Maricopa sheriff's office stays under federal watch as judge says racial-profiling reforms are not yet durable

Society · Civil rights & policing · September 13, 2026

Maricopa sheriff's office stays under federal watch as judge says reforms are not yet durable

A 72-page federal ruling keeps court supervision in place over the Arizona agency that became a national symbol of racial profiling. The decision does not say nothing has changed. It says the county has not yet proved that the changes will hold once the court steps away.

Maricopa CountyMelendres caseracial profilingcourt oversight

2007civil-rights case first filed

2013racial-profiling liability and first reform order

72 pagesSeptember 10 ruling denying full relief

60 daysfor the parties to propose narrower changes

The central question is no longer whether Maricopa County changed after the Joe Arpaio era. It is whether the safeguards are strong enough to survive without a federal monitor.

Thirteen years after a federal judge imposed sweeping reforms on the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office, the case has reached another turning point — but not an ending. Senior U.S. District Judge G. Murray Snow on September 10 denied Maricopa County and Sheriff Jerry Sheridan's request to terminate federal supervision, while leaving the door open to future relief. The order recognizes substantial progress, including a steep reduction in the misconduct-investigation backlog, but says unresolved racial disparities in traffic-stop data and questions about the durability of internal discipline remain too central to the original constitutional violations to justify ending the orders in one stroke. Snow instead directed the parties to spend the next 60 days identifying provisions that may now be modified, suspended or retired.

The Melendres litigation began with traffic stops and immigration enforcement, then expanded into a broader question: how a large law-enforcement agency proves that constitutional reforms have become self-sustaining.

01

What the judge decided — and what he did not

The September 10 order

The county sought relief under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 60(b), arguing that years of new policies, training and high compliance rates had made continued monitoring inequitable. Sheridan joined that request in January, and the U.S. Justice Department, a plaintiff-intervenor, supported substantial relief. Snow denied wholesale termination without prejudice, finding that the defendants had not yet shown that the remedies' central objectives would remain secure without the court. His order also created a narrower route: the parties must meet and confer and file a joint notice within 60 days identifying individual provisions that can be terminated or made inactive. The next phase is a line-by-line durability test, not an all-or-nothing vote on oversight.

The court's test is durability: will fair traffic-stop practices and fair internal discipline continue when the monitor is no longer looking over the agency's shoulder?

That is the through-line of the September ruling, rather than a claim that the Sheriff's Office has made no progress.

The latest order does not terminate the case. It asks the parties to identify narrower parts of the injunctions that may no longer need to remain active.

02

Why a traffic-stop case became an institutional reform case

From roadside encounters to internal affairs

The litigation began in 2007, when Latino motorists and community plaintiffs accused then-Sheriff Joe Arpaio's deputies of using race and Latino ancestry in immigration-related traffic enforcement. The court later found violations of the Fourth Amendment, the Equal Protection Clause and Title VI, and in 2013 ordered bias-free policing, training, detailed traffic-stop records, supervisory review, an early-identification system and independent monitoring. After later contempt findings exposed serious failures in internal affairs and discipline, a 2016 order expanded controls over complaints, investigations, conflicts and discipline. The exit standard is institutional: the county must show that systems meant to detect and correct misconduct can work reliably without a federal monitor.

2007

The case begins

2013

Liability and the first reform order

2016

Internal affairs becomes central

2022–2026

Backlog reduction, but new durability questions

Sept. 10, 2026

Full termination denied

Over time, the case moved from stopping specific conduct to testing whether the agency's own systems can identify and correct problems without outside intervention.

03

The traffic-stop data remains the hardest evidence to explain

Sampling versus the full record

The hardest unresolved evidence is statistical. Snow did not find that every current deputy acts with discriminatory intent; he questioned whether the county's studies were broad enough to prove that unequal treatment has ended. The court noted that analyses relied on by the Sheriff's Office excluded unusually long stops — including encounters involving suspected impaired driving, language barriers or other complications — and that the omitted encounters made up at least half of agency stops in 2024 and 2025. A plaintiffs' expert who analyzed all 2023–2024 stop data found an average 4.7-minute duration gap between Hispanic and white drivers, while the 2024 annual review found Hispanic-driver stops more likely to end in arrest. Those disparities do not by themselves prove intentional discrimination, but they are exactly the signals the monitoring system was created to test and explain.

Signal 14.7 minutes

Signal 2More arrests

Method issueExcluded long stops

The dispute is now heavily statistical: what data should count, what disparities remain, and what those patterns say about the durability of bias-free policing.

04

Internal affairs improved dramatically — then raised fresh concerns

The second pillar of oversight

The Professional Standards Bureau shows both the strongest progress and the newest concern. A misconduct-investigation backlog that exceeded 2,100 cases in late 2022 had fallen to roughly 371 by May 2026, a major operational improvement. But Snow's durability inquiry asks what happens after the pressure of court supervision disappears. The monitor's 46th quarterly report raised concerns about senior management involvement in closed disciplinary matters and the treatment of a bureau commander who resisted reopening cases. MCSO disputed the monitor's characterization and argued that some decisions reflected legitimate management authority. The judge did not declare every disputed action a violation; he concluded that the recent record left enough uncertainty about independent, consistent discipline to make full termination premature.

The county's case

New leadership, rewritten policies, training and a sharply smaller misconduct backlog show substantial institutional change.

The court's concern

Traffic-stop disparities and recent discipline disputes leave the court unconvinced that every safeguard is self-sustaining.

The court's focus is not only how many misconduct files are open, but whether investigations and discipline will remain fair and consistent after supervision ends.

05

Jerry Sheridan's return makes the durability question unusually personal

A former chief deputy is now sheriff

Sheridan's role gives the durability question unusual historical weight. He served as Arpaio's chief deputy during part of the period when the court found that command staff undermined implementation of its orders, and the 2026 decision recounts earlier findings about his authority over internal affairs and disciplinary decisions. Sheridan returned years later as an elected sheriff in a substantially changed agency and says today's office does not racially profile. His argument is that current deputies should not remain indefinitely bound by the failures of prior administrations. Snow's answer is narrower: leadership change matters, but so does evidence that present leaders will preserve the safeguards when judicial oversight no longer structures the system.

The case has become a test of leadership and systems rather than a replay of the original immigration sweeps.

06

The cost argument is real, but the numbers are contested

Taxpayer pressure versus court-ordered reform

County leaders say the case has become too expensive. After the ruling, Board of Supervisors Chair Kate Brophy McGee and Vice Chair Debbie Lesko argued that continued oversight diverts public money from law enforcement. The accounting is contested: Arizona Luminaria and ProPublica reported that a court-directed review found more than $163 million of roughly $226 million MCSO had attributed to reforms was unrelated to the orders or insufficiently supported. Some costs — monitoring, specialized reporting and compliance litigation — clearly arise from the case; training, supervision and ordinary discipline would exist anyway. The relevant question is which remaining expenses still support protections the court considers necessary.

County leaders say the oversight is too expensive; court-directed auditing has challenged how much spending should actually be attributed to the reform orders.

07

Why the Justice Department's position is notable

A plaintiff-intervenor now favors relief

The Justice Department's position adds a notable twist. DOJ intervened in 2015 to enforce federal civil-rights protections, but in the current Rule 60 proceeding it supported substantial relief for the county and sheriff, citing broad compliance. That strengthens the defendants' argument that the push to end supervision is not merely local political resistance. It does not bind the judge. The executive branch can change its view across administrations, while the district court independently decides whether the record satisfies Rule 60 and justifies dissolving its own injunctions.

The federal government now supports significant relief from the injunctions, but the court remains responsible for deciding whether the legal standard has been met.

08

What the ruling means for Latino communities now

Trust is part of the compliance problem

For Latino residents, the machinery of the case — stop data, complaint deadlines, supervisory reviews and monitoring — exists to reduce the risk that a driver is treated differently because of ancestry and to make misconduct complaints credible. For deputies, the same machinery can feel burdensome when rules designed for an earlier era become routine paperwork. A durable exit has to answer both concerns: residents need evidence that protections will survive the monitor, deputies need clear rules, and elected officials need a path back to ordinary control. Snow says the county has not yet proved every safeguard can disappear at once, but the 60-day review can separate mature reforms from protections still tied to measurable risk.

The reform orders are ultimately about confidence that traffic stops and misconduct complaints will be handled fairly after federal supervision ends.

09

The next 60 days could produce the first meaningful off-ramp

From total termination to targeted relief

The immediate off-ramp is negotiation. The parties must identify provisions they agree can be terminated or made inactive, letting the county prove that particular objectives have become ordinary policy instead of seeking release from the entire system at once. Training or reporting rules that duplicate mature systems may be easier to retire; provisions tied to racial disparities or internal-affairs integrity will be harder. Because the denial was without prejudice, Snow can narrow the injunction now and consider broader relief later if the evidence improves.

What to watch next

• The joint filing identifying provisions that can be narrowed or ended.
• Full traffic-stop data and whether racial disparities shrink or are credibly explained.
• Whether misconduct investigations remain timely as the backlog falls.
• How MCSO responds to monitor concerns about Professional Standards Bureau leadership.
• Whether the county appeals while participating in the court-ordered review.

The ruling leaves the door open to a staged exit: provisions can be retired as the county demonstrates that their protections have become durable.

10

A case about when reform becomes ordinary governance

The larger lesson

Long-running institutional cases contain a built-in tension: successful reform creates the argument for ending supervision, but reform succeeds only when constitutional behavior remains ordinary after the judge leaves. Maricopa County is plainly not the Arpaio-era agency that conducted immigration sweeps. It has rewritten policies, trained deputies, built compliance systems and sharply reduced a huge internal-affairs backlog. Snow's ruling says progress and completion are not identical. Because the remaining disputes involve traffic-stop outcomes and disciplinary integrity, the court wants stronger evidence before withdrawing completely. The review can now show which safeguards can safely disappear and which still do necessary work.

The end goal is not permanent monitoring. It is a system where the same rules apply consistently enough that monitoring is no longer needed.

Quick answers

Did the judge find that the Sheriff's Office is still intentionally racial profiling?

No. The court treated persistent disparities as important evidence, not proof that every disparity reflects intentional discrimination.

Is federal oversight permanent?

No. Full termination was denied without prejudice, and the parties were ordered to identify provisions that may now be ended or made inactive.

Why is the internal-affairs system part of a traffic-stop case?

Earlier contempt findings showed failures in internal investigations and discipline, so later orders added controls over complaints, investigations and accountability.

What happens after the 60-day deadline?

The parties must file a joint notice on possible modifications. Snow may then narrow requirements, seek more evidence or hold further proceedings.

The court has shifted the immediate task from arguing over total termination to negotiating which requirements can be safely retired.

Sources and documents

• U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona, September 10, 2026 order in Melendres v. Sheridan (Filing 3564).
• Associated Press, September 11, 2026: judge rejects bid to end supervision in Maricopa racial-profiling case.
• KJZZ, September 11, 2026: federal judge declines to end oversight of the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office.
• Arizona Luminaria and ProPublica, March 26, 2026: traffic-stop disparities and the debate over ending oversight.
• Arizona Luminaria and ProPublica, June 25, 2026: monitor findings involving the Professional Standards Bureau.
• Arizona Luminaria and ProPublica, May 21, 2026: dispute over costs attributed to the court-ordered reforms.
• Maricopa County public statements and legal-position materials concerning the Melendres oversight dispute.

Maricopa County's path out of oversight remains open, but the court wants the final transition to be grounded in evidence that the reforms will last.

The case is no longer mainly about the past. It is about proving the reforms can survive the future.