Turlock Police Department denies it tipped off ICE, which would violate state law
In a statement released Tuesday, the Turlock Police Department denied it notified Immigration and Customs Enforcement of an encounter officers had with Carlos Ivan Mendoza Hernandez days before he was shot by ICE.
Mendoza Hernandez’s family and his attorney allege ICE may have been tipped off by TPD after what they described was a tense encounter with one of its officers during a traffic stop. If true, it would violate California’s strict laws around how local law enforcement can interact with federal immigration authorities.
However, TPD says it did not share information with ICE, stating “no such notification was made” and that the department “had no involvement in (the FBI’s) investigation before, during, or after the April 7 incident.”
On April 7, Mendoza Hernandez was shot seven times by ICE officers trying to detain him in Patterson, attorney Patrick Kolasinski said. He was taken to Doctors Medical Center in Modesto to be treated, then arrested by the FBI as soon as he was discharged.
The Salvadoran national was charged with assault with a deadly weapon against a federal officer. Narratives of the shooting contradict each other. ICE and the FBI say Mendoza Hernandez tried to weaponize his vehicle, prompting officers to open fire. However, Mendoza Hernandez’s attorney maintains his client was shot before he tried to flee.
Four days before the shooting, TPD conducted a traffic stop for a vehicle code violation in the parking lot of a Panda Express in downtown Turlock. TPD has not confirmed what exactly the vehicle code violation was for, but Mendoza Hernandez’s family says it was for a cracked windshield.
The vehicle TPD stopped, a black Toyota C-HR, was the same one Mendoza Hernandez was driving when he was shot by ICE officers last week. His fiancée, publicly identified only as Cindy, said the Toyota is registered in her name and that it took TPD a while to find Mendoza Hernandez in the system during the stop.
Initially TPD told The Modesto Bee that one officer and a translator conducted the stop. But on Wednesday, department spokesperson Dominique Sanchez said she misspoke — the second officer was backup, not a translator, per protocol. A third officer also arrived “to make sure everything was fine,” Sanchez said in a text.
An image shared with The Modesto Bee of the traffic stop shows three TPD cruisers behind the vehicle driven by Mendoza Hernandez. The back trunk to his Toyota and driver-side door is open.
TPD confirmed that Mendoza Hernandez was given a warning. No additional information about the stop has been provided as of Thursday morning. Sanchez stated that TPD ensured the allegations made against it were unfounded by reviewing body-worn camera footage of the stop and interviewing an officer involved.
“No internal investigation was required,” wrote Sanchez.
The Modesto Bee submitted a California Public Records Act request to TPD on April 10 for camera footage and other information related to the traffic stop. Agencies must respond within 10 days if they have responsive records. Delivering those materials, however, can take weeks or even months.
