database also used by state and local police agencies. Clem said police officers have lost their jobs for abusing database access and a law enforcement agency that fails to safeguard NCIC could be barred from using it.
"These kinds of allegations are looked at very seriously, because the integrity of that (NCIC) system is very important to CBI," Clem said referring to Ritter's allegation.
The computerized system's security software should reveal if someone accessed records for the criminal featured in the attack ad, Clem said.
"When you do an NCIC check, it identifies the individual doing the check," said Scott Robinson, a veteran Denver trial lawyer. "If Bob Beauprez wants to reveal the source of the information, we ought to be able to determine who did it.
"The attorney general could subpoena them," Robinson added. "An attorney general who wants to enforce election laws could force Bob Beauprez's camp into revealing the documentation. It is a problem for them."
At issue is how the Beauprez campaign confirmed that an illegal immigrant, identified in the ad as "Carlos Estrada Medina," was the same man busted in Denver in 2001 for heroin possession under the name "Walter Noel Ramo," according to court records.
The ad blamed Ritter for allowing Ramo to plead to felony trespass on agricultural land, a controversial move that Ritter used in at least 151 cases, many involving immigrant defendants.
The ad also blasts Ritter for "bad judgment" claiming that Ramo - who received 63 days in jail and a suspended two-year prison term - was later arrested in San Francisco under the name "Eugene Alfredo Estrada-Acosta" for lewd and lascivious acts with a child, a knife violation and sexually battery of a "medically institutionalized person." He pleaded guilty to misdemeanor battery in 2003.
So, how did the Beauprez campaign know that offenders with three different names and the same birthday - Nov. 2, 1979 - were really the same guy?
Beauprez campaign manager John Marshall told a 9News reporter Wednesday that "in federal criminal databases, the guy's information matches up."
But Marshall seemed to back off from that statement Friday.
"I deduced" that campaign researchers used a criminal database, he said, "but I don't necessarily know exactly how they went about that."
Marshall said "multiple sources" had provided the campaign with information, including Medina's "A number," a hard-to-obtain code used by federal immigration authorities to track an illegal immigrant's arrest and deportation history. NCIC contains such information.
"I was told that this guy's 'A number' matches up," Marshall said, for criminal records under various names in Colorado, California and Oregon.
"I'm not going to reveal my sources," Marshall said. "Hell no, we haven't obtained this improperly."
Database laws
Colorado Bureau of Investigation officials say it shouldn't take long to determine if someone improperly used a federal criminal justice database to mine ammunition for an attack ad against Bill Ritter. It can be a violation of state and federal law to misuse a database. Violations include:
Federal statutes:
• It's a crime to intentionally access a federal computer without authorization or to exceed authorized access. Penalty: First offenses are punishable by one year in prison and fines.
• Knowingly conveying or receiving federal records. Maximum penalty: 10 years in prison and fines.
• Conspiracy to defraud the United States. Maximum Penalty: Five years in prison.
State statues:
• Public officials can be charged with official misconduct for using their authority to maliciously harm someone or violate state law. Penalty: 12 months in jail and a $1,000 fine.
• Embezzlement of government property by public servant. Penalty: Three years in prison and a $100,000 fine.
