On Wednesday, an Arizona county attorney's office announced that it will immediately halt "providing iPhones as an option for replacement or upgrades for existing employees," citing the current legal battle between Apple and the Department of Justice.

Last week, Apple CEO Tim Cook again reiterated the company’s firm commitment to privacy and its resolve to fight a new court order issued earlier this month. If the order stands up to legal challenges, Apple would be forced to create a new customized iOS firmware that would remove the passcode lockout on a seized iPhone as part of the ongoing San Bernardino terrorism investigation.

Maricopa County, the nation’s fourth most populous county, which encompasses Phoenix and the surrounding area, is also well-known for its very conservative sheriff, Joe Arpaio.

"Apple’s refusal to cooperate with a legitimate law enforcement investigation to unlock a phone used by terrorists puts Apple on the side of terrorists instead of on the side of public safety," County Attorney Bill Montgomery said in a statement. "Positioning their refusal to cooperate as having anything to do with privacy interests is a corporate PR stunt and ignores the Fourth Amendment protections afforded by our Constitution."

The agency specified that it has 564 smartphones, and of those, 366 are iPhones.

"If the potential for unauthorized access to an encryption key is truly motivating Apple’s unwillingness to assist in downloading information from specific iPhones, then let’s define the problem in those terms and work on that concern," Montgomery added. "Otherwise, Apple is proving indifferent to the need for evidence to hold people accountable who have harmed or intend to harm fellow citizens."