New Sheriff. Same Lawsuits. Bigger Checks.

Let me break this down in plain terms, because the pattern here is impossible to ignore.

Back in 2022, the Los Angeles Times reported that Los Angeles County agreed to pay $47.6 million to settle claims tied to misconduct by sheriff’s deputies under former Sheriff Alex Villanueva. That number alone should have raised serious concerns about leadership, accountability, and culture inside the department.

Fast forward to 2026, and the same Los Angeles Times reports that the county has now spent over $100 million just defending the Sheriff’s Department in lawsuits under current Sheriff Robert Luna.

Read that again: we’ve gone from paying tens of millions to settle misconduct… to spending over a hundred million fighting accountability in court.

Different sheriff. Same cost to taxpayers.

This isn’t progress. It’s a more expensive version of the same problem.

Because when a department is truly committed to transparency and reform, you don’t see legal bills climbing like this—you see them going down. You see fewer lawsuits, not more aggressive defenses against them.

What these two reports show, side by side, is simple: the culture hasn’t changed enough. And the people of Los Angeles County are still the ones paying the price.

You can change the tone, but if the costs keep climbing, the culture hasn’t changed. The people of this county deserve more than a quieter version of the same problem.