What We Do

 

Sheriff Accountability Action is the only national organization devoted to building power to curb the harms of the more than 3,000 sheriff’s offices across the country.

We work in deep relationship with local and national partners to scale effective strategies to reshape the institution of the sheriff. We think three projects are critical today:

 

  • We support partners to use elections, county commissioner oversight, and long-term organizing as levers for change. We invest in leaders to enact policy that makes our counties safer and more just. In this moment of national polarization, local experimentation is more impactful than ever.

  • Working with families who have lost loved ones in the custody of sheriffs, we are seeking to draw attention to this crisis. We pressure sheriffs into action to protect the health and wellbeing of people in their jails through data visualization, storytelling, and increased litigation.

  • Achieving safety for all people will require a broad coalition of organizers, journalists, and elected officials. We’re telling the story of sheriffs and the people who resist them in order to build a shared public understanding of the work that remains to be done to build a more just and free society.

Our Track Record

Sheriff Accountability Action works to reduce the harm of the system and build the foundation for real safety.

In the past seven years, with more than 50 local and national partners and allied sheriffs, we have:

 

Ousted abusive sheriffs

such as Culpeper Co., VA Sheriff Scott Jenkins, who was indicted for accepting bribes in exchange for badges and guns, and Bristol Co., MA Sheriff Thomas Hodgson, a leader of the national extremist anti-immigrant movement

 

Elected reform-minded sheriffs

such as Orleans Parish, LA Sheriff Susan Hutson, who has refused to take into custody people arrested for abortion-related offenses and Bristol Co., MA Sheriff Paul Heroux who is working to close the longest operating jail in the country.

 

Gave voters direct control to increase sheriff oversight

such as the passage of Measure A in Los Angeles, which provides additional oversight over the city’s troubled sheriff’s office, or the defeat of a jail construction measure in Green Co., OH.

 

Influenced sheriffs’ policies

such as helping to end agreements in Georgia, Massachusetts, North Carolina and Virginia that committed deputies to working with the federal government to increase deportations.

 

Exposed corrupt practices

through our groundbreaking Paid Jailer Report, which highlighted the pay to play nature of local sheriffs' races and empowered communities to take action against this corruption.