20 police forces in Delaware use license plate readers
License plate readers supplied by Flock Safety and other companies have been quietly proliferating across Delaware in recent years.
Flock did not identify its Delaware clients, but WHYY News found that its law enforcement customers include Delaware State Police and the forces in New Castle County and Wilmington — the three largest police agencies in the state of 1.05 million residents.
In addition, several smaller municipal forces, including Newark, Dover, Rehoboth Beach and Milford, as well as the University of Delaware police, have them.
Officials at several agencies provided information to WHYY News about their license plate readers, though the largest one, the 748-officer Delaware State Police, did not. The office of Attorney General Kathy Jennings, which prosecutes all felonies and most misdemeanors in Delaware, would not respond to requests for comment to discuss the cameras and the controversy surrounding them.
Keith Banks, Rehoboth Beach’s police chief, said the resort town has four Flock ALPR cameras at exit and entry points. The town also has a handful of Flock surveillance video cameras that don’t photograph vehicles and tags, but do provide overhead feeds of activities along the boardwalk and Rehoboth Avenue.
Banks understands the concerns of residents and visitors, so the town has a website that provides information about its surveillance program, whose virtues he extols, especially when a driver hits another car and leaves town.
“Hit-and-run accidents here in Rehoboth Beach over the last four or five years have just been crazy,” Banks said. “People used to always leave notes on cars to say, ‘Hey, I bumped into your car while trying to park.’ And now they’re just leaving, constantly.”
Banks explained how retrieving ALPR data works.
An officer with authority to search the Flock data must enter a complaint number and then information such as a full or partial plate number, the vehicle’s color and the existence of a rear bumper sticker.
That sometimes leads police to the camera’s photo of the car, its plate and the owner’s name. Then officers can try to track down the vehicle, alert other agencies and investigate further.
Banks said he’s sensitive to invasion of privacy fears and is aware of inappropriate acts by officers in other jurisdictions. But he said officers with access to the system in his town and elsewhere should know that “every keystroke is monitored” during data searches.
“You’re going to get caught,” he said of those who run afoul of proper uses. “There’s just too many checks and balances today.”
While New Castle County police did not provide information about its Flock cameras to WHYY News, Police Chief Jamie Leonard briefed some County Council members in February on the force’s program.
Jamie Leonard, New Castle County police chief, said his force has strict controls on searching data from its 14 Flock cameras. (New Castle County)
Leonard said during the recorded meeting of Council’s Public Safety Committee that the county currently has 14 Flock cameras that cost taxpayers about $20,000 a year.
“It does not identify people. It doesn’t do any type of facial recognition,” Leonard said. “It’s all just pictures of the tag and generally the rear of the car. It does capture car make, car model, the specific time and obviously the location of where it hit on that particular camera.”
Leonard said the tag readers have helped solve all kinds of crimes, primarily stolen cars and burglaries. He noted that the county shares data and receives data from other jurisdictions he did not identify, and stressed that only a handful of officers can search the data.
“Flock is not a free search system. You must justify, document and limit your search to a single license plate,” Leonard said. “We will never fully alleviate or dispel the privacy invasion concerns, but we’ve put guardrails up and framework in place to show that we are limiting our access to this information, our storage of this information, and treating it with the respect that it needs to be treated with.”
Wilmington has four Flock ALPRs that were donated by a nonprofit, as well as a handful of ALPRs from other vendors, said Daniel Walker, deputy chief of staff for Mayor John Carney.
“They’re helpful to allow us to identify vehicles that are tied to a crime or an action of concern,” Walker said. “They have been very helpful in helping us recover children that may be missing and are with an individual in a car, or in instances of people who are involved in activity that is dangerous or violent in nature, being able track their location and apprehend them.”
But Walker said the city is “decommissioning’’ the donated Flock cameras, in part because of the controversy around them and the fact that the city doesn’t have a contract with the company.
He also stressed that Delaware’s largest city “does not participate in immigration enforcement.”
Newark police Lt. Greg D’Elia said the force has “several” tag readers from Flock and another vendor but would not specify the number. He said they have helped detectives solve several crimes, including two robberies last year.
Officers conducted a search for a red Tesla seen near one of the robberies and got a hit near the crime scene, D’Elia said. Working with county detectives, they seized weapons and arrested two suspects who later pleaded guilty and received prison sentences.
“Without that ALPR from Flock, we wouldn’t be able to get the information from the system that led us to these people to begin with,” D’Elia said.
