The Phoenix metro area sheriff’s office has been spending millions from the budget allocated for compliance costs in a racial profiling case linked to Joe Arpaio’s immigration crackdowns, on items largely unrelated to the court-mandated reforms, as per an expert’s report.
The Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office faced criticism in the Wednesday-released report for directing compliance funds toward personnel and tasks not aligned with the necessary overhaul.
The report highlighted several instances of questionable spending, including $2.8 million on surplus body-worn camera licenses that exceeded court requirements; $1.5 million for renovating and relocating an internal affairs office; over $1.3 million on 42 vehicles; and an $11,000 golf cart to transport staff from headquarters to internal affairs, despite already leasing parking space at that location.
Maricopa County taxpayers have borne the cost for over a decade to address constitutional breaches found in a 2013 verdict concerning profiling during Sheriff Arpaio’s immigration-focused patrols.
The profiling case was based on 20 major traffic operations targeting immigrants between January 2008 and October 2011, which resulted in a profiling verdict and prompted costly court-ordered reforms of the department’s traffic operations and internal affairs unit.
The county reports that $323 million has thus far been expended on legal costs, the staff monitoring the sheriff’s department, and the agency’s compliance costs. It projects the total to rise to $352 million by July 2026.
The federal judge presiding over the case expressed concerns about transparency in spending by the sheriff’s office and ordered a review, leading to the blistering report from budget analysts. The report was prepared by budget analysts picked by the case’s monitor.
The report concluded 72% of the $226 million in spending by the sheriff’s office from February 2014 to late September 2024 was either wrongly attributed or “improperly prorated” to a compliance fund.
Budget analysts who reviewed hundreds of employee records over roughly that time period found an average of 70% of all positions funded by compliance money were “inappropriately assigned or only partially related to compliance.”
Those expenditures were unrelated to or unnecessary for compliance, lacked appropriate justification or resulted from purposeful misrepresentation by the sheriff’s office, county leaders or both, the budget analysts wrote.
Sheriff Jerry Sheridan’s office released a statement saying its attorneys are reviewing the report to identify areas of common concern and any findings it may dispute. Sheridan, who took office this year, is the fourth sheriff to grapple with the case.
Raul Piña, a longtime member of a community advisory board created to help improve trust in the sheriff’s office, said the report opens up a broader conversation about the integrity of the sheriff’s office.
“You will have to double-check now whenever the agency talks about statistics,” Piña said.
Beginning earlier this year, county officials ramped up their criticism of the spending. They said the agency shouldn’t still be under the court’s supervision a dozen years after the verdict and shouldn’t still be paying such hefty bills, including about $30 million to those who monitor the agency on behalf of the judge since around 2014.
The report criticized Maricopa County and its governing board for a lack of oversight over the spending.
Thomas Galvin, chairman of the county’s governing board and a leading critic of the continued court supervision, said the board’s legal counsel is reviewing the report. “The board has confidence in MCSO’s budgeting team and will respond accordingly,” Galvin said.
Since the profiling verdict, the sheriff’s office has been criticized for disparate treatment of Hispanic and Black drivers in a series of studies of its traffic stops. The latest study, however, shows significant improvements. The agency’s also dogged by a backlog of internal affairs cases. While the agency has made progress on some fronts and garnered favorable compliance grades in certain areas, it hasn’t yet been deemed fully compliant with the court-ordered overhauls.
