U.S. judge rebukes top aide of Arpaio

A Maricopa County Sheriff's administrator's decision to call a federal racial-profiling ruling "absurd" and "ludicrous" were made in the heat of the moment and do not reflect the agency's intention to prevent racial profiling among deputies, attorneys for Sheriff Joe Arpaio argued in U.S. District Court on Monday.

The remarks from Chief Deputy Jerry Sheridan drew a rebuke from U.S. District Judge Murray Snow and the agency will likely receive a letter that clarifies Snow's ruling in response to Sheridan's statements. But experts said the hearing was likely designed to put the agency on notice that Snow and his court-appointed monitor are paying close attentiont to how Sheriff Joe Arpaio's agency enacts the changes Snow ordered last year following his racial-profiling ruling.

Last week, Snow ordered Arpaio, Sheridan and their attorneys to attend the hearing after Snow was made aware of training the two officials gave to deputies during a crime suppression operation in mid October.

The training was required under a court ruling Snow issued in October that also triggered the appointment of a monitor to review Maricopa County Sheriff's operations and created other changes including the addition of cameras in every sheriff's patrol car.

Such status conferences are not uncommon in cases that involve court-ordered remedies, and judges often want to ensure early on that their orders are being obeyed, said University of Pittsburgh law professor David Harris, a University of Pittsburgh professor and national expert on racial profiling.

"Courts like least being purposefully ignored and flouted," Harris said. "They give an order and they expect it to be obeyed."

Snow on Monday cited an editorial Sheridan penned for The Arizona Republic, in which Snow said the Chief Deputy had mischaracterized Snow's order, as well as the comments Sheridan made during a training session for deputies who were about to engage in a large-scale patrol weeks after Snow's racial-profiling ruling was issued in October.

Snow said he was worried when he read the article that Sheridan was sending the wrong message, but that ultimately it was Sheridan's right to make public statements, but Snow made a distinction between those statements and training offered to deputies.

"It changes when we talk about how they instruct their officers," he said.

The racial-profiling case a group of citizens brought against the Sheriff's Office centered on how deputies acted during he agency's high profile crime-suppression operations that also served as an avenue for deputies to conduct immigration enforcement. But much of the trial that took place in downtown Phoenix in the summer of 2012 touched on the training that deputies received before embarking on large-scale operations.

Snow said he was concerned that Sheridan's remarks during the training briefing sent mixed messages to the deputies and a perceived "wink and nod" mentality about how to follow the court's orders.

Defense attorney Tim Casey said it was a blatant display of Sheridan's frustration. The Sheriff's Office has maintained that they fundamentally disagree with the court's ruling of racial discrimination, and have recently filed an appeal. The sheriff's defense attorneys have previously stated that the Sheriff's Office plans to concurrently comply with the court's orders while appealing.

"One of the most difficult things that we as human beings experience in life is change," Casey said. "Sometimes change is imposed on us by a number of factors, including a court order."

Sheridan echoed Casey's sentiments when he addressed Snow directly.

"I'm ashamed of the things I said during that briefing," Sheridan said on Monday. "I mischaracterized your order, there is no doubt about that. I had gotten some facts incorrect … I was very emotional."

Sheridan said in an interview after the hearing that his remarks gave Snow room to question the agency's sincerity about living up to the spirit of the court order.

"I would argue that while I was passionate that day, my actions prior to, and since then, speak very loudly," Sheridan said in an interview Monday evening.

As an example, Sheridan said deputies are out on the streets right now, verbalizing over the radio the exact reason for making their traffic stops. The issue had been a disagreement between Snow and Sheridan in the past, and Sheridan mentioned it to exemplify that even on issues he disagrees with, that he will follow the order to the letter.

Snow said he would require a corrective letter to be distributed to the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office would effectively correct Sheridan and Arpaio's past statements, and will summarize more than 200 pages of court decisions, including the court's factual findings and mandatory changes for the agency.

Snow additionally addressed the community relations requirements of the October ruling which were meant to repair the Latino residents' mistrust of the Sheriff's Office.

Specifically, Snow took issue with the appointment of sheriff's deputy Hector Martinez as the community liaison officer.

Martinez, who was a member of the human smuggling unit, had previously made statements in a separate Department of Justice racial profiling lawsuit that indicated that he clearly found no wrongdoing in the Sheriff's Office's treatment of Latinos, said Dan Pochoda, legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona. Pochoda said Martinez's engrained attitudes did not instill trust in the Latino community, whose members should feel comfortable taking complaints to the community liaison.

Snow said that in light of a number of complaints he has received about the meetings, in addition to the sheriff's aversion to being involved, he proposed to instead transfer the meeting reigns from the Sheriff to Robert Warshaw, the court-appointed monitor for the case.

Snow said he would draft a modified order on this point that he will submit to both parties.

An attorney for the plaintiffs said after the hearing that the proceeding should put the Sheriff's Office on notice that Snow expects for the agency to take his order seriously.

"What we saw today was the court taking a serious step to say to MCSO that the court's orders will be complied with," said Cecillia Wang, director of ACLU Immigrants' Rights Project.

"Chief Deputy Sheridan acknowledged that he made a serious blunder in making statements to the MCSO rank and file and to the community here in Maricopa County that would tend to countermand the court's orders," she said.

--/

Harris said there is always a period of adjustment for law enforcement agencies who are ordered to make changes to their operations, and varying degrees of investment from the parties.

Even for some cities and agencies that have not been found liable but have entered consent decrees, Harris said, it becomes clear to the judges that officials are not really interested in cooperating, just running out the clock. Harris noted one instance involving the Cincinnati Police Department's federal oversight when the police chief had the agency's court-appointed monitor thrown out of the CPD headquarters. The judge in this case heard about the incident as well.

Harris said Monday's hearing was the judge's way of seeing what he's dealing with while everyone is trying to figure out a way to move forward.

"He didn't want something like this to just pass, that would be tantamount to tolerating it," Harris said. "The judge is giving notice to these guys that, 'no winks and nods, you do what the order says. I am watching'."

Arpaio did not speak in court on Monday, but briefly addressed the media outside the Sandra Day O'Connor U.S. Courthouse just after the hearing adjourned.

"Certain items were discussed in the court and we'll see what happens," he said. "All I'm going to tell you is that we will be appealing this case."

Snow's ruling issued in October brought an end to a long running racial-profiling lawsuit that began when Manuel de Jesus Ortega Melendres, a Mexican tourist legally in the United States, was stopped outside a church in Cave Creek where day laborers were known to gather. Melendres, the passenger in a car driven by a White driver, claimed that deputies detained him for nine hours and that the detention was unlawful.

Eventually, the case grew to include complaints from two Hispanic siblings from Chicago who felt they were profiled by sheriff's deputies, and an assistant to former Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon whose Hispanic husband claims he was detained and cited while White motorists nearby were treated differently.

The lawsuit did not seek monetary damages. Instead, plaintiffs asked for the kind of relief the Sheriff's Office has resisted in the past: a declaration that spells out what deputies may or may not do when stopping potential suspects, and a court-appointed monitor to make sure the agency lives by those rules.

Snow delivered just about everything the plaintiffs, represented by the American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona, had asked for, Pochoda said at the time.

The ruling included some immediate changes to sheriff's policies that reinforce existing court injunctions against deputies detaining people based purely on a suspect's "unlawful presence" in the country without any other violations. The ruling also prohibits deputies from engaging in "pre-textual" traffic stops to engage in immigration screening, such as stopping cars for broken taillights to question the driver and passengers about their status — a hallmark of Arpaio's controversial immigration raids.

In closing, Snow acknowledged that while Monday's hearing was somewhat "painful" for all parties, he hoped that it served as a clarification of what is acceptable and unacceptable.

Snow took no corrective action Monday, and said he would prefer the Sheriff's Office complies with the order so he is not forced to make that decision, but the judge left little doubt that he would take action.

"I am perfectly willing to do it if I have to," he said.