Charges Filed Against Alleged Grafton Cop Shooter; Officials Affirm Officer Conduct Was Proper

GRAND FORKS, ND (trfnews.i234.me) Federal charges were filed Wednesday morning against Ruben Cruz. He’s the man who allegedly shot Grafton Police Officer, Lucas Campoverde on August 14th. Federal prosecutor Drew Wrigley says there is no evidence of any wrong doing by officers who returned fire and wounded Cruz. The Officer and Cruz have been released from the hospital. Cruz remains in jail with no bail set.
Neil Berg here in grand forks at the federal courthouse where uh the u.s attorney drew wrigley is talking about charges now filed against ruben cruz in the officer-involved shooting in grafton here’s all of that news conference prior to the events that we were addressing today in the courthouse here in grand forks in federal court prior to those events the defendant in this case had been charged with being with being a drug dealer by federal court in south dakota on february i’m sorry on august on august 14th we have alleged in our charging documents and the grand jury has indicted this defendant on august 14th of dramatically elevating his state of play beyond being an alleged drug dealer as you’ll see in our federal indictment the grand jury has returned an indictment including overt acts focusing on the attempted murder of a grafton police officer officer campa verde is not able to be here today but i spoke with him yesterday and we’re all we’re all pleased obviously and we’re all fortunate that he is surviving his injuries so today the grand jury we’ve we’ve announced the grand jury’s indictment of the defendant reuben cruz with at this point three additional federal counts two involving allegations of his work and conspiracy in drug dealing and the third one of those and using a firearm both possessing brandishing and using that firearm in furtherance of his drug crime under federal law which i should point out i want to thank their participants here today and we’re all available for your questions to my immediate right is the state’s attorney from walsh county north dakota she has been up there for quite some number of years we were talking about that going on 20 years as an assistant state’s attorney and now the state’s attorney for walsh county uh state’s attorney kelly cole back uh in the far right here is the chief of police from grafton north dakota we won’t be talking about the facts of that night but i can share with you that the chief responded to these events as well i’ve been out to the scene of these alleged occurrences last friday and have seen the proximity of the crime scene uh to the law enforcement center and it’s quite something also responding that night was the sheriff from walsh county uh sheriff jergens is back here to my left a chief police dumas as i said states attorney cole i wanted to point out that uh from the very beginning the the the hours uh after these these occurrences that i was in contact by phone with my state law state and county law enforcement partners it’s important for people to recognize that we’re working hand in glove on these matters i appreciate very much the state’s attorney showing up today there are obviously state charges that could be brought to bear in this matter as well uh we’ve worked out in the ensuing days of what the appropriate sequence would be federal charging and then other matters to be addressed up ahead federal law enforcement is working hand in glove with chief dumas and with sheriff jurgens the north dakota bci and others who are working on this north dakota highway patrol a host of other agencies that are working we appreciate it very much it’s important i think that people see that united front where appropriate and i would tell you that we presented this matter to the grand jury because this is one of those cases where appropriate federal law provides we all call an elevated forceful appropriate set of options in response to escalations of and severity of violence as i said at the beginning of this the defendant in this case walked into that day as an alleged drug dealer under an indictment out of south dakota my federal counterparts down in south dakota and at the end of that day and now as a result of this federal grand jury indictment he stands as a twice accused federal drug trafficker and conspirator and elevated his his state of play his level of play to the attempted murder of a grand forks north dakota i’m sorry a grafton north dakota police officer you heard that if you were in the hearing i know a couple of you were the potential penalties under federal law and i point out that those would be in addition to anything that would happen under state law just at the foundation point the allegations of the grand jury today hold under our federal indictment here for the drug components of it mandatory sentences of 10 years mandatory sentences of 10 years and up the alleged violence that the grand jury has said they are alleging a company that drug trafficking brings additional minimum of 10 years consecutive that’s before anyone hears the first bit of evidence about officer campa verde taking a bullet and the uh circumstances inside of grafton which i it was interesting chief dumas told me last friday when i was in grafton that it was the first time in grafton’s history that there had been an exchange of gunfire with law enforcement in that community so before anyone has heard any evidence in addition to that if and when these allegations become convictions the defendant is facing in federal court a mandatory minimum sentence of 20 years and we’re just talking about the federal indictments here in north dakota that says nothing of the indictments in south dakota but that will take us some questions unless you have some statements you’d like to make beforehand any of you can you talk about whether all the officers involved in the shooting of mr cruz have been cleared of any wrongdoing and can you talk more specifically about the timeline there’s been some suggestion that once mr cruz was already shot he was shot again yeah i don’t know where you heard a suggestion like that and i don’t know why you would raise a question of any uh allegations of wrongdoing for nothing along those lines nothing in the facts that i’ve heard about this case and i’m not aware of any any substantial or credible allegations of wrongdoing by anyone but they’re going through their administrative processes obviously federal state local law enforcement working together and those those matters will be vetted out up ahead but have heard no no credible allegations of anything along that along those lines at all and there are plenty of witnesses out there is the minimum 10 or 20 years well there because i didn’t state it correctly it’s 20 because they have to be stacked the 924c the firearms charges the discharge of a firearm in this instance the attempted murder we allege the attempted murder of officer campo verde that has to be stacked on top of that is consecutive under federal law to any any sentence for the drug the drug trafficking crime or any other uh allegations or other crimes in this case so you’ve got the mandatory minimum of 10 years on the drug case and then the if there’s a conviction on the firearms uh component of it that’d be ten years consecutive so it’s a mandatory you’re looking at mandatory sentences if convicted of a minimum of 20 years on just the on the just the north dakota indictments alone and that’s only on the federal side says nothing of the federal indictment out of south dakota says nothing of any state charges that might come down the road in north dakota was bail set today uh no they waived uh even a detention discussion today and uh they could have had they’re entitled to have that within a number of days i think the judge said it would have been monday and uh they waived that indefinitely and so it’s it’s undetermined whether they’re even going to seek to have him released you’ve got experienced counsel there they’re aware of the factors that go into a release decision uh we’ll see but uh until further notice that that hearing is not set is it common to survey search warrant at that or an arrest warrant at that time of day common um well i mean you talk to any any men and women in in law enforcement they’ll tell you you know the time of day unlike the rest of us the time of day isn’t the determinant of their work right and their work goes on around the clock and uh it’s you know time of day when they’re certain there’s a federal warrant or there’s a state warrant for somebody and law enforcement has uh a beat on their whereabouts they do the very best they can to make sure that that warrant is executed with safety for everyone involved for the public safety for law enforcement obviously and safety for the people who they’re seeking to bring into custody the allegations in this case uh you know bear out and i think i’ll leave it to the indictment i don’t want to go into far into the uh the facts that are being alleged from that night there are overt acts that’s a public document as of now that we’ve had this hearing that’s been unsealed and be available for all of your review so can you talk about the timeline at all what happened and who fired well no we’re not going to talk about uh not talk about that right now um but you know as these court hearings proceed there’s there’s some discussion but really the time for all that becomes if there’s a when there’s a trial in this matter and that got scheduled today as well uh tentatively scheduled for november third in front of judge welty in federal court i presumably that would be down in down in fargo and uh they had some dates also for pre-trial motions that it’s you know more typical maybe especially in the area of cove 19 that this would be for a little further on down the road but the investigation continues uh as to uh as to mr cruz and his associates in grand forks i’m Neil Berg reporting for trfnews.i234.me