After News-Press investigation, sheriff changing policy, but says ICE arrests at jails will continue

Amid ongoing immigration arrests at county jails, the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Office has changed one jail protocol, and is open to another policy change in response to questions raised by a News-Press investigation, Sheriff Bill Brown told county supervisors Tuesday.

At the same, Brown insisted his office will not count or attempt to monitor federal arrests in its jail lobbies or parking lots, and that he plans to continue honoring ICE’s requests to transfer inmates through official channels, as long as they comply with legal restrictions. 

Brown acknowledged that a man interviewed for the News-Press investigation was released without staff ensuring he was fitted with a court-ordered electronic monitoring device — and was immediately arrested by ICE agents in the jail lobby. Brown said he has now changed the system for those devices after reviewing the case. And he said he is open to a system to notify defense attorneys of possible pending ICE arrests.

The sheriff’s office reported to state officials that it officially transferred 12 people to ICE last year, and had handed over an additional 33 inmates after ICE agents presented judicial warrants. A News-Press investigation published in April found that immigration agents labeled at least 99 arrests as occurring at Santa Barbara County jails in 2025, according to federal data obtained through public records requests. 

On Tuesday, Brown acknowledged the large number of additional arrests saying, “Sometimes it is obvious that ICE is awaiting the release of a certain person.” He said those arrests happen in non-secure areas that are open to the public, like lobbies and parking lots. He said attempting to track such “peripheral arrests” would be burdensome given the current extent of his office’s resources, and he has no plans to monitor them. 

Brown told the supervisors he does not collaborate with ICE outside the boundaries of the law. 

Several county supervisors questioned how it was possible the office could be unaware of federal agents operating on its own property, including in its own lobbies. “Their arrests… are really not our business,” Brown said. 

Since 2018, the California Values Act has barred law enforcement agencies from transferring inmates from local jails to Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, except for those already convicted of certain major crimes. Most people in county jails — convicted of lower-level offenses or not yet convicted while awaiting a trial — are not allowed to be handed over to federal agents under that law, also known as SB 54. 

State law also requires that sheriffs hold an annual meeting to disclose the arrests that are coordinated with ICE; that meeting, known as a Truth Act forum, happened before the supervisors on Tuesday in Santa Maria. 

In the meeting, Brown detailed the severity of the crimes committed by the people he transferred to ICE custody, including lewd acts with a minor, domestic violence, and carjacking. He said there were an additional 16 people who qualified for a transfer based on prior serious convictions, but ICE agents never showed up to arrest them. 

In internal ICE data acquired by the Deportation Data Project, ICE agents labeled 30 of the people they arrested near Santa Barbara County jails in 2025 as having no criminal record at all. 

After multiple supervisors questioned the large number of arrests that he said didn’t fall under his purview, Brown said he believed ICE arrests were an inevitability.

“Frankly, I would much rather they arrest people at our jail … or even in our jail,” he said. “Because it’s less disruptive, it’s going to be more safe if they do it at the jail location rather than if they do it in the community.”

Man released from jail arrested by ICE, without court-ordered ankle monitor

The Sheriff’s Office has already reported to the state that in 2025, it transferred 12 people to ICE under the tenets of SB 54. The office says in those cases, qualifying inmates are notified about the transfer, and when the time comes, are taken to a secure set of doors known as a “sally port,” where an ICE vehicle is waiting. 

But the News-Press investigation found dozens more people were arrested in the lobbies and parking lots of county jails, including many for whom ICE records do not disclose any conviction, much less a conviction that meets the SB 54 threshold. 

In the meeting, Brown addressed questions about the case of a man named Gustavo, who was arrested by ICE in the Main Jail lobby in January. 

Gustavo told the News-Press that he was ordered to be released with an ankle monitor while awaiting trial. Instead, he said, jail staff released him without a monitor, and ICE was waiting to arrest him. 

Supervisor Laura Capps, in a letter sent in advance of the meeting, questioned why Gustavo had been released without an ankle monitor as was written in a judge’s order. That monitor was to be installed by a county contractor called SCRAM.

For the April report, Sheriff’s Commander Cassandra Marking told the News-Press “SCRAM is responsible for making sure the device is installed in compliance with court” but that if ordered to have a monitor, an inmate is “not released without the monitor.” At the Main Jail, Marking said, “SCRAM personnel are escorted into the facility to place the monitor on. When complete with the process both the SCRAM personnel and incarcerated person are escorted out of the building.”

In the case of Gustavo’s release and ICE arrest, Brown said, that didn’t happen.

“Review of the video showed that ICE agents had taken Gustavo into custody before a SCRAM technician, who had been waiting in the lobby himself, could attach a SCRAM device to Gustavo’s ankle,” Brown told supervisors. 

“As a result of our review of this situation,” Brown said, “the Sheriff’s Office has established a uniform practice of inviting the SCRAM technicians inside the jail” to install the devices inside a secure area. 

Asked by Capps whether ICE agents could be “tipped off” about a SCRAM installation, Brown said no. “There was nothing that was untoward or inappropriate with the policy that we had,” he said. 

“You can see how there’s alarm bells if a judge has ordered the rehabilitation of somebody, and then as that technology is put on… the federal government comes in in an inhumane way and takes them,” Capps said, asking, “There’s no sort of tip-off to ICE when the SCRAM devices are being put on?”

“Well, I’m not aware of any tipping going on at all,” Brown said. “If there were, that would be a violation of the law. … As far as it maybe being done by somebody else, I don’t know, I don’t have control over that.” 

Brown criticized a statement made by Gustavo, who told the News-Press earlier this year that jail staff “led me out by the arms, and ICE was already there.”

Brown said his office reviewed security camera footage of the release. “Although clearly identified ICE agents were waiting for him in the lobby, Gustavo walked out of the sally port under his own power with no custody deputy holding his arms or touching him in any manner.” 

“This inmate had been arrested for felony charges of having beaten and strangled his wife on two separate occasions,” Brown said. 

Court records show the man faced domestic violence charges but was released awaiting trial; he pleaded not guilty. Before his trial could begin, he was deported. 

Government oversight and more changes

Sheriff Brown also told the Board of Supervisors he would communicate with the local public defender’s office to discuss a potential new policy in which relevant lawyers would be notified when ICE agents request information from the sheriff’s office about immigrants the defenders are representing in court. Previously, the Sheriff’s Office told the News-Press jail personnel do not notify inmates or their lawyers of ICE’s presence, even when officials have advance notice.

Capps also floated the idea of passing a policy that would require ICE agents to submit judicial warrants to the sheriff’s office for all potential transfers, but she noted that the policy’s success would require full cooperation from the sheriff, and could not be implemented through the supervisors’ will alone. 

As the meeting drew to a close, over 60 community members shared their comments to the supervisors, and many also addressed Brown directly in their speeches. Several volunteers from the 805 Rapid Response Network said they had witnessed ICE arrests outside local jails. 

“The sheriff has the discretion to choose whether or not to cooperate…” Brooke Lautz, an immigration attorney, said in her public comment. “His continued voluntary decision to cooperate with ICE blurs the lines between federal immigration enforcement and local law enforcement. For community members who are afraid and living their lives in the shadows and terrified of being arrested, detained, and separated from their families, this distinction must be crystal clear.”