Gov. Larry Rhoden speaks to reporters from a podium on July 28, 2025, at the Public Safety Administration Building in Sioux Falls. Also visible are, from left, Dan Satterlee, director of the state Division of Criminal Investigation, and Sam Olson, Minneapolis field office director for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. (John Hult/South Dakota Searchlight)
The South Dakota Highway Patrol has revised its drug arrest numbers for a recent saturation patrol, saying it jailed fewer than half of the people its original terminology suggested.
Last week, Gov. Larry Rhoden gave South Dakota Searchlight and several other media outlets a list of arrests from the first saturation patrol conducted in Sioux Falls by his administration’s “Operation Prairie Thunder” public safety campaign.
The list included 174 arrests for drugs, 44 of which involved felony drugs.
First state-funded ‘Prairie Thunder’ patrol results in 44 felony drug arrests in Sioux Falls
Over the weekend, however, The Dakota Scout newspaper reported that those arrest numbers did not square with the number of people who were arrested.
The governor’s office did not dispute the newspaper’s findings, even as Rhoden told the paper he was still pleased with the results.
The Highway Patrol said it uses the words “arrest” and “citation” interchangeably, and that a single person could be cited multiple times.
The agency has done so for years, Highway Patrol spokesman Brad Reiners said in an email to South Dakota Searchlight on Monday, including in its daily “rally tally” of arrests during the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally.
“The way they are counted fits our reporting system, but not necessarily the way the public perceives the numbers,” Reiners wrote.
According to a statement released Tuesday afternoon, the Highway Patrol said that the 174 charges reported for the three-day saturation patrol in Sioux Falls were filed against 78 people.
Of those, 51 were booked into jail, and 27 were “arrested, cited and released with a notice to appear.”
In a statement, Department of Public Safety spokesman Steve Long said the agency “apologizes for the confusion regarding the statistical reporting,” and that in the future, Highway Patrol press releases will “accurately reflect the number of unique individuals arrested in addition to the number of total charges filed.”
“Nonetheless, the results continue to reflect the significant positive impact Operation: Prairie Thunder has to reduce criminal activity,” Long wrote.
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