Alachua County Sheriff and Gainesville Police Chief Talk ICE and Open Carry at Town Hall
Editor’s Notes: Officials jumped around different topics throughout the town hall, and the information in this article is not presented chronologically. Click here to watch the full town hall.
On October 19, local civil rights activist Faye Williams hosted a town hall at the Library District Headquarters with Alachua County Sheriff Chad Scott, Gainesville Police Department (GPD) Chief Nelson Moya, GPD Major Jamie Kurnick and High Springs Police Department (HSPD) Sgt. Jason Taylor, who filled in for Chief Antoine Sheppard.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the recent change to Florida’s open carry law dominated the conversation.
Introductions:
Scott introduced himself stating one of his key goals after getting elected as sheriff has been to retain deputies in the Alachua County Sheriff’s Office (ACSO).
Scott said he is focusing on hiring ACSO employees who are not deputies. “They can close that gap between us and the community,” he said. “During COVID and everything with George Floyd, people lost trust… I’m just being honest. I want to make sure that I really focus on bringing people in to work in the community and touch every person in our community.”
Scott said he’s increased co-responder units in ACSO, where a clinician will ride with a deputy in calls involving mental health. Moya and Scott both said calls involving mental health have been rising. “We do understand that not every person needs to go to jail,” said Scott. “There may be some other issues that they need to deal with.”
Moya said one of his primary efforts upon assuming his position has been to reduce gun violence in Gainesville and talked about community initiatives to reduce gun crimes. Moya called Gainesville a “distinctly different community” compared to other places he has worked. Moya added that retention has been a similar goal in GPD and that they currently have 23 vacant positions.
ICE:
Kali Blount asked Scott how he is implementing Florida’s mandate for sheriff’s offices to support ICE by signing a 287(g) agreement.
Scott said that ACSO “follows the instructions” of the Florida Sheriff’s Association.
Bount asked Scott if he is willing to risk removal if he sees ICE “doing something excessively brutal or ignoring credentials.”
Scott responded, "Here's why I’m not willing to risk removal… If I get removed from office, which is probably what they would like to happen, the president will put exactly who he wants to be sheriff. I have to, as the sheriff, be very conscious of the law at all times.”
Another attendee asked Scott which laws he would follow if some don’t support due process.
Scott responded, “The ones that are pushed down through the legislature.”
The attendee said, “so the not constitutional laws,” and Scott replied, “Yes, right,” before stating, “Well, the law we’re specifically talking about is the one that’s concerning immigration.”
Someone asked if there’s been any issues with ICE locally, and Scott responded, “I haven’t had any problems with ICE. What ICE did was they designated a lot of troopers, and they’ve been doing a lot of work in this community.” The attendee then asked if her biracial grandkids should carry identification of them. Scott said that everyone should carry ID regardless of immigration status “so people know who you are.”
Moya said he hasn’t yet signed the 287(g) form. “287(g) is a state mandate,” said Moya. “I’ll use that word for now loosely, mandate… That agreement speaks of well, just that, that we will collaborate with ICE in all it is they do, enforcement, reporting. The key thing, I’ve been staying on top of it, is that it is not yet a mandate. Right? I will tell you, it does make me nervous, because everybody around GPD and the city has, for reasons that I can appreciate, signed that agreement… Because I don’t have a clearer picture, I’ve been foregoing a signature… But that pressure is mounting. I will tell you it's just a matter of time before that agreement is absolutely invoked.”
Chief Moya speaks on ICE (GnvInfo)
Moya said, “Now reporting. Now, that one is a little different. That one does become a mandate for us to report and record data that we gather, whether it's street-side, coming across people, or certainly if we are in a position to arrest somebody that's undocumented. We are consulting with the state to see what that reporting looks like. The mandate speaks of something that was effective the minute we got documentation, and that’s just unreasonable.”
Moya continued, “We all know that there's a philosophy that the federal government has employed when it comes to this issue. That philosophy is trickling down to the states, and it is for the first time in my 35-year career now trickling to municipal police departments.”
Moya said he’s “yet to be contacted by anyone from ICE” and that ICE “has not called” the GPD office. Moya said he has “no idea” if ICE “does any details in the city.” “I’ve never heard of it,” he said. “I’ve never heard of any roundups in our city. I think I would’ve gotten some frantic phone calls. That has not happened. We are not going hand and hand with ICE to do anything.”
Moya then stated that if ICE calls and asks for help, GPD “will respond.” Moya said “it would not be ethical” if he didn’t respond for ICE, but that GPD will “access what's in front” of them.
Moya went on to say that “not necessarily" everyone picked up by ICE or ICE partners will be taken to the Alachua County Jail, indicating that local jail booking statistics on ICE holds and detainers aren’t representative of the total number of people arrested by ICE in Alachua County.
Moya said, “What I'm trying to tell you in a very neutral way, is that I will follow federal and state law, but right now there's some unclarity as it relates to ‘mandates’ quote unquote, to the municipal level. Because of that clarity, I need some more time to make assessments before I bring forward a policy.”
Blount asked Moya where he’d stand legally if a masked individual accosted him without identification and he defended himself.
Moya responded, “I believe firmly that anybody who enforces the law, particularly operational, meaning street level, you go put your hands on somebody for whatever reason, you better have number one, due authority, and number two, identification. I'll give you an example of what that means here because we too have undercover units. We too have the masks that our undercover agents wear so that they're not identified from drug dealers or people that bear firearms or deal in firearms. So, I support that. However, if they’re taking operational action against one of our citizens, okay, then you better be wearing a vest that says ‘Police;’ ‘Gainesville Police;’ that is a part of our policy. Short of that, I would leave the person to make a judgement call on what actions to take next.”
Chief Moya answers a question on what to do if accosted by a masked man without identification (GnvInfo)
Sgt. Taylor acknowledged that HSPD has signed the 287(g) agreement but said their agency hasn’t had any interaction with any undocumented individuals.
Open Carry Law Change:
An attendee asked Scott about the recent change to Florida law allowing the open carry of firearms and if police would support a private business restricting guns. Scott said police would side with the business by issuing a trespass.
An attendee said, “Fresh Market had an incident where someone did come in and was being very belligerent and very puffed up, like, ‘haha I get to carry’ and was disrupting the business. I don’t know who the manager called, if it was GPD or the Sheriff’s Office, but was told, ‘Sorry, it's the law.’”
Scott responded, “I think as a police officer when you respond to a call, I mean, we're there to keep it safe and keep peace. Anytime there's an altercation or anybody doing something out of order, whether they're carrying a gun or not, we have to resolve the situation. These officers use discretion when they're out there, and they're trained. We do rely on them to keep it safe and keep peace.”
Sheriff Scott speaks on open carry laws (GnvInfo)
The attendee said that if an election vote was held in a library, a public building, a sign restricting guns would “do squat."
“It’s a very convoluted situation,” said Scott. “I’ve seen a lot of people ask a lot of questions where, to be honest with you, some of it you just can’t answer. We don’t know.”
Crime:
Kurnick said, “One of the things that happened recently is our SWAT team did serve a search warrant in Porters Quarters. We had an active investigation going on and it is still going on. You may have seen animal control over there. It was involving dog-fighting. It multiplied into other things. I can’t talk too much about it because it is still open… I actually got a call from a victim advocate who said, ‘Hey Jamie,’ he sounded really concerned, like ‘can you go check out whats going on,’ so I knew and I went over to the house.”
Kurnick offered to answer any questions about SWAT.
Blount asked if there’s ever a practice of no-knock warrants in Alachua County, and Kurnick said they always knock and announce.
Kurnick said that GPD “has always been best practices” and that they take in feedback from the community. She went on to announce that GPD had zero shots fired calls last month and violent crime has gone down by 16% over the past year.
The entire town hall was over two hours long and is available to watch.
