Updated: April 4, 4:45PM
The Justice Department Civil Rights Division has cut off negotiations with Joe Arpaio‘s Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office over their refusal to consider an independent monitor to prevent future violations of civil rights. DOJ Deputy Assistant Attorney General Roy Austin said in a letter to Arpaio’s lawyer that a monitor would be a non-negotiable component of any settlement.“DOJ considers the oversight of an independent monitor to be an absolute necessity for meaningful and sustainable reform of MCSO,” Austin wrote. “It was disappointing, to say the least, for you to contact us 24 hours before our negotiations were scheduled to continue and raise, for the first time, a precondition that you understood would result in the cancellation of negotiations — and, by extension, the initiation of a civil lawsuit — and calls into question whether you were ever interested in settling this matter.”
This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://talkingpointsmemo.com/?p=100036