- Flock Safety cameras helped police locate fleeing suspects.
- Incident footage shows how the tracking technology works.
- Systems can identify vehicles even without visible plates.
Cities across the USA are ditching Flock Safety cameras and other similar systems, with privacy advocates saying that such networks are a violation of the Fourth Amendment. Now, a new video from two police departments shows how the technology can help capture suspects. It also demonstrates some limitations and verifies the concerns some have.
Officers in Glendale, Arizona, found themselves called to a local carwash thanks to a Flock camera alert. The system saw an allegedly stolen truck pass a camera and police tracked it to a bay where the driver was vacuuming it out. Despite having three cruisers on scene around the car, the driver decided to flee the scene.
More: Flock Traffic Cameras Track Everything, Except The Cops Misusing Them
In doing so, he rammed one of the cruisers multiple times to escape. In the process, he nearly hit one deputy, and the entire police force showed extreme restraint in not escalating the situation further. The truck driver sped off, drove into oncoming traffic, and then disappeared.
Video Glendale PD
Thankfully for the police, their “Real Time Crime Center” has access to more than 1,700 CCTV cameras, including ALPRs like the ones Flock provides. For reasons the department didn’t state, it took officers a week to track down the suspect, at which point they took him into custody. There’s also no word on whether they actually retrieved the stolen truck in question.
In a separate incident in North Carolina, police responded to a report of a shooting. The suspect allegedly fled the scene in a burgundy Nissan.
“Within moments, the suspect’s car was seen on camera and that information was relayed back to officers in the field. Thanks to this rapid coordination between Patrol Officers in the field and RTCC, officers were able to quickly narrow their search and apprehend the suspect,” says the Gastonia Police Department.
How Flock Identifies Cars
Privacy advocates have pointed out that Flock Safety camera systems don’t just take a picture of license plates. They look for other identifiers, and we seem to have proof of that here. The Nissan in the video captured by police doesn’t have front plates, so the system would’ve needed to leverage other identifying features to trigger an alert.
That said, when this technology works, and when it’s used lawfully, there’s no doubt that it can help police apprehend suspects. These two incidents show the best-case scenario. The real question is how often it stays that way.