Key Points:

• ACLU alleges sheriff’s department may be tracking interactions with federal immigration officials

• Nanos claims his deputies do not cooperate with ICE officials

• Inherited policy from former sheriffs could be the culprit

The ACLU is seeking records from Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos to determine if his deputies are contacting immigration officials during traffic stops.

In a new lawsuit, attorney John Mitchell claims that his organization requested information in May about the agency’s practices. That, he said, specifically includes a policy about communication with federal officials to verify immigration status.

He also wants to know what policies the sheriff’s department uses to determine whether a traffic stop is extended for the purpose of verifying immigration status or waiting for immigration authorities to arrive.

What he got, Mitchell said, was a series of delays.

Worse yet, he said he has reason to believe that policies about tracking interactions with federal officials were wiped out shortly after the public records request was submitted in May. Now, he wants Pima County Superior Court Judge Greg Sakall to order the documents produced.

Nanos told Capitol Media Services that there was some kind of tracking for interactions with those illegally in the country, but that it was inherited from his predecessor, Mark Napier, when he took office in 2021.

Nanos said Napier was trying to gather that data in his bid to secure federal funds through Operation Stonegarden, a now-defunct program that provided money to local law enforcement agencies for border security operations. County supervisors blocked that move. 

However, Nanos said the no-longer-needed reporting requirements remained on the books — without his knowledge.

He said he ordered their removal not to thwart the ACLU, but because the provisions had been brought to his attention when Arizona Luminaria, an online Tucson newsletter, requested the data the reports were supposed to collect.

What data was being collected since he took office, the sheriff said, were routine things like calls to Border Patrol for help in missing persons cases.

However, Nanos acknowledged that his department does keep records on the ethnicity of those stopped for traffic violations. He said, though, that it is simply “for auditing purposes to guard against racial profiling.”

He also acknowledged that the official policy regarding traffic stops — and the recording of reasonable suspicion by officers requesting immigration status — had changed.

Nanos noted all that was in a section that dealt with working with federal authorities on immigration issues. The language, he claimed, went back to when Napier ran the office. That was part of a larger rewrite of the policy, which he believes had no nefarious intent.

Mitchell, however, said he’s not convinced.

He said there were reports by those in the Tucson community who were trying to observe interactions between community members and federal agencies, specifically Border Patrol and Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

“They noticed that there were some instances of a Pima sheriff being called to a scene, either for a traffic stop or some sort of investigation and federal immigration showing up as well,” Mitchell told Capitol Media Services. Those federal appearances, he said, led to the request for records of the communications.

“We have yet to understand the extent of communications between the sheriff and federal immigration authorities,” Mitchell said. “We don’t have answers because the Pima sheriff has not given us the records.”

Less clear is whether any calls to the feds — to the extent they exist — are legal. 

“Context matters a great deal,” Mitchell said.

“There may be legitimate reasons, or, at least, lawful reasons for immigration to be called,” he explained. “Or there may be unlawful reasons, like racial profiling or other more nefarious explanations.”

Nanos said it is his policy that none of his deputies call immigration officials in the case where a traffic stop finds someone not here legally. In fact, he said, his agency will not cooperate with ICE, even to the point of refusing to detain someone the agency wants.

“They’re unconstitutional,” the sheriff said. “You want us to hold a prisoner? Then get a warrant.”

Mitchell remains skeptical.

“We can’t say for sure what Pima sheriff is doing,” he said. “But what we can say is they’re not giving us the records we requested so that we can make that determination.”

A Feb. 27 version of the rules does say department members “shall not engage in racial or bias-based profiling.” It also says they can’t consider race, color or national origin except when part of a specific suspect description.

And it says offices “shall document the existing reasonable suspicion in a case report.”

However, the language regarding what can be considered — and the requirement for documentation — was removed in a version of the rules dated May 21. That’s just a week after the ACLU submitted its request for public records.

“They do owe the public answers about the timing,” Mitchell said.

“Obviously, causation isn’t established just by the fact that the sheriff changed their policy after our inquiries,” he said. “We have yet to understand the full circumstances.”

Nanos said it all came about because of the inquiry by Arizona Luminaria.

“Once I heard of this, I immediately had staff remove that policy with the intent being to reflect current practices regarding tracking contacts with immigration officials, something I thought I had stopped when first taking office,” he said.

The sheriff provided Capitol Media Services with some data on traffic stops for the year.

He said there were 5,331 citation issues. Half were classified as white, with 35% identified as Hispanic motorists, 7% as African American, and smaller numbers for other groups, along with about 4% listed as unknown or with the box on the form left blank.

The numbers were pretty similar, with 2,922 warnings, breaking down as follows: 55% for white motorists, 30% for Hispanics, and 4% for African Americans.

“I’m guessing the percentages fall pretty close in line with our county demographics,” Nanos said.

And the issues the ACLU is raising?

“I completely understand their concern,” the sheriff said, saying his staff may have been overly aggressive with the alterations.

“Mea culpa, that’s on me for not being clear,” he said. “But we are not done with that policy review.”