TUCSON, Ariz. – A Pima County Superior Court judge ruled in July that Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos violated Arizona public records law by failing to fulfill public records requests submitted by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Arizona. The requests sought records related to the Pima County Sheriff Department’s (PCSD) involvement with federal immigration officers following field encounters with Spanish-speaking individuals. The ACLU of Arizona is releasing those records today after redacting personally identifying information.
By April 2026, more than 1,800 unsorted incident reports containing ‘Border Patrol’ or related terms from January 2021 to May 2025 had been identified. Upon review, the ACLU of Arizona uncovered an additional 80 instances of collaboration between PCSD deputies and Border Patrol, mirroring interactions in previously obtained records.
“Sheriff Nanos owes Pima County residents a complete explanation for his deputies’ actions, along with his failure to produce evidence of these actions in a timely manner,” said John Mitchell, immigrants’ rights attorney at the ACLU of Arizona. “Our public records case, while successful, highlights the work that remains to rebuild our immigrant communities’ confidence in law enforcement.”
In its filing, the court found Nanos to have “violated the law by failing to respond promptly to Plaintiff’s May 14, 2025 public records request," prompting the ACLU of Arizona to sue in July 2025 after 68 days with no response. Only then did PCSD begin releasing records in batches, which detailed PCSD and Border Patrol collaboration — directly contradicting Nanos’ public claims.
The court ordered Sheriff Nanos to pay the majority of ACLU of Arizona’s fees and costs, finding that ACLU of Arizona had “substantially prevailed” in obtaining public records through the lawsuit. The court ordered additional fees after Sheriff Nanos’s attorneys admitted to using artificial intelligence and inadvertently including false and misleading citations to the record in their filings.
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