This Sheriff's Office Says Racial Profiling Reforms Are Too Costly. Auditors Found It Misused $163 Million.

[muriel_volestrangler]

Source: ProPublica

A federal judge in 2013 found the department under then-Sheriff Joe Arpaio had violated the constitutional rights of Latino drivers, and the court has required sweeping reforms. These include documenting all traffic stops to detect patterns of racial bias, employing additional investigators to probe reports of deputy misconduct and appointing a monitor to oversee the settlement.

Since Sheriff Jerry Sheridan took office last year, he and Republicans on the county’s Board of Supervisors have cited the cost of complying with these orders to call for an end to the settlement of the case known as Melendres v. Arpaio — even as reviews of the department’s traffic stops continue to show racial disparities affecting Latino residents. The lingering disparities amplified Latino leaders and community members’ concerns as the second Trump administration has boosted local law enforcement’s involvement in its mass deportation campaign.

Maricopa County, home to more than half of Arizona’s population, has approved $353 million in spending related to the settlement since 2013. But an audit of the sheriff’s office spending ordered by the court and a review of the public ledger by Arizona Luminaria and ProPublica show millions of dollars went to expenses that had little or nothing to do with the settlement. (The audit focused on $226 million that the sheriff’s office charged to the settlement over a 10-year period; it didn’t examine legal and monitoring costs or the two most recent department budgets.)

The auditors, who were hired by the monitor, found that nearly 72% of the sheriff’s office spending was misattributed or misappropriated. For example, the full cost of some services and salaries was assigned to the settlement when those jobs were completely unrelated or only partially related to court orders. Only $63 million was appropriately charged to the settlement, they said.

Read more: https://www.propublica.org/article/maricopa-county-sheriff-audit

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I think Trump has found his five-man board to administer the slush fund for traitors.

[OldBaldy1701E]

1. You know, I was never one of those ACAB people...

But, these so called 'law enforcement' types are making it so very hard not to be...

(ACAB=All Cops Are Bad)

[NoMoreRepugs]

2. The Republican tree is diseased, hard for the fruit not to be rotten.

[FakeNoose]

3. Someone should explain the labor-saving benefits of AI

Why did they hire an army of $$$-per-hour auditors when AI could have done the job for free?

[Zelda_Orchid]

4. For who?

Law enforcement abuses are much more costly to the public than the expense to fix it.

[malaise]

5. It's Institutional

Racism - they do not intend to stop it

[Boomerproud]

6. I knew who it was before reading the body of the article.

What a character as my grandma used to say.

[odins folly]

7. We were able to get rid of arpaio,

But the toxic shit he left behind remains. I wouldn’t classify all cops are bad either, however power corrupts. When you start to believe you are the law and not someone paid to enforce the law then your perspectives change.

And I honestly believe there is no such thing as a reformed racist piece of shit….