Chittenden County Sheriff’s Department Sgt. Scott Costella was patrolling far outside his jurisdiction near the Canadian border in West Berkshire on July 19 when he pulled over a car with two dairy farmworkers. Within minutes, he summoned Border Patrol agents to the scene.
That led to the deportation of the car’s passenger, 22-year-old Alex Genri Jimenez, and prompted an investigation into whether Costella violated state policing policy that limits collaboration with federal immigration authorities.
But the incident, brought to light by the advocacy group Migrant Justice on August 10, also raised another question: Why was a sworn member of the Chittenden County Sheriff’s Department patrolling along Vermont’s border with Canada that Sunday morning?
Costella was participating in an obscure federal program called Operation Stonegarden, which pays local officers to work overtime shifts assisting the feds with border enforcement. Despite Vermont’s strict policies meant to prohibit state and local officers from enforcing federal immigration law, such arrangements are common across northern Vermont.
Law enforcement and elected leaders have defended Stonegarden as permissible, saying deputies on the shifts focus on crimes such as drug or human smuggling — not civil immigration violations. But Costella’s traffic stop shows how easily the line between the two can blur.
“We’ve always said the existence of Stonegarden agreements are antithetical to the purpose, concept and goals of the Fair and Impartial Policing Policy and would inevitably lead to violations,” said Will Lambek, a spokesperson for Migrant Justice, “and that is exactly what has happened in this instance.”
Migrant Justice revealed details about Costella’s traffic stop on Monday, the eve of a primary election in which Chittenden County Sheriff Dan Gamelin faced a Democratic primary challenge from Kevin Bloom. Gamelin released a statement that night reaffirming that “Vermont law enforcement has no role in enforcing federal immigration law.” (He went on to win the nomination.)
But records obtained by Seven Days show Vermont state troopers, sheriffs deputies and local cops are regularly clocking in to work shifts under the instruction of the U.S. Border Patrol. When they see something deemed suspicious, they can call in the feds.
Operation Stonegarden, a grant program administered by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, was created in the wake of 9/11 to improve collaboration between federal and local law enforcement on border security. Vermont agencies have participated for years.
In the federal fiscal year that ended in October 2024, Vermont agencies received a total of $760,000 through Stonegarden, which was divided among six law enforcement agencies: Chittenden County Sheriff’s Department, Swanton Village Police Department, Orleans County Sheriff’s Department, Essex County Sheriff’s Department, Newport City Police Department and Vermont State Police.
The Chittenden County Sheriff’s Department received $218,854, more than any other Vermont agency that year. The grant awards fluctuate, and in 2025, Vermont agencies received a total of just $150,000, significantly less than previous years.
The money can make up a significant portion of local agencies’ budgets: In 2024, Stonegarden funding made up one-fifth of the Swanton Village Police Department’s operating budget, the Boston Globe reported in November.
Most departments use the money primarily to pay their officers an overtime rate for shifts patrolling the border, according to applications each department filed for funding in 2024, obtained by Seven Days through a records request. But the money has also been used to buy special equipment.
The Orleans County Sheriff’s Office bought an ATV with all-terrain tracks and night vision goggles to help with evening patrols. The Newport Police Department, which has been participating in Stonegarden since 2009, bought snowmobiles, ATVs and a boat for patrolling bodies of water.
“We have been involved in many incidents that have led to Drug and Currency siezures [sic] and apprehension of illegal entries into the US,” the Orleans Sheriff’s department’s application for funding says. “There has also been numerous intelligence reports from our patrols that have been gathered and assist with the overall mission of border security.”
Seven Days obtained the departments’ applications from the Vermont Department of Public Safety. The overtime rates that officers were to be paid for shifts were redacted. So, too, were the number of shifts that departments expected to work. A request for officers’ daily incident reports from Stonegarden shifts was denied.
In an interview on Thursday, Sheriff Gamelin stood by his statement that his deputies are not expected to enforce federal immigration law, even during Stonegarden shifts. Their objective is to assist with “drug trafficking interdiction, gun interdiction, human trafficking and human smuggling interdiction,” he said.
“We cannot do any immigration enforcement on that program,” Gamelin said. “We have to follow the [Fair and Impartial Policing] Policy of the state and my own policy.”
Gamelin said his department has participated in Stonegarden for about 15 years, and this is the first time he’s aware of an apparent conflict with the Fair and Impartial Policing Policy. He said officers are paid time and a half for Stonegarden shifts, and that about six of his deputies participate — some signing up for a shift a week.
Traffic stops like the one Costella initiated are supposed to be handled without notifying federal authorities, Gamelin said. But he also acknowledged that the expectations can appear to conflict.
“It puts you in a tough situation when you’re working up there,” he said. “But if you do it right, you shouldn’t have any issues.”
When asked what a deputy on a Stonegarden shift should do if they see someone who appears to have just walked across the border, Gamelin said, “I wouldn’t even touch that. We can’t notify [Border Patrol] that you have somebody that just came across the border.”
When asked if that wasn’t part of the point of Stonegarden, he reconsidered.
“It’s illegal to do it,” he said of crossing the border. “So if it’s smuggling somebody across the border, then that’s criminal activity, so that is different, I think.”
Costella, who has been with the department for 25 years, has been reassigned to non-patrol duties while an investigation is under way into whether he violated policy by calling Border Patrol.
Bodycam footage and police reports from the July 19 incident show Costella was patrolling dirt roads along the border when he passed a car without a front license plate. He turned around to follow the car and then conducted a traffic stop after learning the registration was also expired.
After asking the car’s driver for his license, insurance and registration, Costella returned to his cruiser to grab his cellphone. Two minutes after making the traffic stop, he texted two Border Patrol agents: “potato hill rd on stop,” followed by a second message: “need one of you,” according to a copy of the messages released by Migrant Justice.
Border Patrol agents arrived 25 minutes later, and detained the car’s passenger, Jimenez, a dairy farmworker who had been in Vermont for about two years. The driver, also a Franklin County farmworker, was not detained.
Migrant Justice called the incident a clear violation of the Fair and Impartial Policing Policy, which prohibits Vermont law enforcement from sharing any information about an individual with federal immigration authorities except in cases where public or officer safety or other law enforcement needs make it necessary.
At least one sheriff has called for amending the policy because of the way it conflicts with the border security work his office does as part of Stonegarden.
Essex County Sheriff Trevor Colby brought his concerns about the policy to the Vermont Criminal Justice Council last September. He said he doesn’t have a problem with not asking people about their immigration status himself, but said he should be able to call Border Patrol to investigate.
“If I’m doing an investigation and somebody has illegally entered the country along the border, our general practice is going to be to put them in contact with Border Patrol,” Colby told the committee.
“It feels like this policy blurs the line between civil immigration enforcement and criminal enforcement,” he said. “And that is the issue I really have.”
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