Analysis: Several Benton County police departments arrested Hispanic and Latino people at higher rates last year

Multiple Benton County police departments arrested Hispanic and Latino people at a higher rate in 2025 than in any of the previous three years, according to an Arkansas GRITA analysis of Benton County Sheriff's Office jail booking data. The analysis also found that the Benton County Sheriff's Office (BCSO) has likely under-reported jail bookings of Hispanic and Latino people in official records over the last four years. This discrepancy raises questions about how arrest data involving Hispanic or Latino residents has been tracked and reported by the county's primary law enforcement agency.

Methodology

Arrest data from 2022 to 2025 was received from BCSO through a Freedom of Information Act request. The dataset included booking records for arrests made by agencies whose detainees are processed through the Benton County Jail. To estimate whether detainees were Hispanic or Latino, we compared surnames in the arrest records to the U.S. Census Bureau's 2010 surname dataset, the most recently available list for frequently occurring surnames in the U.S. The Census reports the percentage of people with each surname who self-identify with a particular race or ethnic group.

For example, 94.9% of people appearing in the 2010 Census with the surname Hernandez were of Hispanic or Latino origin.

In this analysis, arrestees whose surnames have a 75% or greater rate of Hispanic or Latino origin in the Census list are considered to be Hispanic or Latino. Because surname classification is an estimate, the data was replicated with 90% thresholds, reflecting the most conservative adjustment of the data. Data as reported by the department and adjusted data are accessible in charts below. For example, the last name Aguilar (93.3%) would be classified as Hispanic or Latino in both the 75% and 90% certainties, but Camacho (89.6%) would only be classified as Hispanic or Latino in the 75% analysis.

Analysis

GRITA's analysis found that Benton County has likely under-reported Hispanic or Latino bookings by 26% from 2022 to 2025 when adjusted using the 75% certainty model. For example, BCSO's data reports that 21 out of 53, or 39.6% of individuals booked into detention with a surname of Aguilar were not listed of Hispanic or Latino origin. Similarly, the department's data classifies just 35% (7) of the 20 Camachos arrested during this time as Hispanic or Latino.

Arresting officers are responsible for completing the intake sheet including questions about race and ethnicity, Lieutenant Shannon Jenkins told Arkansas GRITA in response to a request for comment from BCSO. "We respectfully disagree with the assertion that race or ethnicity is being underreported. Our reporting follows the strict guidelines established by the FBI through the NIBRS reporting system. All inmates are classified according to these federal standards, and this information is recorded with a high level of accuracy," Jenkins said in an email. The department did not answer further questions about whether officers receive training on how to record racial and ethnic data, or the exact process by which an individual's racial or ethnic identity is determined for the purposes of the form.

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The Benton County Jail serves as the detention facility for 18 cities across the county. In 2025, this analysis shows, several municipalities including Bella Vista, Highfill, and Pea Ridge arrested Hispanic or Latino people at a significantly higher rate than in prior years.

The Bella Vista Police Department arrested more than twice as many Hispanic or Latino people in 2025 as it did in 2024, despite having arrested fewer people overall. Hispanic or Latino people accounted for 20% of arrests in 2025, compared to 8% the year before. Bella Vista's Hispanic and Latino residents make up only 4.6% of the population, according to 2020 census data. Pea Ridge, arrested 47 Hispanic or Latino people in 2025, an increase from 29 the year prior. Pea Ridge police chief Lynn Hahn, in response to a request for comment, said via email that the Latino population in Pea Ridge has increased from roughly 5.8% of the population in 2010 to around 8% today. "It is reasonable to expect that arrest statistics may reflect those broader demographic changes," she wrote, and said that surname analysis "does not necessarily reflect how individuals self-identify." However, GRITA's data analysis shows that in 2025, the percentage of arrestees who were Hispanic or Latino was up by 7.1 percentage points from the previous year (15.5% to 22.6%).

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The Bigger Picture

This data raises questions about another side of immigration enforcement in Arkansas. The only law enforcement agencies in Benton County operating under 287(g) agreements—formal partnerships between local law enforcement and the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement—are the Benton County Sheriff's Office and state-level agencies. However, because BCSO has a Jail Enforcement Model partnership with ICE under 287(g), when an individual is booked into the county jail, the sheriff's office can look up whether they are a candidate for deportation, hold them under an ICE detainer, and potentially transfer them into ICE custody. In this context, increased arrests of Hispanic and Latino people by local law enforcement agencies increase their risk of deportation.

Read more about 287(g) and which Arkansas agencies currently have agreements

A Note on Ethnicity and Race in Demographic Research

Racial and ethnic categorizations are difficult to nail down, as their theoretical composition and their Census definitions often change over time. This is true for "Hispanic or Latino" categorized people, who may come from dozens of countries, have various racial identifications, and may think of themselves primarily in relation to their nation of origin rather than a broader pan-Hispanic identity. The Census Bureau says that its racial and ethnic categories reflect "a social definition of race recognized in this country."

Early Census racial categorizations were based on the color of people's skin, and expanded to include national-origin categories with the rise of exclusionary immigration laws targeted at Chinese immigrants, University of Arkansas political science professor Alejandra Campos told GRITA. The change to the use of the "Hispanic" category on the Census was an effort not only by the U.S. government, but also from community organizations and Spanish-language media. Initially, Census-takers assigned race based on Census-takers' observations. Today, the Census asks people to self-identify.

The exact categorizations on the Census change frequently over time and individuals may not self-identify with pan-ethnic categories (such as Hispanic or Latino), instead preferring to use national-origin label markers, according to Campos. The "Hispanic or Latino" category as present in the Census is an ethnic category, inclusive of anyone of Spanish-speaking heritage (and excluding, for example, Brazilians, who speak Portuguese).

Editors Note: The "Analysis" section of this story has been updated for clarity.