Pueblo Police officers feared ‘aggressive’ cop, now he’s a deputy for Teller County
PUEBLO, Colo. (KRDO) -- In May 2020, just days following a fatal officer-involved shooting on the east side, Pueblo police officers working the night shifts were called into the station so that investigators with the Pueblo County Sheriff's Office and Pueblo Police Department could ask questions about the shooting by a Pueblo police officer on May 15.
Most of the questions didn't focus on the shooting, but the shooter.
"I think he is a loose cannon," one Pueblo Police officer told investigators. "I don't want to be near him."
That’s how former Pueblo Police officer Brandon Victor is described in an internal affairs investigation by his own coworkers.
The internal affairs investigation into Victor was launched after he shot three suspects in three separate cases across ten months as a patrolman in the Steel City. The IA investigation coincides with the 10th Judicial District Attorney's Critical Incident Team's own investigation into the May 15 shooting.
According to his disciplinary records, Victor resigned from the Pueblo police force in the midst of an internal affairs investigation. He’s still carrying a badge and a gun, working now as a deputy in the Teller County Sheriff's Office.
'He is going to get one of us killed'
Across more than a dozen audio recordings obtained by 13 Investigates, a common theme continued to reappear in each interview: Victor's behavior on the job.
Some of his coworkers said Victor was a "proactive" patrol officer, especially when it came to finding stolen vehicles. During interviews with investigators, a large majority of Victor's fellow officers characterized him as reckless, hot-headed, and unstable.
"He has like an ego problem," said one officer. "He always has to prove something."
"Victor just snapped on me," said another officer when recalling an incident with Victor at the scene of an arrest. "He is like get the f*** off my scene. He's so aggressive."
"Basically he is going to get one of us killed," said a third officer that went through the police academy with Victor. "Or he’s going to end up going to jail, or a civil lawsuit. Frankly, I don't want to work with him."
One officer told the investigators that a common joke amongst the officers was "Don’t run from Victor," painting him as "trigger happy."
Following Victor's second officer-involved shooting on March 20, 2020, officers told investigators they were disturbed by something Victor said during an exchange with one of his fellow Pueblo police officers.
"[Victor] starts going back and forth kind of just talking s**t back and forth," said a first-hand witness. "Then Brandon kinda got serious like, 'You better watch out for me man. I’ve already shot two people’."
"When I heard that that really took me back," said another Pueblo police officer. "You don’t, you don’t say that. Joking or not that’s jacked up."
The shootings
After graduating from the Pueblo Police Academy, Victor started his first job as a patrol officer in March of 2018. He resigned from the job in July of 2020.
In ten months as an officer in Pueblo, Victor pulled the trigger in three shootings while on the job.
The first occurred in July of 2019, Victor shot and killed a suspect who threw a butcher's knife at officers following a domestic violence call at the 1700 block of East 5th Street.
Four days after the shooting was deemed justified in March of 2020, Victor found a stolen truck near the intersection of 13th Street and Deane Lane.
The 10th Judicial District Attorney's Office says a suspect drove the truck toward Victor's partner in an effort to flee.
Victor fired multiple rounds in the direction of the driver, effectively stopping the truck. The driver was injured but not killed.
The third shooting happened on May 15, 2020. Victor was on patrol when he spotted another stolen vehicle near the intersection of Reading Street and E. 4th Street.
Officer Victor reported that he approached the vehicle alone, first believing no one was in the stolen vehicle. Then he came to the belief that the two occupants were asleep.
"As he went out with the car I was sitting there thinking to myself, 'Man we are going to have fricken shots fired'," said one of Victor's fellow officers who was working May 15. "Within thirty seconds, sure as s***, we did."
As Victor reached for the door of the stolen vehicle, the driver woke up. Victor told investigators he gave commands for the driver to turn off the vehicle, but he didn't obey.
"He reached over with his left hand towards the center console," Victor said. "I don’t know what possibly he would cross his body to grab and I thought he had a gun."
Victor told investigators he reached into the open window of the vehicle to stop the driver. That's when the driver hit the gas.
“He was either pulled or dragged by the vehicle," PPD Capt. Kenny Rider told KRDO that morning. "And the officer pulled out his handgun and was dragged by the vehicle.”
According to the incident report, Victor fired several rounds into the open window as the vehicle crashed into a nearby fence.
The driver, 31-year old Anthony Avila was pronounced dead at the scene. Sarah Naranjo, Avila's girlfriend and the sole passenger in the vehicle, was hit several times but lived. Naranjo told investigators with the Pueblo County Sheriff's Office she woke up in the car to the shots.
"I was just scared," Victor said to investigators. "I don’t want to take someone's life. I don’t want to hurt anybody."
The Pueblo Police Department Policy manual says, "It is the policy of this department that members shall activate their body-worn cameras when such use is appropriate to the proper performance of his or her official duties." Despite this policy, Brandon Victor did not activate his body-worn camera before approaching the stolen vehicle. In the days following the incident, Victor told investigators he thought he had turned on his camera before approaching, but the camera never recorded the incident. Investigators can only rely on Victor's word.
13 Investigates also obtained video of Victor's interview with investigators following the third officer-involved shooting:
Investigator: You know it’s a stolen vehicle?
Victor: Correct.
Investigator: And you air that to dispatch?
Victor: Correct.
Investigator: Do you call for cover at that point?
Victor: At that time I believe the dispatch had given a '20' on the channel, and I remember people coming out to come cover me.
Investigator: Do you remember where your cover is coming from?
Victor: I don't really recall.
Investigator: You do know they are coming.
Victor: I do know they are coming.
After the shooting, Victor's fellow officers said they were concerned.
"If they are asleep, why are you going to approach the car?" one Pueblo police officer questioned. "You knew somebody was coming. I just thought that was careless. He's acting so careless. That whole call, it doesn't make sense."
"We are always told ... you are supposed to know where your cover's at," said another officer. "We don't feel like he does that, and he puts all the rest of us into situations."
Two months later in July of 2020, Victor resigned in the midst of an internal affairs investigation and two ongoing officer-involved shooting investigations being conducted by the 10th Judicial District Attorney's Office and their Critical Incident Team.
Four months later in November 2020, the District Attorney's Office released the findings from Victor's March shooting and May shooting -- both were ruled justified. However, District Attorney Jeff Chostner added a quick caveat to his finding.
In the review, Chostner said the missing body camera footage would have reflected misconduct by the officer if the Enhance Law Enforcement Integrity Bill, which passed during the 2020 Legislative Session, was in effect. The law requires mandatory discipline up to termination for an officer who fails to turn on their body camera.
After the shootings
“Listening to the audio and reading the documents, it made me have a chill go down my spine,” said Sean Simeson, an attorney for Naranjo and Avila's family.
On behalf of Naranjo and the Avila family, Simeson filed a federal lawsuit in October seeking damages. The suit alleges Victor used excessive force in the May 15, 2020 shooting, and it also includes failure to train and failure to discipline complaints against the city of Pueblo as well.
According to Victor's disciplinary records obtained by 13 Investigates, the Pueblo police officer received verbal counseling after damaging a police vehicle in March of 2020, and received a warning letter after losing a citizens property in December of 2019.
The disciplinary records show Victor resigned before he could be disciplined during a Pueblo PD internal investigation - the investigation was looking into violations of officer efficiency, safety and when to initiate a pursuit.
The civil suit against Victor also alleges that he breached department policy when he failed to wait for additional officers to respond before approaching a stolen vehicle and was reckless in his actions.
According to the Pueblo PD Policy Manual under the traffic stops category, it states the following:
'While conducting unknown-risk stops, the officer should follow the same procedures as for
conducting traffic violator stops and request a cover officer. Consideration should be given
to waiting for a cover officer to arrive prior to making the traffic stop and/or approaching the
vehicle.'
Simeson provided the audio recordings of interviews between investigators and Pueblo police officers to 13 Investigates.
“I think a majority of his fellow officers at the Pueblo Police department -- well their words speak for themselves.”
"He is not afraid to flaunt he has been in officer-involved shootings," a Pueblo police officer said.
In the suit, Simeson outlines many of the audio recordings. Including one Pueblo police officer who says, "Victor was proudly showing videos of one of his previous killings to anybody who would watch."
Nearly a year after his resignation from PPD, Victor became a Deputy Sheriff in Teller County in June 2021, where he works today.
“There are a lot of police officers and agencies out there that would like to have an individual like this on the payroll," Simeson said. "It should be apparent to them cause it is apparent to me and most other people including most other police officers at least in Pueblo that this person is a liability and presents a danger to the community.”
On to Teller County
Victor's lawyer stressed to 13 Investigates that all three shootings were justified. He did not want to comment on all the allegations from other officers or allow his client to speak on camera.
The Teller County Sheriff's Office and Sheriff Jason Mikesell declined to comment on our story, along with the police unions for both Pueblo and Teller County. 13 Investigates requested disciplinary records for Victor from the Teller County Sheriff's Office and we were told no such records exist.
According to Victor's application for a deputy position with TCSO, the reason he left his former employer was due to "leadership" concerns within the Pueblo Police Department.
Pueblo Police Chief Chris Noeller, who was appointed after the shootings, provided a statement to 13 Investigates in regards to Victor's tenure in the department:
"With respect to the May 15, 2020 shooting death of 31-year-old Robert Avila by Pueblo police officer Brandon Victor, the matter was subject to a very thorough investigation by the Pueblo County Sheriff's Office as part of the Tenth Judicial District Critical Incident Team protocol," Noeller said. "A detailed report was completed by the Pueblo County Sheriff's Office and reviewed by the Pueblo County District Attorney, and as a result, Officer Victor was cleared of any criminal liability. His employment with the Pueblo Police Department ended on July 2, 2020. We have no further comment due to pending litigation."
Due to their involvement with the federal suit, 13 Investigates also reached out to the city of Pueblo for comment on Victor's tenure at the department. A spokesperson for the city said they had "no further comment due to pending litigation," and provided the same statement from Chief Noeller.
On Dec. 28, the city of Pueblo filed a motion for dismissal of Simeson's suit. In the suit, the city says, "What happened to Mr. Avila and Ms. Naranjo is a tragic incident, but this incident was not caused by, and cannot be attributed to, the actions of the City of Pueblo."
In the motion, the city says it has provided constitutionally sufficient training to its officers, including Victor, when it comes to "implementation and constitutional limits of using force and deadly force."
In a response to the motion to dismiss filed Jan 18, Simeson stands firm with his original claim:
"Defendant Victor’s alarming and violent history has been ignored despite repeated fatal shootings and multiple personal complaints from fellow officers. Defendant Pueblo is liable under a theory of municipal liability because Defendant Victor was not disciplined for his unlawful uses of deadly force, and because he was improperly and inadequately trained in the constitutional limitations of the use of deadly force, which was the proximate cause of Plaintiffs’ injuries and damages. These failures show a deliberate indifference by Defendant Pueblo towards the constitutional rights of persons with whom the police come into contact, leading to the probable result that more people like Robert Avila and Sarah Naranjo will be unjustifiably shot and killed."
13 Investigates reached out to the Teller County Commissioners for comment on Victor's employment. According to Teller County's general fund, commissioners allocated more than $4.8 million for the Sheriff's Office for the fiscal year 2021. That amount made up a little more than a quarter of the total expenditures for the 2021 general fund, and was by far the highest expenditure in the 2021 general fund. The second highest is the Sheriff's Office detention center with a little more than 13% of the general fund's expenditures.
Despite their financial investment into the Sheriff's Office, Teller County Commissioners could not provide answer to our questions about our report.
"We cannot answer any of your specific questions because we have no specific knowledge related to them. The Teller County Sheriff is an autonomous elected official and is responsible for personnel decisions ... We have great confidence in Sheriff Mikesell and he has our full support," said a statement from Teller County Commissioners
