The El Paso County Sheriff’s Office announced last week that 47 people have been transferred to Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody since late September.

The transfers were between Sept. 25 and Feb. 26, according to the announcement. The previous transfer amount was 26 during a three-month period.

Data previously analyzed by The Gazette shows that more than 3,000 people were arrested by ICE in Colorado from January through mid-October 2025.

The people were being held at the El Paso County jail on immigration detainers, which is a request from ICE that asks a federal, state or local law enforcement agency to notify the requesting agency as “early as possible” before they release someone believed to be undocumented, according to the ICE website.

Eighteen other detained individuals were released from the jail before ICE agents could arrive in time to take them into custody, according to the announcement.

The transfers follow Colorado law, but law enforcement is prohibited from providing personal information of individuals, such as country of birth, to federal immigration authorities.

That brings the total number of people transferred from the jail in Colorado Springs to ICE custody to 92, The Gazette found through previous reporting. The highest month was November with 14, matching the monthly high set in September.

“My priority as Sheriff is the safety of our community and justice for victims,” El Paso County Sheriff Joseph Roybal said in the announcement. “Our Office follows Colorado law while safely transferring individuals within our facility to the custody of our federal partners at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The sheriff has been vocal about wanting to collaborate with ICE in the past. Roybal told The Gazette during the first transfer announcement in May that he would join ICE in the 287(g) agreement, which authorizes one or several deputies to perform specified actions done by immigration agents.

In Colorado, no other law enforcement agency has an active 287(g) application besides the Teller County Sheriff’s Office, according to ICE records updated Tuesday.

The records show there are 1,527 agreements across 39 states and two U.S. territories.

Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Cassandra Sebastian previously told The Gazette that their standard procedure is to cooperate with immigration detainers.

The Gazette requested the Sheriff’s Office’s policy and procedures manual, which Sebastian said is only published internally. The Gazette requested specific policies related to immigration. She declined to provide policy information Tuesday, saying it will be available later in the week.

The detainer also includes holding the person up to 48 hours beyond the time they would ordinarily be released, but Sebastian said the detainee is released in the normal 48-hour window.

“If they (ICE) happen to be there when the person is released, they can arrest them on our facility,” Sebastian said.

Several organizations, including the American Civil Liberties Union, have been critical of immigration detainers and have called on Colorado sheriffs to “promptly” join the “growing number of local law enforcement agencies” that have chosen to “stop imprisoning people based on immigration detainers.”