{"id":62129,"date":"2025-10-14T11:03:29","date_gmt":"2025-10-14T16:03:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/?p=62129"},"modified":"2025-10-14T15:10:47","modified_gmt":"2025-10-14T20:10:47","slug":"va-accessing-alpr-information-doesnt-require-a-sw","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/?p=62129","title":{"rendered":"VA: Accessing ALPR information doesn&#8217;t require a SW"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Accessing the ALPR system to look at license plate location is not a search requiring a warrant. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.vacourts.gov\/static\/opinions\/opncavwp\/0737251.pdf\">Commonwealth v. Church<\/a>, 2025 Va. App. LEXIS 627 (Oct. 14, 2025) (unpublished):<\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n\n<p>In Church&#8217;s case, the 172 Flock cameras in use in Norfolk are not as intrusive as cell towers and aerial surveillance equipment. The camera images are of vehicles, not persons, and the only information collected-license plates and physical characteristics of the vehicle-is already publicly viewable to anyone who sees the vehicle on the street. See generally Neal v. Fairfax Cnty. Police Dep&#8217;t, 299 Va. 253, 269 (2020) (holding that the ALPR camera database (similar to the Flock system) did not violate the Government Data Collection and Dissemination Practices Act, Code \u00a7\u00a7 2.2-3801 through -3809, because it did not contain &#8220;identifying particulars&#8221; about individuals). The data in the Flock system is only kept for thirty days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Sergeant Myers obtained three images that were taken during approximately seven minutes of Church&#8217;s drive and showed a short portion of his route. The police did not continuously monitor his travels around the city. The collected Flock data did not create an &#8220;intimate window&#8221; of Church&#8217;s overall movements and associations. Unlike in Carpenter and Beautiful Struggle, the Flock system provides only short-term monitoring of a vehicle&#8217;s movements on public thoroughfares. It is not &#8220;a detailed chronicle of a person&#8217;s physical presence compiled every day, every moment, over several years.&#8221; Carpenter, 585 U.S. at 315. Because the Flock system simply took pictures of the license plate and Church&#8217;s vehicle as he drove it down public thoroughfares in the City of Norfolk, the circuit court erred in ruling that a search warrant was required for police to access the Flock system.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Accessing the ALPR system to look at license plate location is not a search requiring a warrant. Commonwealth v. Church, 2025 Va. App. LEXIS 627 (Oct. 14, 2025) (unpublished):<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[141],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-62129","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-automatic-license-plate-readers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62129","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=62129"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62129\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":62131,"href":"https:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62129\/revisions\/62131"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=62129"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=62129"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fourthamendment.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=62129"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}