|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
NEW BEDFORD – Helpful. Intrusive. Evolving. Dystopian.
Those were a few of the words describing the controversial automated license-plate readers bandied across the community room at Keith Middle School on Wednesday night at a forum entitled “Flock: Public Safety vs. Privacy.”
The Community Conversations event was organized by The New Bedford Light to examine the pros and cons of automated license-plate readers for public safety and the privacy concerns they raise. The event brought together a police chief, a civil liberties attorney, a state lawmaker and about 40 residents, whose strong feelings about the technology erupted into occasional shouts during the discussion.
Panelists who were chosen for their different viewpoints on the subject included:
- Fall River Interim Police Chief J.T. Hoar, whose department has used Flock for more than five years and who has recently implemented more policy controls and audits around the technology;
- Gideon Epstein, an attorney and policy counsel with the American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts’ Technology for Liberty Program, where he focuses on surveillance, data privacy and artificial intelligence;
- State Rep. Steven Owens, a Democrat representing the 29th Middlesex District for his third term, who has introduced legislation calling for statewide regulation around law enforcement’s use of Flock.
New Bedford Police Chief Jason Thody was scheduled to join the panel but notified organizers a few hours before the forum that he had contracted the flu. The panel was moderated by Karen Bordeleau, executive editor of The Light.
In his opening remarks, Epstein said that the ACLU has scrutinized license-plate surveillance for more than a decade. He said last year, the ACLU sought records from dozens of Massachusetts police departments about their use of body cameras and other surveillance technologies.
“Our team does believe that license-plate readers may be a helpful tool in specific criminal investigations of serious felonies, for example, stolen vehicles, missing persons cases,” Epstein said. “But in the absence of any statewide regulation of license-plate readers, the right thing for municipalities to do at this point is to ban their use, at least until state legislators have a framework of these basic guardrails.”
Chief Hoar said he agrees regulations should be consistent across the commonwealth. He joined the department in 2012, becoming the fifth generation of his family to serve on the city’s police force. He also serves on the Massachusetts Police Association’s board of directors and as a commissioner with the Massachusetts Police Accreditation Commission.
“Just because technology gives law enforcement the ability to do something, it doesn’t automatically mean we have the authority to do it without appropriate safeguards,” Hoar said. He said when he became deputy chief in 2025, he recognized policy deficiency and adopted more stringent oversight including audits that were implemented earlier this year.
Owens said the effort to regulate automated license-plate readers in the commonwealth began years ago, when handheld devices were used to identify stolen vehicles or cars with overdue payments. He said regulations were later expanded to include guardrails around government use of toll data collected on Massachusetts highways, bridges and tunnels.
“This is not the first time that technology changes faster than legislation can catch up to it,” he said. “This is something that has been rolling out, and just as we think we get a handle on it, the technology has changed.”
Forum
The first question, directed to Police Chief Hoar, began with the basics: how automated license-plate readers work and how they compare with other surveillance tools police have used in Massachusetts.
Hoar said early license-plate readers were mounted on police cruisers, photographing vehicles parked along streets and uploading the images to a database.
The Flock technology is different in the sense there’s two parts to it, Hoar said. The first consists of motion-activated cameras that photograph passing vehicles and their license plates. The second is software that allows police [and other out-of-state agencies] to search those images by license-plate number or vehicle characteristics. He said unlike earlier systems, Flock does not check plates against law enforcement databases.
From there, Epstein and Owens addressed the spread of the technology, including Flock’s camera network, and whether its proliferation should concern the public.
Epstein said more than 110 Massachusetts police departments have contracted with Flock Safety, but about 45 communities have since ended or suspended their use of the technology.
New Bedford will not renew its contract with Flock Safety for automated license-plate readers when it expires Nov. 12, the Police Department confirmed to The Light on Oct. 23.
“So at this point there are approximately 70 Massachusetts police departments deploying this technology,” Epstein said. “More broadly looking at the picture nationwide, Flock has about 6,000 law enforcement customers across the country and one of our primary concerns is that they encourage and even incentivize widespread data sharing.”
He said nearly every Massachusetts department examined by the ACLU had opted into Flock’s nationwide database, potentially allowing out-of-state officers, including those enforcing restrictive abortion laws or working with federal immigration authorities, to search Massachusetts vehicle data. That, he said, is the central reason for the ACLU’s opposition to the cameras.
“Flock’s value proposition is the size of their network,” added Owens. “The more departments, the more cameras that Flock has, the better their value proposition is to their customers who are law enforcement agents.”
The conversation then turned to who should set the rules. Hoar and Epstein were asked whether state legislation was needed, what it should cover and which decisions should remain with cities and police departments.
“As far as the government is concerned, I just think that we have to do it collectively with all parties represented here in some way, shape or form, but have a good understanding of all the technologies,” Hoar said, adding that Flock’s technology has helped Fall River police investigate crimes ranging from illegal dumping to serious sex offenses.
“It’s important to understand the different brands and the different layers of that technology, and not rush legislation,” he said.
Epstein agreed that lawmakers should not rush legislation but said his team had identified key issues that need to be addressed, including widespread data sharing.
“Anytime a police department out of state or even within state, when they want access to another police department’s data, they should have to get a warrant signed by a judge prior to accessing another department’s license plate or data,” he said, adding that warrant requirements are already in place with other sorts of location tracking tools.
In addition, he said, police departments should only retain data as long as they need to for legitimate criminal investigations. “And that means deleting data almost immediately on individuals who are not suspected of criminal activity.”
Municipalities across the country have uncovered misuse of the technology following journalists’ requests for audits. In New Bedford, for example, Chief Thody suspended the use of Flock in August, a day after The New Bedford Light asked about allegations that an officer, Emily Pacheco, had used the system to track her ex-girlfriend. Pacheco and another officer, James Marinelli, were recently fired by the mayor for misusing the system. They are appealing their terminations.
The dataset may simply be too tempting to misuse, Owens said. “It’s really hard to put those kinds of guardrails around it,” he said. Even if Flock limits how long data can be stored, “the trust has been broken. It’s been broken in communities that I represent.”
Hoar said that he is a firm believer in disciplinary standards for police officers and that those whose misconduct puts their certification at risk should be held accountable and disciplined accordingly.
“A few bad actors should not spoil it for everyone.”
The comment drew immediate reaction from the audience.
Hoar said his department paused its use of Flock in January and required all officers to undergo training again.
Epstein joined the discussion on accountability, saying that through obtained records requests he saw a voluminous amount of totally vague and nondescript search reasons. “Those kinds of searches obviously completely evade the possibility of accountability.”
In Milwaukee, for example, he said a police department review found that an officer who had searched for a vehicle more than 120 times, citing “investigation” as the reason, was actually tracking a former romantic partner.
“There is probably a lot of abuse that’s going under the radar and unnoticed at this point.”
The discussion also touched on a recent federal court ruling in Oklahoma concerning whether searches of Flock data without a warrant violated the Fourth Amendment.
Epstein explained the ruling’s significance. An Oklahoma police officer used Flock to track a vehicle with California plates over 30 days, revealing that the driver had crossed state lines several times and eventually led to criminal charges. A federal judge later ruled that the officer should have obtained a warrant before conducting the search, Epstein said.
“Courts are grappling with these questions,” said Epstein, “but this recent case in Oklahoma underscores the trend that courts are going in, which is that these kinds of queries should require a warrant.”
In Fall River, Hoar said, the department’s 40 Flock cameras are used differently. “It’s never used as the sole reason to develop probable cause or the main investigative tool. It’s an enhancement to an investigation.”
The Light previously reported that New Bedford city councilors were unaware of Flock’s use until this summer, despite approving a budget item that mentioned neither the company nor its cameras.
Asked how Fall River handled the technology’s introduction, Hoar said the city held public hearings and subcommittee meetings to discuss its use, particularly in addressing illegal dumping.
“I think when there was open conversation and open forums like that, questions came through and we were able to have some meaningful discussions,” Hoar said. “Fall River hasn’t been shy about having Flock.”
The audience reacts
The forum then opened to questions from the public — all of whom expressed concerns and opposition to the technology.
New Bedford residents last had a chance to discuss Flock at a July 28 public meeting, where more than 100 people expressed privacy concerns and demanded that city officials remove the cameras. Three days later, Thody ordered an audit and suspended Officer Pacheco’s access to the system, according to the city.
“No amount of guardrails are going to keep us safe from this technology that has no positive use cases, that outweighs an image that we’ve seen even locally demonstrated,” said Dubhan Ó Máire, taking the microphone. “So why is the conversation about guardrails? Why can’t we just ban it?”
Epstein said local leaders should listen to residents, noting that not everyone wants the technology banned.
“There are many people who do want to ban this technology, and there are people who think that this technology can have the potential to help support legitimate law enforcement investigations” with safeguards to prevent misuse and abuse, he said.
Resident Dan Moriarty, a high school civics teacher who was dressed as a Patriot, took the microphone.
“How can any police department, which swears an oath to the Constitution, in any city bound by the Supremacy Clause to protect it, especially a city in a region, whether it’s New Bedford or Fall River, with such a rich history as ours of fighting off redcoats and slave catchers and unionizing against oligarchy, possibly justify allowing forces so blatantly and explicitly anti-democratic, anti-constitutional and, frankly, anti-American, and so blatantly opposed to our entire cultural legacy as a region, to install completely unaccountable cameras all over the city, tracking everything we do?”
Hoar started to respond saying it’s important to separate the technology itself from the company.
“We don’t want to create a political fire here. The president of the United States, some people agree with his way. Some people don’t.”
His response prompted a shout from an audience member: “Well, the president was elected. Marc Andreessen [an investor in Flock Safety] isn’t elected.”
Email Eleonora Bianchi at ebianchi@newbedfordlight.org.
