Goodyear Police Dept. investigate whether officer misused Flock license plate reader system

GOODYEAR, AZ — The Goodyear Police Department is investigating whether an officer misused Flock automated license plate readers system, making it the third Valley police agency in less than a week to report suspected violations involving the A.I. vehicle locator tool.

The Goodyear Police Department was one of 14 area police law enforcement agencies that ABC15 reached out to on Tuesday to ask about Flock search audits and cases of suspected misuse.

Hours later, Goodyear issued a press release saying that during a July audit of the Flock system, activity was identified that raised concerns. One officer is on leave pending a criminal investigation.

Earlier this week, Apache Junction Police announced one of its officers, Josh McDaniel, resigned after he was accused of improperly using the Flock system to try to locate his wife in another city.

When asked whether McDaniel could face criminal charges, Apache Junction Police Chief Mike Pooley said, "Right now, it's not a crime; In my opinion, should it be? Absolutely."

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Last week, Chandler's police chief said his department was investigating one of its employees related to Flock usage. According to the department, an audit identified an anomaly in how the system was used that could not be explained through standard police activity.

"Any potential misuse of the Flock system should be taken seriously," Chief Bryan Chapman said.

Flock Safety cameras mounted along streets can capture images of every car and transmit them to computer servers. Artificial intelligence extracts data, including the car's license plate number and color, make, and model. The data is saved to the cloud.

When officers search the system, they have to include their name, a law enforcement reason, and a case number. That information is saved in an electronic log.

In May, a Flock Safety spokesperson told me about a built-in audit tool that automatically flags unusual activity in department search logs.

"The new tool uses some of our machine learning technology to determine if maybe there's a number of plates that are being searched repetitively over time that aren't potentially connected to an investigation, or if a timeframe of the searches is outside the normal ways that an officer may search for something within the system," Flock spokesperson Paris Lewbel said.

Of the 14 police agencies that ABC15 contacted, 7 responded by Tuesday afternoon. All seven indicated they do regular audits and have not detected any abuses.

In their responses, Mesa and Casa Grande also said their departments each had investigated a prior citizen complaint but found no violations.

Also on Tuesday, the Tempe Police Department announced it will no longer automatically share its Flock data with any other police agency.

YouTuber Benn Jordan is a leading critic of Flock Safety. In a recent conversation with ABC15, he raised issues about multi-department data sharing and the potential for undetected misuse.

"Basically, the police department that is using it the most recklessly is what sets the standard for the entire network," Jordan said. "When you have a third party allowing every single police department in the country that wants to share their data with one another, you end up with good police departments having the same standards as bad police departments."

Several Arizona law enforcement agencies have decided to cancel their Flock contracts and remove their cameras.

The Chandler Police Department and the Pinal County Sheriff's Office made the decision this month.

In the last 12 months, Flagstaff, Sedona, and South Tucson also took down their cameras.'

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