AURORA, Colo. — Two men being held at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in Aurora are believed to have escaped the facility during a power outage, and police say they weren’t notified for hours.
Joel Jose Gonzalez-Gonzalez and Vido Romero Gueilond-Jose escaped from the Aurora ICE processing center late Tuesday and were still at large Wednesday night.
There are conflicting reports about the response to their escape.
An ICE spokesperson said in a statement that “local authorities were notified immediately and declined to assist with the search.”
The timeline provided by Aurora police tells a different story. According to APD’s report on the escape, the power went out at the ICE facility around 9:30 p.m. Tuesday, leaving one of the doors to an exit unlocked. ICE officials then began counting the detainees. APD estimates that around 10 p.m., officials believed that the two men had escaped. Officials finished the emergency headcount around 12:30 a.m. Wednesday, when they confirmed the men were missing, APD said. About two hours later, at 2:30 a.m., ICE GEO officials called 911 to report a possible escape. During that call, they requested APD's help.
"Due to the lack of information in the initial call, an APD watch commander called ICE GEO officials to clarify the limited and unclear information in the original call notes," APD said. "During the call with ICE GEO officials, the watch commander learned the escape happened approximately four and one-half hours before it was reported to police."
This did not meet APD's guidelines for a "hot" escape report, meaning the escape had happened within 15 minutes of a call to police, the department said.
APD said a patrol officer responded to the facility at 5:15 a.m. to take a report.
Aurora police also said they were told the last time Gonzalez-Gonzalez and Gueilond-Jose were accounted for was during a facility-wide count at 2 p.m. Tuesday.
The APD report cites the account of an assistant administrator at the ICE detention center, who told police the back doors to the facility opened during the power outage and said he believes that’s when the detainees escaped. Camera footage wasn’t available due to the power outage at the time police took the report, though the facility staffer told police he believed he would eventually be able to retrieve it.
“We received late notification about the incident and upon response learned the event occurred several hours prior,” Aurora police said in a statement to Denver7. “The Aurora Police Department is available to assist our federal partners with active public safety emergencies. As a municipal law enforcement agency, we do not enforce federal immigration law and cannot participate in large-scale searches or follow ups.”
APD said it was working with federal authorities to determine whether or not Gonzalez-Gonzalez and Gueilond-Jose had connections to Aurora.
The Aurora Police Department also shared a copy of its Memorandum of Understanding with ICE GEO — embedded below — to show the agreed-upon guidelines for APD when it receives calls for service from the facility.
Around noon on Thursday, APD Chief Todd Chamberlain issued a statement about the escapees, saying the department is "ready and willing" to help its federal partners, including those at the ICE GEO facility.
“In order for us to effectively respond to and assist our federal partners with calls for service, we need to receive timely and accurate information. That unfortunately did not happen, as demonstrated by the facts of this incident," the statement reads. “The Aurora Police Department is dedicated to serving and protecting the city of Aurora community. The ICE GEO facility is a holding center for people who come from all over the state of Colorado, not specifically from Aurora, and there (is) nothing to indicate at this time the escapees have any ties to our city. The city of Aurora did not create this situation, but I want to assure our residents that an active investigation is underway to determine if these individuals have any connection with Aurora. If these two men are hiding out in our city, we will find them and return them to custody.”
In its statement, ICE said it had also notified “additional state and federal law enforcement partners.”
Gonzalez-Gonzalez, 32, is described as being 5-foot-7, 165 pounds with short black hair, brown eyes and a tattoo on both arms. ICE says he entered the country illegally from Mexico in February of 2013. ICE arrested him on Feb. 12 after making contact with him at the Adams County Jail on Jan. 8.
Gueilond-Jose, 24, is described as being 6 feet tall, 185 pounds with short black hair and brown eyes. He allegedly came into the U.S. illegally from Venezuela in December of 2023. ICE arrested him on Feb. 27. The Douglas County Sheriff's Office told Denver7 its deputies arrested Gueilond-Jose a day earlier on charges of theft and resisting arrest. An immigration judge had ordered him to be deported a week earlier.
Denver7 has also reached out to Adams County for more information on the circumstances around Gonzalez-Gonzalez's initial arrest. ICE said only that both men had been arrested on "local charges."
- Denver7 is following up on this story Thursday in an effort to answer questions about the escape and the response. We will update this story with new information when we obtain it.