Latest news with #AutomatedLicensePlateReader
Yahoo
17-06-2025
- Yahoo
Tacoma police release details on how toddler subject to AMBER Alert was found
Tacoma police released additional details Monday about the search that unfolded after a 2-year-old girl went missing Saturday, leading to her safe return hours later. Authorities activated an AMBER Alert across the state a little over two hours after a woman called to report her daughter, Delilah Everett, couldn't be found in or around a residence in the 4200 block of South Prospect Street, according to a police news release Monday. The alert was canceled that afternoon. Police announced that Delilah had been returned to her family unharmed and they were questioning a man in custody, The News Tribune reported. The Tacoma Police Department initially posted on Facebook that a man was suspected of taking the girl in his car after entering a fast-food restaurant at 4112 S. Steele St. at 9:10 a.m. Saturday. A man who wrote that he is Everett's father posted a reply to the Police Department's post Saturday afternoon, saying that he is grateful for the man who took the girl and that the man saved his daughter. The father declined to comment when The News Tribune reached him via direct message Monday, saying he had already talked to several other news teams, but said he would inform The News Tribune if he has a statement in the future. Here's how police found the toddler, according to the news release: ▪ 9:30 a.m: A call came in from a mother who said her child was missing from a residence in the 4200 block of South Prospect Street. An employee at a nearby business called to report that a man recently entered the business, saying he found the child alone outside and was looking for her parents. When the employee told him that police would be called to help, the man left with the child in his silver sedan. Police began searching for the child and the man based on surveillance footage from the business. Officers checked nearby police stations and the Tacoma Mall, contacted local hospitals and Tacoma Fire stations and ran searches through Flock Safety systems and Automated License Plate Reader technology for the man's vehicle. The search was unsuccessful. ▪ 9:52 a.m.: Suspecting a child abduction, the police patrol shift commander activated the department's Child Abduction Response Team (CART), which includes criminal investigators and personnel from various agencies trained to 'quickly and effectively recover a child who has been abducted, or who is missing under suspicious circumstances by utilizing a team of trained personnel.' ▪ 10:30 a.m.: CART members began arriving on scene and were briefed on the situation as patrol officers continued the search. ▪ 11:42 a.m.: In the absence of new information about the child's location or why she was taken, the Washington State Patrol issued an AMBER Alert across the state notifying the public of the missing child. The alert said the girl was last seen walking on South Steele Street before a man drove away with her toward 38th Street, The News Tribune reported. 'Within minutes, dozens of calls came in from community members,' the news release said. ▪ 11:50 a.m.: A caller provided authorities with 'key identifying information' about the man seen with the missing child. ▪ 12:06 p.m.: Based on the caller's information, police located the man's address, where they found the missing child. Police took the man into custody and interviewed him at police headquarters. Police also interviewed the man's friends and family. Police booked the man into the Pierce County Jail on an outstanding warrant and forwarded their investigation to prosecutors for a charging decision. The investigation is still active, and police might share further updates after a charging decision. 'The Tacoma Police Department would like to thank the community and our agency partners for their swift assistance during this incident,' the release says.
Yahoo
13-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Texas police 'abused' license plate data for immigration search, Illinois police say
A Texas law enforcement agency reportedly used license plate data shared by a Chicago-area police department in locating a woman for immigration enforcement purposes, despite Illinois state law prohibiting such use. The Johnson County Sheriff's Office allegedly used data from Automated License Plate Reader (ALPR) — also referred to as Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) — through Flock Safety, a private company. The "National Lookup" feature is used by law enforcement agencies "for purposes of immigration enforcement." The Illinois Secretary of State's Office notified the Mount Prospect Police Department that it was among multiple other law enforcement agencies whose data was used by the Texas department. "The use of ALPR data collected by Mount Prospect Flock Safety cameras for this purpose does not align with the Mount Prospect Police Department's values and is a clear violation of Illinois state law," the Chicago department stated in a press release. A site called 404 Media shows the Johnson County Sheriff's Office requested data from 83,000 of Flock Safety's cameras, including those in Mount Prospect. Illinois Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias is requesting an investigation into the incident by the attorney general, The Independent reports. He says he is also making an audit system to prevent similar uses of ALPR data in the future. A 2023 Illinois law prohibits the sharing of license plate data to track undocumented immigrants or people seeking abortions. A total of 262 immigrant-related searches were made between mid-January and April in Mount Prospect alone, Giannoulias said. Deputy Secretary of State Scott Burnham warned that such violations could lead to the loss of state funding. Giannoulias says he requested that Flock Safety block access to 62 out-of-state agencies seeking data related to abortion or immigration. The ALPR company also created a program to flag access requests with the terms "abortion" and "immigration" and deny the requests. Finally, law enforcement agencies will be required to respect the secretary of state's audits with the goal of noting trends in certain requests, Burnham explained. "I am tremendously upset that some law enforcement agencies who agreed to follow Illinois law, in order to gain access to our ALPR data, conducted illegal searches violating the trust of our community," Chief of Police Michael Eterno said. "As disappointed as I am with these other agencies, I want to emphasize that no member of the Mount Prospect Police Department shared ALPR data in violation of the law. I realize that this misuse of Mount Prospect's ALPR data violates the trust of our community, and we as a department will continue to work to enhance the Flock ALPR software and ensure this abuse does not occur in the future." Following the incident with the Johnson County Sheriff's Office, the Mount Prospect Police Department said it has made, or plans to make, several changes to prevent similar incidents in the future, including opted out of the Flock Safety "National Lookup" feature cancelled any data sharing agreement with law enforcement agencies who violated Illinois state law revoked access to Mount Prospect's ALPR data for all law enforcement agencies outside of Illinois will be updating its ALPR policy to include regular audits of the searches being conducted by internal and external users As of Friday morning, the Johnson County Sheriff's Office had not issued a public statement about the incident. The name of the individual who was the focus of the search has not been disclosed to the public. Flock Safety has released a statement amid what it calls "a misunderstanding." The ALPR company indicated contact with the Johnson County Sheriff's Office regarding the incident in Illinois, seeking to correct "misreporting" that the program was used "to target people seeking reproductive healthcare." The Sheriff allegedly told Flock Safety that this "is unequivocally false." "According to the Sheriff's office, a local family called and said their relative had self-administered an abortion, and then she ran away," Flock Safety said. "Her family feared she was hurt, and asked the deputy to search for her to the best of their abilities. Law enforcement performed a nationwide search in Flock, the broadest search possible within the system, to try to locate her quickly. Luckily, she was found safe and healthy in Dallas a couple of days later." The woman faces no charges and was never under criminal investigation, the ALPR company added, saying that Texas police were looking for her as a missing person rather than as a crime suspect. "We're grateful for the opportunity to work with Illinois officials to clarify what happened, correct misconceptions, and implement lasting improvements that uphold the trust of both law enforcement agencies and the residents they serve." — The Independent contributed to this report. This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Texas police use of license plate data under investigation in Illinois
Yahoo
04-06-2025
- General
- Yahoo
License plate reader vote postponed amid community, council concerns
AUSTIN (KXAN) — According to an email sent to Austin city council members and Austin Mayor Kirk Watson, City Manager TC Broadnax will postpone a vote on whether or not Austin police can continue to use license plate readers. The city manager wrote: 'While I appreciate the Austin Police Department's thorough presentation at today's work session regarding the Automated License Plate Reader technology and have confidence that APD can continue to use this tool in a responsible way focused on keeping Austinites safe, I am also sensitive to community concerns and outstanding questions from members of the City Council. Given concerns expressed today, I have decided to withdraw this item from the agenda at this time to provide more opportunities to address council members' questions and do our due diligence to alleviate concerns prior to bringing this item back to City Council for consideration.' It's unclear when license plate reader technology may come back to the city council for a vote. KXAN has reached out to APD for a response. During Tuesday's work session, APD explained to the dais why it finds the technology beneficial. 'This police department is 300 officers short. Currently, we do not have enough officers to [perform] the job that we would prefer to do without the use of technology to supplement [our] work,' said Assistant Austin Police Chief Sheldon Askew. 'Today we heard powerful testimony from residents, nonprofit leaders, privacy experts, and many others,' said Council Member Mike Siegel in a release. 'We are in an unprecedented time of authoritarian rule at the state and federal levels, and we should not be using City of Austin resources to fund a mass surveillance tool that can be used by private companies, immigration authorities, and other outside entities. I look forward to working with my colleagues on Council to support public safety strategies do not create such a risk of injury to our diverse communities.' You can read more about the contents of that work session and the discussion had here. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
03-06-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Safety leaders question privacy of Austin license plate reader data
AUSTIN (KXAN) — Auditors this week called for the city to update the terms of its Automated License Plate Reader program to clarify how long data is stored and limit who can access it. The discussion took place just days before the Austin City Council is to consider the program's future. At Tuesday's Public Safety Commission meeting, members heard the results of an audit assessing the Austin Police Department's APLR pilot program from March 2024 to March 2025. Central Texas continues to grapple with use of license plate readers The audit said the city's 40 fixed cameras and the 500 cameras attached to Austin Police vehicles made an estimated 75 million scans of license plates. The city's vendors for ALPRs are Flock Safety and Axon. Recommendations from the audit said the language in the city's contract with Flock is too vague and 'possibly expansive.' Safety commissioners questioned how long vendors store that data. The original terms outlined that Austin's program would store the data for seven days, but the audit determined vendors can retain that data. Access to that data has come into question in recent months as immigration and deportation efforts have escalated under the Trump administration. Critics of ALPRs have accused local law enforcement agencies of sharing data with Immigration and Customs Enforcement. APD Sergeant Lee Knouse responded to commissioners' questions about ICE's access to APD's data. He said data collected by ALPRs is only accessible to APD. 'When a network administrator looks into Flock, we can see who has searched our cameras, what they're searching for, when they search for it, if an ICE agent or an outside agent was accessing our cameras. We do not provide access to APD data to anyone outside of APD personnel who's been through our training,' Knouse said. The audit presentation will be made again to Austin City Council members at their workshop on Wednesday. The city council is expected to vote on the program's future at its regular Thursday meeting. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
26-05-2025
- Yahoo
Multi-agency investigation leads to arrest of Rio Vista arson suspect
( — The office of the State Fire Marshal's Arson and Bomb Unit led a multi-agency investigation that resulted in an arson arrest. On May 15, Cal Fire announced that a joint investigation led by the Office of the State Fire Marshal's Arson and Bomb Unit resulted in the arrest of Kenneth Allen Hubbs, who had a connection to a March 21 residential arson incident that caused an estimated $700,000 in damages. According to officials, on March 21 at around 1:34 a.m., security camera footage captured an unidentified man using a hammer to break a rear sliding-glass door to enter a home on Sherman Island East Levee Road in Rio Vista. Once Hubbs was inside the home, he ignited road flares and set fires in at least three separate locations before fleeing through the same door he came in at around 1:36 a.m., California Statewide Law Enforcement Association said. Evacuation order issued for some residents due to Inn Fire in Mono County The Cal Fire OSFM Arson and Bomb Unit was requested to take the lead in this investigation, stated CSLEA. After a thorough investigation, detectives identified Hubbs as the primary suspect, and a Sacramento County no-bail arrest warrant was issued on May 5. On May 14, the San Joaquin County Sheriff's Deputies found Hubbs after receiving an Automated License Plate Reader alert broadcast by the Arson and Bomb Unit, according to CSLEA. Hubbs was taken into custody without incident and booked on the following charges: Arson of an inhabited structure Possession of an incendiary device Burglary 'Outstanding work by all involved in the investigation and arrest of this arson suspect,' said CSLEA President Alan Barcelona. 'In less than two month's-time an unidentified suspect, breaking into and setting fire to a house in the middle of a night, was identified and arrested! Great job.' Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
