Incumbent Chris Nanos (D - left) and challenger Heather Lappin (R - right) are both ran for Pima County Sheriff.
A Pima County Sheriff’s Department employee and previous candidate for sheriff has announced plans to sue current Sheriff Chris Nanos for placing her on administrative leave three weeks before election day.
In a notice of claim over 100 pages long, attorneys for Heather Lappin, a Corrections Lieutenant at the Pima County Adult Detention Center and Nanos’ former Republican opponent in the 2024 Sheriff’s race, argue Lappin was subject to five retaliatory investigations after her bid for PCSD’s highest office was made public in the fall of 2023—investigations attorneys say were deliberately meant to interfere with her campaign.
As well as Nanos, Corrections Bureau Chief Scott Lowing, Corrections Bureau Captain Benjamin Hill, and Administration Bureau Captain Christy Anderson are subjects in the claim. She is seeking a $2 million settlement for primarily First Amendment violations, due process violations, physical and emotional harm, and damage to her reputation. A notice of claim is the first step to filing a lawsuit.
Sheriff Nanos and the department said they were unable to comment, citing pending litigation.
Background
In October 2024, after news broke that the Republican candidate for Sheriff had been placed on leave, PCSD released a media statement alleging Lappin “colluded with a journalist to facilitate payment to an inmate in exchange for a news story.”
After other outlets began to report the journalist in question was John Washington with AZ Luminaria—known widely for his reporting on in-custody deaths in the jail under Nanos’ control—the outlet released text messages showing he had reimbursed an inmate for the cost of a phone call, a total of $24.99, and asked Lappin how to do so in a text thread.
At the time, AZ Luminaria’s Principal Executive Irene Fischler McKisson told AZPM there is a clear difference between paying individuals for stories and reimbursing an inmate for the cost of a phone interview from a jail phone.
The claim alleges Lappin’s role in coordinating a media interview with an inmate was “utterly unremarkable and quickly forgotten” until she began making headway in the sheriff’s race. The interview coordination took place in July 2024 and was not brought up again until the meeting with senior leadership that preceded Lappin’s discipline in October, according to the claim.
However, according to the claim, Lappin was originally questioned by corrections leadership over a separate issue.
That same week, Sergeant Aaron Cross, an outspoken critic of Nanos and union leader, picketed for multiple days on a street corner with a sign saying, “Deputies Don’t Want Nanos.”
According to the claim, after a picture of that sign in the air was posted to the Lappin campaign’s Facebook page by her campaign manager, Nanos, and senior leadership were made to believe she had coordinated with Cross’s demonstration.
Cross was placed on leave at the same time as Lappin on the basis that he had disobeyed direct orders to not look like an on-duty officer while protesting, according to the Oct. 15 PCSD media release. Cross’s outfit—including BDU pants, a polo shirt, and a tactical belt with ammunition and handcuffs—became the subject of a lawsuit that later resulted in PCSD changing its policy on appropriate protest attire for an off-duty officer to disqualify nearly all of the items Cross wore.
Lappin’s attorneys claim she only knew that Cross was planning to demonstrate and did not know what he was planning to wear.
The filing alleges Lappin’s suspected involvement with Cross’s protests was used as an excuse to confiscate her phone, after which leadership escalated her role in AZ Luminaria’s media coordination.
“It was apparent that Chief Lowing and Captain Hill, at the direction of Nanos, had used an investigation into Sergeant Cross as a pretext to demand Lieutenant Lappin’s surrender of her department phone to go fishing for anything that they might spin into an attack on Lappin’s reputation in the final weeks prior to the election, to bring disciplinary proceedings against her, or both,” the claim reads.
According to the claim, Lappin’s media policy violations included not requiring the interviewed inmates to fill out a media consent form.
The claim argues Nanos knowingly published false information in the Oct. 15 media release, which stated: “It is known that Sergeant Cross is collaborating with Lieutenant Heather Lappin on her campaign.”
“The media release was intended to accuse (and did accuse) Lieutenant Lappin falsely of involvement in Cross’s activities, was intended to delegitimize her campaign with accusations that she was violating federal elections law, and was intended to imply (and did imply) that she helped a journalist solicit damning accusations against the Sheriff’s Department from desperate inmates in exchange for a cash reward. All of these assertions were patently false, and Nanos had actual knowledge that they were false at the time he issued the media release.”
Her lawyers also allege the circumstances of Lappin’s leave were unprecedented. According to the claim, Administration Captain Christy Anderson told Lappin to stay in the house and be constantly available by phone. If she wanted to leave the house, Anderson told her she must use sick time or vacation time and report her movements to her chain of command.
Her lawyers claim this was a direct tactic to influence her ability to campaign.
“Pima County and PCSD policies on paid leave with pay expressly contemplate that the person has complete freedom of movement,” the claim said.
Anderson relayed Nanos’ order to place her under a gag order, according to an audio recording of the Oct. 15 disciplinary meeting, which her attorneys argue prevented her from defending herself from false statements.
Nanos’ statements in the Oct. 15 media release, attorneys argue, violated PCSD policies preventing employees from discussing their leave status, on the basis that it could compromise an ongoing investigation.
“It is no coincidence that his orders preventing Lieutenant Lappin from responding to his public and false accusations against her, and unlawfully confining her to her house, came just three weeks before the election,” the claim said.
Other Instances of Retaliation
Lappin’s attorneys argue she is still facing professional retaliation and claim Lappin has not returned to normal work functions as of March 20, the filing date of the claim.
When she returned to work in December 2024, her chain of command told her she was required to sit at a desk and read SOPs (standard operating procedures) for two weeks.
Her use of family and medical leave—which her attorneys claim was due to physical symptoms of stress—was also scrutinized upon her return to work, and she received written discipline.
Most recently, the filing includes a copy of a Notice of Investigation dated March 7, 2025, for “contact with a person on a pre-trial status.” According to the claim, this investigation is over a letter Lappin wrote to a judge in favor of a former employee at the jail.
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