North Carolina Cops Used Flock Cameras to Target Black Drivers

Allegedly. Wouldn't want to imply that I think cops are always the bad guys. Officers in North Carolina allegedly competed to pull over the most Black drivers, report says

A state investigation into the misuse of Flock Safety license plate reader cameras"uncovered text messages in which Charlotte police officers competed to pull over the most Black drivers, WBTV reported.

At least six officers with the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department were recommended to be fired or to resign after the messages were discovered, according to the CBS affiliate in Charlotte. In a statement to the station, the department neither confirmed nor denied the details.

This state of affairs was discovered when another officer, or one of these, was investigated for using Flock to help a friend who ended up on the wrong side of a drug investigation.

The details can be found in the video below. One of the details is that the racist (allegedly) behavior of the cops involved goes back a decade.

This is the Liberty Doll video EXPOSED: Cops Held Contest to Target Black Drivers

WSOC has an article from after the production of the Liberty Doll video. CMPD releases names of seven officers linked to racist text messages

Channel 9 first reported on the controversial messages last week, and CMPD Chief Estella Patterson said in a news conference that several of the officers had already resigned. She said all of the officers involved were cited for termination, and she was working to revoke their police licenses in the state.

And as bigots are almost never limited in their views...

CMPD Chief Estella Patterson revealed in last week’s news conference that the text messages dated back several years, and they included racist, sexist, and religiously biased messages.

Is anyone shocked?

Ex-Indiana Deputy Abuses Flock Cameras to Stalk Girlfriend

From the New York Post: Ex-Indiana deputy Skylar Thompson allegedly used Flock cameras to stalk girlfriend, charged with felony. Allegedly.

A former Indiana sheriff’s deputy was charged with abusing access to Flock camera technology to stalk his girlfriend for over the period of a year by allegedly conducting more than 2,000 searches for her license plate.

I am sure if you asked, that the department in question would tell you that they have appropriate safeguards in place.

He resigned from the sheriff’s department the day he was confronted about the alleged abuse.

That says a lot about what he knew about what he was doing.

Thompson reportedly listed his searches as “city planning/traffic analysis” despite never being assigned tasks involving either duty, prosecutors said.

Flock issued a statement.

Welcome to the Panoptican.

Flock Camera Meets Florida Man

Flock cameras are evil. More twists than a lifetime romance movie: Florida man arrested for destroying Flock camera | Eatgrueldog

Despite the decoy camera being worth, at most, several dollars worth of plastic filament, Evan Meyer was charged with three felonies:

attempted larceny/grand theft, criminal mischief of property damage worth more than $1,000, and property crimes against computer equipment supplie . The arrest report states that the operation was devised after several Flock cameras in Oviedo were stolen in late July and early August.

There is more, including politicians reaction. Click thru.

Police Officer Abusing Flock Cameras

Allegedly. But it just highlights that Flock cameras are evil and need to be removed. Officer accused of misusing Flock cameras to track estranged ex-wife more than 700 times, police say

Christopher Goodson faces two criminal charges after an investigation found evidence that he allegedly misused Flock cameras while on and off duty to track his ex-wife.

After all of that, he faces 2 charges, which doesn't seem like enough.

... one count of offenses against users of computers, computer systems, computer networks and electronic devices, and one count of official misconduct.

The Brass on the city in question is downplaying everything.

“This is an unfortunate incident,” Haines City Police Chief Isaac Jackson said in the release.

Haines City, Florida, is in Polk County, roughly 30 miles southwest of Orlando.

Welcome to the Panoptican.

Hat tip to Angry Cops (Detective Richard Hy), and his video Caught On Camera: The Truth About FLOCK Abuse. I have it set up to start at the appropriate section, though the whole video is good, and only 12 minutes long.

Flock Cameras, Liberty, and Justice

From The Law Dog Files: It is better that ten guilty persons escape - by Ian: Than that one innocent suffer.

The title to this article is Blackstone’s Ratio, quoted from his seminal work: “Commentaries on the Laws of England”.

John Adams, Founding Father and second President of the United States, expounded further on Blackstone’s Ratio.

Flock cameras treat everyone as guilty. The surveillence state, once established, will find more ways to "punish the guilty," and more things for you to be guilty of.

A deputy sheriff in Bugscuffle County, Texas is able to look for a license plate registered to Los Angeles, California; or New York City, New York; or Toadstomp, Montana — with no Constitutional protections for the owners of that plate whatsoever.

There are — as one might imagine — multiple issues here, not the least of which is that there are no active audits being run. Since a search warrant is not required, LEOs are getting caught running searches for license plates using “Test”, “Training”, and the always popular generic “Investigation” — if they even input a reason. Several officers didn’t either bother entering a reason for the search.

Is anyone shocked that cops are using Flock to stalk people, their ex-partners, their girlfriends/wives, people that they are interested in romantically.

Click thru for the "If you've got nothing to hide..." argument, and how it falls apart.

Welcome to the Panoptican

FLOCK is not alone, of course, they are just the most well-known company building the surveillance state. When Every Streetlight Becomes A Surveillance Tower

For years, Americans were told that the greatest privacy battles would happen online. The debate centered around social media, smartphones, and internet tracking. Few imagined that one of the most controversial surveillance technologies would instead appear quietly on neighborhood streets, mounted atop poles at busy intersections and neighborhood entrances.

Today, those poles have become a flashpoint in a much larger debate over technology, artificial intelligence, and the future relationship between citizens and government.

Read the whole, disturbing thing, and the few signs that people have had enough of the creeping technology and are pushing back. (Hat tip to MaddMedic.)

And you vocabulary word of the day (Courtesy of Merriam-Webster): Panoptican

a circular prison built with cells arranged radially so that a guard at a central position can see all the prisoners