Removing the Blinders for Chief Dwyer
He is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts
At the Butler County Commissioners’ meeting on June 3, 2026, Chief Anthony Dwyer delivered a defensive rant (starting at 1h:10min) about criticisms that taxpayers, lawyers, immigrants, their loved ones, and allies have been making about the Butler County Jail’s treatment of so-called “civil immigration detainees.” Dwyer even addressed three lawsuits pending against the jail, a strange move since his office usually employs the “no comment on litigation” shield.
There are now three civil rights lawsuits pending against the County and Sheriff Jones, because jail officers assaulted incarcerated people without provocation. Two were filed by men detained for ICE, and one by a U.S. citizen. Two of these lawsuits have been pending for six years and one was filed in May 2026.
Dwyer’s speech at the Commissioners’ meeting was riddled with inaccuracies, lazy generalizations, and outright lies, which we carefully unpack here. Many of his claims resort to the tired cliches of “they’re criminals” (the plaintiffs) and “they’re lying” (the plaintiffs and their lawyers). Those are standard tropes law enforcement officials turn to when someone is getting too close to holding them accountable for bad acts, and they want to shift the blame.
The Morrow County Sheriff said the same thingwhen immigrants, lawyers, and allies called out abuses and violations at his jail in 2019 and 2020. The ACLU of Ohio filed lawsuits and U.S. District Judge Sarah D. Morrison — a Trump appointee — issued a scathing order that proved everything the immigrants, lawyers, and allies said was true. Following her ruling, immigrants in ICE detention had to be released from Morrow and today, the jail no longer has an ICE contract.
Following is the truth, with evidence, as well as additional data about the criminal history of people detained for ICE at the Butler County Jail, and a quote from Ohio Immigrant Alliance’s Executive Director, Lynn Tramonte. (Download a PDF of these charts here.)
Unpacking Chief Dwyer’s False Claims, One By One
When hundreds of people who don’t know each other and didn’t cross paths in jail say the same things, over and over again, the truth is pretty easy to understand.
Learn about the successful effort to end the contract at this jail during the first Trump administration, and how immigrants, lawyers, and advocates are working to repeat the victory today, here.
Said Lynn Tramonte, Executive Director of the Ohio Immigrant Alliance, "Chief Dwyer is knee-deep in the cover-up of a number of violent attacks by guards in the Butler County Jail. He oversaw sham investigations, failing to interview victims and review medical records. He may even have allowed investigators to lie about the hospital’s conclusion in the Tenelanda case. Meanwhile, Chief Dwyer is attempting to keep the Commissioners onside, because he knows the public is losing faith. But he’s doing so through lies and manipulation.
“As advocates for human rights and immigrants, we have always relied on the truth, because our credibility is our currency. We don’t have money; we only have our integrity. It took ten months to prepare the Tenelanda case because the lawyers had to do their due diligence. Lawyers have been fighting the Bayong and Benty cases for six years, without receiving a dime, because that’s how civil rights lawyers work. They don’t get paid unless they win, and they don’t take cases unless they have merit.
“The jail, however, has every incentive to lie, and that’s exactly what they are doing. Sheriff Jones thought he was untouchable until he lost his ICE contract in 2021. Everyone knows he’s a liability when it comes to speaking about all of these pending cases, so they sent Chief Dwyer to be his public face. But Dwyer isn’t doing any better. Butler County taxpayers deserve transparency, and they deserve law enforcement officers who follow the law. Everyone has human and civil rights, including immigrants and citizens in the Butler County Jail. We will keep bringing cases to federal court until the jail and County leadership finally understand this, and stop letting the Sheriff do whatever he wants.”
