The U.S. Department of Justice announced Friday that it would appeal a judge’s decision to dismiss charges of discriminatory profiling and other civil rights abuses filed against Alamance County Sheriff Terry Johnson (pictured).

A 2012 lawsuit brought by the federal government charged that under Johnson’s command, the Alamance County Sheriff’s Office systematically and unlawfully targeted Latino residents for investigation, traffic stops, arrests, seizures, and other enforcement actions. During the trial held earlier this year, experts testified that Johnson’s deputies were approximately 4, 9, and 10 times more likely, respectively, to stop Latino drivers than similarly situated non-Latino drivers along three major Alamance County highways.

The lawsuit listed examples of Latino drivers being followed by Alamance deputies for long stretches of time and then pulled over for little or no reason. Witnesses also testified about numerous incidents in which Johnson and other ACSO employees expressed prejudice against Latino residents, such as Johnson allegedly ordering deputies to “bring me Mexicans,” “put heat on” predominantly Latinos neighborhoods, and “go out there and get me some of those taco eaters.” Deputies were also accused iof sharing links to what the Associated Press described as “a bloody video game where players shoot people entering the country illegally, including children and pregnant women.”

The ACLU of North Carolina has received similar reports of discriminatory policing by Alamance deputies for years. Federal judge Thomas Shroeder’s decision in August to dismiss the charges against Johnson’s office flies in the face of a mountain of evidence, and we support the Justice Department’s decision to appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. The residents of Alamance County deserve fair and impartial policing, as does every other locality in our state. Discriminatory profiling erodes the necessary trust between law enforcement officers and the communities they swear to serve and protect and does not make us safer.