Audit finds $163 million misused in Maricopa County sheriff’s racial profiling settlement
Auditors found that nearly three-quarters of the $226 million spent by the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office since 2013 on reforms mandated by the Melendres v. Arpaio case was either misattributed or misappropriated.
An audit of the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office has determined that approximately $163 million of the $226 million spent since 2013 on a racial profiling settlement was misattributed or misappropriated. The funds were established following a 2013 federal court ruling in Melendres v. Arpaio, which identified constitutional violations including racial profiling against Latino drivers. Despite the findings, current Sheriff Jerry Sheridan and the Republican-majority Maricopa County Board of Supervisors have opposed continued federal court oversight, arguing the reforms are too costly.
The audit, conducted by William Ansbrow and Eric Melancon, found that only $63 million of the total expenditure was appropriately charged to the settlement. The remaining sum covered expenses unrelated to court-ordered reforms, including $1.5 million in renovations to office space for the Professional Standards Bureau in a Phoenix high-rise, more than $7,000 in cable television subscriptions, and $3,259 in car washes for patrol vehicles. The auditing team stated that such mischaracterisation misleads the public on the cost of reform efforts and undermines the court’s credibility.
Financial records also revealed significant discrepancies in personnel and equipment costs. The department purchased 950 body cameras at a cost of $8.6 million, exceeding the court’s requirement for 434 to 513 cameras, and bundled $1.7 million in Tasers, which were not court-ordered, with the camera purchase. Of the 209 positions charged to the settlement at the start of the 2025 fiscal year, the audit found only 55 could be reasonably attributed to court orders, with 84 inappropriately attributed and 70 partially related.
The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors provided no meaningful oversight of these expenses, rarely questioning them in public budget hearings over nearly a decade. Supervisors Thomas Galvin and Kate Brophy McGee defended the county’s budgeting practices, stating that the audit’s scrutiny exceeded the original racial profiling complaints. They argued that the Hispanic residents concerned with racial profiling are unaffected by how the county allocates costs, and that the board declines to participate in further arguments over compliance costs.
Sheriff Jerry Sheridan’s attorneys have joined a motion to end court oversight, which is currently pending before U.S. District Judge G. Murray Snow. Snow has yet to clear the department in two key areas: racial disparities in traffic stops and a backlog of uninvestigated misconduct claims. The American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona opposes ending oversight until full compliance is achieved, while the county maintains that the reforms have become an undue financial burden on taxpayers.
