Can state police track drivers through hundreds of license plate cameras? a new one litigation Illinois’ widespread use of the cameras, known as automatic license plate readers (ALPRs), violates the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition against unreasonable searches because it violates citizens’ reasonable expectation of privacy, the state said.
The complaint, filed May 30 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois by two Cook County residents, Stephanie Scholl and Frank Bednarz, accuses the Illinois State Police (ISP) and ISP Chief Brendan F. Kelly ), Illinois State Attorney General Kwame Raoul and Governor JB Pritzker are defendants.
“Defendants are on a daily basis tracking anyone who drives in Cook County to go to work, to school, to the grocery store, to the doctor’s office, to the pharmacy, to a political rally, to a romantic encounter, to a house party,” the lawsuit states. state”, “There is no reason to suspect anything about anyone and to keep those whereabouts in case they believe in the future that certain citizens may be appropriate targets for law enforcement.
Illinois’ highway camera network began in 2019. Tamara Clayton Highway Photography Actnamed after a postal worker shot on an interstate highway south of Chicago. The bill directs state police to “increase the number of cameras along highways and the state highway system.”
Illinois State Police received The state allocated $12.5 million in 2021 to install the cameras, with funding more than doubled in June 2022 when Pritzker extended the bill, Grant Up to $20 million in additional funding. As of press time, the Illinois Department of Transportation has bought 652 license plate cameras, 340 of which are installed in Cook County, which includes Chicago.
According to ISP’s Dashboard, in the past month, the system recorded more than 215 million “detections” (when cameras capture digital images of license plates) and more than 1.4 million “hits” (when captured license plates match state license plates) When matched) the police’s “hot list,” which includes the license plate numbers of stolen vehicles and wanted subjects). Each year, the system Record More than 1.5 billion tests — more than 100 times the state’s population.
Camera readings are stored by the ISP 90 days.
However, law enforcement considers it a more effective way to catch criminals, while some legal experts believe it could infringe on privacy and, in turn, citizens’ Fourth Amendment rights.
Since 1967 the Supreme Court Decide exist Katz v. United States, searches that violate a “reasonable expectation of privacy” are considered a violation of the Fourth Amendment, with some limited exceptions. This latest lawsuit argues that citizens have a reasonable expectation of privacy regarding the “aggregation” of their location data (i.e., the sum of their activities).
“I think it’s fair to say this is a new area of the law, there are very few cases and the rules are still being developed,” said Reilly Stephens, an attorney with the Liberty Justice Center who represents the plaintiffs. reason. “We want to be a part of developing those legal rules.”
The most similar situation is Commonwealth v. McCarthy (2020), which is first The appeals court took up the case, which addressed the interplay between license plate cameras and the Fourth Amendment.
exist McCarthythe Massachusetts Supreme Court denied defendant Jason McCarthy’s motion to suppress ALPR evidence, but held that McCarthy’s challenge potentially It’s feasible, provided the license plate tracking is comprehensive enough. “With enough cameras in enough locations, historical location data from the Massachusetts ALPR system would violate a reasonable expectation of privacy and constitute a search for a constitutional purpose,” the court ruled.
McCarthy is just tracked Through two license plate cameras – in two bridges as the gateway to Cape Cod—police had limited visibility into his whereabouts. In Illinois, there are more than 600 such cameras located throughout the state.
Therefore, the Liberty Justice Center believes that Illinois’ complaint may be more effective than McCarthy’s complaint. “We intend to provide the court in this case with evidence that the Massachusetts Supreme Court wanted but did not have: evidence that a particular ALPR system was widespread enough to produce a sufficiently comprehensive record of citizen activity,” Stephens said. reason.
As tracking measures become more commonplace and cost-effective, courts will need a clear line to draw a clear line between permissible public surveillance and surveillance that violates citizens’ privacy expectations. If there were license plate readers on every street, legitimate expectations of privacy would likely be violated. In Massachusetts, the state’s highest court said two ALPR systems failed to do so. What’s the difference between the two? Where should courts draw the line?
“This case is important because it can help clarify and strengthen the scope of Fourth Amendment rights in response to increasingly pervasive and unavoidable government surveillance,” said Jonathan Menes, senior staff attorney at the MacArthur Justice Center. reason In re the Illinois lawsuit. “This case is about ensuring that advances in police technology do not defeat the purpose of the Fourth Amendment.”
