Sheriff Arpaio’s Racial Profiling Campaign to Cost Maricopa County $22Million
by Liam O'Conner
Maricopa County,
Arizona, is going to have to stump up $22 million over the next 18
months to fund an on-going, highly contentious program of racial
profiling.
Sheriff Joe
Arpaio's tactic of targeting racial and ethnic minorities and forcing
them to turn over identifying documents was declared to be nothing more
than blatant racial profiling by a district judge in a ruling back in
May, 2013.
According to WLWT.com:
[box
type="shadow"]The sheriff's office had a history of targeting vehicles
with occupants with darker skin or Latino heritage, scrutinizing them
more strictly and detaining them more often, U.S. District Judge Murray
Snow ruled.[/box]
Arpaio,
who claims that he is rigorously enforcing immigration laws, is
challenging the ruling. In the mean time Judge Murray has ordered a
monitor to oversee the retraining of officers under Arpaio, and has
created a community advisory board to help address local grievances.
While
the legal challenges continue, the monitoring and creation of the board
will cost the county $21,943,107. Should the case go on, it will cost a
further $10 million per year.
This
farcical case represents an enormous waste of the taxpayer's money.
Arpaio's tactics were demonstrably racist from their inception. Now that
they have been proven to be so in a court of law, the Sheriff would do
his county an enormous service if he merely accepted the ruling and
backed down.
However, sadly, demagogues rarely go quietly.
h/t: WLWT
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