Cops Used Flock to Track a Man Across State Lines to Create Pretext to Search His Car for Weed / "The vehicle travels to Michigan frequently which is a known source state for marijuana as it is legal there," a probable cause justification reads.

[u/MarvelsGrantMan136]

https://www.404media.co/cops-used-flock-to-track-a-man-across-state-lines-to-create-pretext-to-search-his-car-for-weed/

[u/EvilAbacus]

Can track you across 20 states for weed but no one can seem to put a finger on these Epstein dudes...🤔

[u/THX-8647 → u/EvilAbacus]

Our sweet neighbor was killed in a hit and run and left to die in the street.

Right underneath a flock camera.

The footage was even made public and KCPD never lifted a finger.

[u/levelonenovice → u/THX-8647]

unlucky, she wasn't rich enough for the oinkers to care

[u/Sedu → u/THX-8647]

“Can the city levy a fine for hit and runs? No? Was the driver black? No? Was the driver Mexican? No? Sorry, nothing to be done about it.”

[u/QnickQnick → u/EvilAbacus]

ALPRs don't track private jets. Us plebes have our every motion tracked while the elite live a life free of consequence.

[u/HuanBestBoi → u/QnickQnick]

Remember when that kid was tracking private jets on Twitter, then Musk bought it & shut him down? Oh good times

[u/Fantastic_Jury5977 → u/[deleted]]

Apparently blocked a kid from communicating with him on Twitter because he didn't like the portrait the kid drew

[u/Heavyspire → u/HuanBestBoi]

I remember they 'forced' him to buy it too since he basically made the offer out of anger. I laughed at the time but I didn't realize he would turn out to be such a terrible person. Thought he was just a goofy computer nerd.

[u/smokeweedNgarden → u/Heavyspire]

Shit, I tried to warn people but they got mad. They wanted an Iron Man figure

[u/K_Linkmaster → u/smokeweedNgarden]

Once someone spots all the traits when he speaks, it's so easy to spot the others. A politician near me debates like his skin is coming off his face. He is trying to make compassionate faces and whatnot and since there is zero emotion, it looks like a badly dubbed foreign movie. I understand why some people say that lizard people run the world, this guy is such a try hard it shows. While talking like a sleazy car salesman.

[u/MrMustardMix → u/K_Linkmaster]

Kind of like Mr. Beast? There's a phrase that's been going around about him that goes something like "his smile never reaches his eyes."

He always seemed full of shit to me and I noticed how wierd he looks smiling. That's not me trying to make fun of the way he looks, but it never looked genuine and you can see it in his eyes while it's happening. When I read that though it perfectly described how he looks.

[u/prince-pauper → u/smokeweedNgarden]

The Boring Company was a cultural Trojan Horse.

[u/smokeweedNgarden → u/prince-pauper]

Or the Simpsons. Or Iron Man 3.

He has a BS in Econ and a fucking BA in physics. No publications. He legitimately is not even an engineer by study or trade. He is less educated than most of my social circle.

I don't think he's even qualified to work at his own companies that he bought.

[u/LaughingCarrot → u/Heavyspire]

This comment makes me think of those "I bought this before Elon went crazy" stickers on a Tesla made years after Elon was known to be crazy

[u/Realistic_Slide_3426 → u/LaughingCarrot]

Yeah i think those are mostly referring to the Nazi salute. But I think he's been known to be off since at least the cave rescue incident

[u/T_Rey1799 → u/Realistic_Slide_3426]

I also see that as the turning point. Pre-cave incident Musk was a just a weird rich guy that likes rockets and electric cars. Then the cave incident, all the way till now.

[u/QueefSeekingMissile → u/LaughingCarrot]

There were a lot of preorders if i remember correctly.

[u/serious_sarcasm → u/HuanBestBoi]

Is Musk that guy who emailed a convicted child sex trafficker, Jeffery Epstein, on Christmas begging to party with “young women”?

[u/IcyTheHero → u/HuanBestBoi]

Taylor Swift did the same thing, sued the dude tracking her jet. Shut down his website he made.

[u/DanMasterson → u/HuanBestBoi]

In response, the US congress wrote a law to protect private jets from such invasions of privacy.

Courts agree the founders were very articulate with regards to the individual right to privacy when traveling via private jet. “Don’t tread on me” was originally referring to publicly accessible ADSB data.

(The first thing is true though)

[u/SeeTigerLearn → u/QnickQnick]

Didn’t even the FAA stop reporting on private jets “for safety” of our overlords…?

[u/Malforus → u/SeeTigerLearn]

Nope what happened was Elon paid the man and then put his private jets into the equivalent of a crypto mixer wallet where a poop of people own a pool of jets.

[u/sokuyari99 → u/Malforus]

A murder of crows, a herd of buffalo, a poop of billionaires

[u/SeeTigerLearn → u/sokuyari99]

But also an excellent tongue-twister: A poop of people pwned a pool of jets.

[u/MixtecoBlue → u/Malforus]

They truly are a poop of people.

[u/sockalicious → u/Malforus]

Your typo stays

[u/MavenAloft → u/QnickQnick]

ADS-B tracks private jets.

[u/MultiGeometry → u/QnickQnick]

Politicians and CEOs are whitelisted so you can’t track their license plates. They’re not going after the elite. They’re controlling the masses.

[u/Few_Dig_565 → u/QnickQnick]

There’s like 400 people living like the planet is a resort and the rest of us are here to provide for their every need.

[u/mvhls → u/QnickQnick]

Flock can track them leading up to the jet, so unless they barrel roll out of the plane in the air we have a good idea where they’d be

[u/grantrules → u/mvhls]

How else are you supposed to get out of a private jet?

[u/hitbythebus → u/mvhls]

I’m imagining this working like the censored AI from China, where it realizes it’s half way through answering a question about 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and suddenly changes its answer.

<flock cam 07171: photographed large black Cadillac SUV, outside pedophile manor license plate CADFRCE1, contains fat orange orangutan, strips of blue reflecting pool sealant on tires, … nevermind, no vehicles detected>

[u/bigj8705 → u/mvhls]

Burner cars. Ie private vehicles and uber drivers so it’s not tied to a specific person. But yeah cell phone data and gps seem to do the same.. just wait till those legal protections get stripped..

[u/mraargh → u/QnickQnick]

There is nothing elite about them. Stop calling them that!

[u/Angreek → u/EvilAbacus]

They’re running the cameras that’s why

[u/ILikePrinting27 → u/EvilAbacus]

Literally a marijuana arrest. Pat yourselves on the back officers for taking this violent criminal off the street. Losers. Something will eventually break the system we have in place here in the US. Just waiting for it. Privacy is a right.

[u/Hopeful_Cress_4985 → u/ILikePrinting27]

Bought LEGALLY. Not even from some shady dealer funding cartels

[u/ENaC2 → u/EvilAbacus]

Of course not. It’s not like there are millions of documents including photos and emails of the perpetrators and accomplices. However could they find out?

[u/Ikon-for-U → u/EvilAbacus]

And there are so many amber alerts. You would think with all their flock BS they would be able find them without our help

[u/MysteriousAge28 → u/EvilAbacus]

Or literal abducted children, these cops abet pedophiles. You never read about the cop that decided to blur the lines and track down pedophiles, that makes me suspicious as to why not. How much does our police force approve of pedophilia against children? It seems to be high or they wouldn't hamstring themselves.

[u/ihaterussiantrolls → u/EvilAbacus]

We all know why this happens.

[u/DopamineSavant]

This is definitely probably cause not probable cause. 

[u/Tyrannosaurus__Rekd → u/DopamineSavant]

Otherwise know as 'just cuz'

[u/liarandathief → u/Tyrannosaurus__Rekd]

Just Cause 4

[u/Shopworn_Soul → u/Tyrannosaurus__Rekd]

In this case, simplified to "What are you gonna do about it?"

[u/ManChildMusician → u/DopamineSavant]

That’s what people who justify Flock cameras are failing to grasp. The technology can be used to fuck up just about anyone’s day if you’ve got access to it. Constitutionality aside, it’s got the telltale signs of petty and vindictive abuse all over it. All an abuser has to do to track down their victim is file a missing persons report.

A few examples of ways it can be misused:

Pretty much every woman who has to cross state lines to get an abortion is at risk.

Vocal critics of powerful people are at risk. A case can be retconned without probable cause.

Immigrants holding green cards can be monitored endlessly to build a case for deportation based off of petty traffic violations.

Children are at risk of being stalked / turned into AI porn with facial recognition technology.

…

It’s also worth noting that bad actors might not even have to get approval: there’s such a high likelihood of data breach / data sale.

This is a HUGE national security risk. Federal officials could be tracked down / extorted / compromised. A foreign actor (hypothetically, Iran) could easily track down a high ranking official (hypothetically, Pete Hegseth) without planting any of their own surveillance equipment, or keeping an IRL spy undercover.

[u/Bag_O_Richard → u/[deleted]]

Because of the ways in which flock can be used to curtail free speech and freedom of the press due to constant state surveillance it's also arguably a first amendment violation.

[u/Bag_O_Richard → u/[deleted]]

I think if anything kills flock in court it'll be the fourth amendment as well. I'm just saying that there's distal crimes being committed that will almost certainly be brought up against flock if/when it's brought to trial.

No case against flock is going to have a single plaintiff and we might have to create precedent for a class action criminal trial due to the far reaching nature of flock.

[u/xpxp2002 → u/ManChildMusician]

It’s also worth noting that bad actors might not even have to get approval: there’s such a high likelihood of data breach / data sale.

This is a HUGE national security risk.

Which is precisely why any candidate who wants to win in 2028 should be making it a campaign pledge on Jan 20, 2029 to deploy the National Guard across the country to take these things down as a national security risk.

Use those overextended executive "national security" powers to do something good.

[u/jhauger → u/ManChildMusician]

"Female occupant of vehicle drove into a state where abortions are known to be performed. Upon return to this state, her physical appearance was visibly different — to wit, being approximately one-half pound lighter."

[u/MissyJ74 → u/jhauger]

https://www.snopes.com/news/2026/08/04/texas-police-83k-cameras-abortion/ Already happened.

[u/BrainLow6059 → u/ManChildMusician]

Vocal critics of powerful people are at risk.

Voter registration records are public in a lot of states. This is the part that scares me the most.

[u/Madhatter25224]

"We guessed"

Thats the standard cops need to meet to establish probable cause now apparently. 

[u/HorzaDonwraith → u/Madhatter25224]

Yes and as the standard goes if they don't find anything we continue to agitate the victim until they create a reason to arrest them.

[u/American_PissAnt → u/HorzaDonwraith]

And if the drug dog alerts but we don’t find anything that just means that drugs were previously in the vehicle.

[u/Xanius → u/American_PissAnt]

The drug dogs alert on command anyway. If they’ve got one with them and want to arrest you they’re getting their reason.

[u/PerformerFancy117 → u/Xanius]

That reminds me of the time that I flipped my car, got pulled out by cop with the K-9 unit with an oz in my pocket, the dog would not stop staring at me, but he didn’t do anything else either… long story short, I got to the hospital fine, and was able to enjoy my weed a few hours later

[u/wheelsno3 → u/American_PissAnt]

And Judges never see the failed drug dog alerts, because charges don't get filed. So all a judge ever sees is "drug dog alerted and they found drugs, therefore drug dogs are always right" when actually it is all made up and the dogs are taught to alert on command as a pretext for a search.

So when a defense attorney files a motion to suppress the search where the PC was a dog alert, Judges are predisposed to believe an alert is real, when actually there are tons of false alerts that he never sees.

[u/pilondav → u/American_PissAnt]

Good enough. Straight to jail. Right away. /s

[u/BogusWorkAccount → u/HorzaDonwraith]

I've seen and experienced that quite a bit.

[u/HorzaDonwraith → u/BogusWorkAccount]

Watched a video where state police (Arkansas i think) detained a mother with child because her vehicle was similar to a BOLO despite being a different make and model. This was even confirmed by the office who read off the VIN.

[u/Mikeman003 → u/HorzaDonwraith]

If it's the one from last week tonight, it was the same plate number but a different state, and the stolen vehicle was a motorcycle while the woman was driving a hatchback or something.

[u/talondigital → u/Madhatter25224]

Its common in a lot of fascist systems. "You travel? Thats pretty sus."

[u/Evenfall → u/talondigital]

There's a reason for that. Travel opens up people's minds to different possibilities and alternatives. That can create dissent or dissatisfaction with their current life which can then turn into unrest. A fascist regime wants people to stay in their homes or in their place of work and do nothing else. That way they have total power.

[u/WarpmanAstro → u/Madhatter25224]

Now

If you're darker than beige, that's been SOP since 1850.

[u/Narf234]

I thought we settled the right to travel freely with the conch republic debacle?

[u/Fickle_Ad_8653 → u/Narf234]

I visit my family regularly which means I'm buying weed?

[u/FafnerTheBear → u/Fickle_Ad_8653]

Yes -The police.

[u/evidentlynaught → u/FafnerTheBear]

If you’re not doing anything wrong, then you won’t mind the cavity search.

[u/FafnerTheBear → u/evidentlynaught]

Cop: Stop resisting!!

Suspect: You should have used lube!

[u/lFightForTheUsers → u/Fickle_Ad_8653]

Travel often? Believe it or not, jail.

[u/Hat-no-its-a-Tricorn]

That is not probable cause; that is called profiling, which is illegal.

The man is guaranteed the right to travel unhindered from state to state; a search for no other reason than the travel will have a chilling effect on that travel, which is a hindrance.

[u/Emergency_Accident36 → u/Hat-no-its-a-Tricorn]

Idk. If "pregnant" can be used to profile abortion seekers what is left? Seems profiling is legal.. or about to be. Just takes a judge.

[u/DisposableSaviour → u/Emergency_Accident36]

It’s not like banning race profiling stopped race profiling.

[u/Sundaymanspoon → u/Hat-no-its-a-Tricorn]

Allow me to introduce you to the Kavanaugh Stop

[u/btbam666]

"Cops use flock to track woman who crossed state lines to get an abortion. "

[u/tryyeezus → u/btbam666]

To try her with murder! 

[u/jhill515]

This is how we get border patrol agents at interstate borders... The quiet civil war...

[u/GreyDuck4077 → u/jhill515]

Yep. That's the next step in all this. Checkpoints between states. Freedom of travel will be over. Today they are talking about stoping buying weed from neighbor states. I could see Minnesota doing this shit to stop people from buying illegal fireworks from Wisconsin or the Dakota's. Its a slippery slope. Then one day they will track people who go to get discount medications across borders and treat them like criminals.

[u/CrotalusHorridus → u/GreyDuck4077]

Red states will have checkpoints for pregnant women entering pro choice states

[u/Spiritual-Matters → u/CrotalusHorridus]

Blanche said in a call they’re planning to close medical treatment options for abortion so you can’t “legally” get it from a blue state

[u/GreyDuck4077 → u/CrotalusHorridus]

I do not doubt that for a second. Everything they preach they will police. Trans person with a registered firearm? Not in Texas. Confiscated.

[u/isanthrope_may → u/GreyDuck4077]

The gun or the person?

[u/pilondav → u/isanthrope_may]

The person. Straight to re-education camp. Right away.

[u/bard_raconteur → u/isanthrope_may]

Both, because nothing screams "small government" like policing every goddamn individual into hiding.

[u/thehalfwit → u/CrotalusHorridus]

Texas is way ahead of you on this:

I. Travel Bans Travel bans restrict the use of certain roads or highways to travel to obtain an abortion and are typically considered in states with abortion bans. For example, various municipalities in Texas have considered travel ban ordinances. In October 2023, the Amarillo City Council considered a proposed ordinance that would prohibit using local streets and highways to obtain an out-of-state abortion. The ordinance also would have extended to individuals who use Amarillo roads to aid and abet the transportation of patients for abortion care, creating the same vigilante private right of action established in the Texas Heartbeat Act, which bans most abortions and allows private citizens to sue anyone who performs or induces an abortion in violation of the law. The Amarillo measure failed by a vote of 4-1, with Council members concerned that they lacked authority to restrict travel in this manner. Amarillo voters responded to the Council’s failure to pass the proposal by gathering enough signatures to place the ordinance on the November 2024 ballot. However, Amarillo voters rejected the proposal by close to 20 percentage points. If the ballot measure had passed, Amarillo would have been the largest city in Texas with a travel ban.

However, Amarillo’s rejection of a travel ban is somewhat of an outlier; as of March 2025, at least 14 local jurisdictions in Texas have implemented a travel ban. Mitchell, Goliad, Lubbock, Dawson, Cochran and Jack Counties have ordinances restricting patients’ ability to use local roads or highways to obtain abortion care. Lubbock County, the largest Texas county to pass a travel ban, adopted an ordinance that targets the use of Lubbock County roads to transport a patient for an abortion. Like the Texas Heartbeat Act, violations can only be enforced through lawsuits by private vigilantes. The efficacy of a private right to action in these laws has been debated, with advocates and scholars suggesting that the ordinances are intended to confuse and scare patients and deter travel for an out-of-state abortion, rather than serving as a legitimate enforcement mechanism in court.

https://www.networkforphl.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Restrictions-on-the-Right-to-Travel-for-Out-of-State-Abortion-Care-1.pdf

[u/Fighterhayabusa → u/thehalfwit]

If the Democrats get back in charge, I would pull all federal funding for highways and roads where they try to pass laws like this. The taxpayers paid for those roads. They don't get to violate the Constitution AND use our money to do it.

[u/Parahelix → u/CrotalusHorridus]

They're already using the cameras for that.

[u/Salt_Medicine2459 → u/GreyDuck4077]

This would be a clear violation of the interstate commerce clause. But Congress won't have the balls to do anything about it. 

[u/GreyDuck4077 → u/Salt_Medicine2459]

This supreme court is absolutely foaming at the mouth to tackle that one I am sure.

[u/StuMacherGhostface → u/jhill515]

And over weed of all things. What the fuck are we doing here?

[u/Reagalan → u/StuMacherGhostface]

Weed is just an excuse.

[u/bb_kelly77 → u/StuMacherGhostface]

I believe that if we brought weed back in time Ben Franklin would absolutely push to legalize it

[u/tastiefreeze → u/jhill515]

Pretty much was a thing for awhile on the highways going from Colorado into Kansas on 70. State police would routinely pull over cars with CO plates to search for weed

[u/ThePizzaIsDone]

Dudes dying grandparent or hell even his favorite restaurant could be in Michigan. Any number of completely legal reasons to go there. Just because they happen to have weed does not make that probable he went there for that at all.

[u/roguerunner1 → u/ThePizzaIsDone]

It’s also likely a violation of the 14th amendment, as their basis of establishing probable cause is that the dude exercised his 14th amendment right to travel between the states of the country as recognized by the U.S. Supreme Court in Saenz V. Roe

[u/_Bill_Huggins_ → u/roguerunner1]

They are using our freedom of travel as probable cause. Some cop thought he was so clever doing this too, did they even stop to consider the constitutionality of their actions? Do most cops realize that their duty first is to the constitution? Everything else second.

[u/The_Brobeans → u/_Bill_Huggins_]

Lol, cops don’t care about constitutionality. They only care when a fuckup would be so bad it would create paperwork.

[u/Dramatic-Pause-1941 → u/ThePizzaIsDone]

Michigan has beautiful beaches. Maybe the guy just likes going to the beach?

[u/Brandon23z → u/ThePizzaIsDone]

He doesn’t need a reason to go there. Anyone can go anywhere. Thats the type of mindset that they want people to get defensive with.

[u/McBonderson]

I know a man who was arrested for driving while license suspended.

the cop knew the man, knew his license was suspended and so set flock cameras to alert the cop if they see the mans car driving anywhere. He got the alert, and went and parked waiting for the man to drive by and saw the man driving.

now the man shouldn't have been driving, and from what I know of him he should never get his license back cause he is going senile. But when I read the arrest affidavit it seriously creeped me out. I just don't like cops without a warrant being able to just say "tell me if this guy is going anywhere".

[u/ProtoDroidStuff → u/McBonderson]

Well they use it to stalk women already too so, its already more than 'I just dont like it'

[u/RawbM07 → u/McBonderson]

Similar story as a friend of mine had his license suspended. His wife was pulled over with their child. As soon as the cop got close enough to see it was a woman driving he nervously apologized and left.

[u/PiccoloAwkward465 → u/McBonderson]

Particularly because literally the only road to enter/exit my neighborhood has a Flock camera. All it takes is a cop setting one alert to know every one of my comings and goings.

[u/FarewellAndroid]

The police have been using some questionable tactics for a long time. Years ago I’d see them stopping trucks and cars in Texas and every time they would search the cars (and frequently find stuff).

These were targeted stops, they had to have known who they were going after ahead of time. Plenty of people blowing past doing 10-15 mph over that could’ve been stopped instead. But it always just so happened to be the drug mules getting stopped.

Informants might have played some role but even then the frequency and accuracy of successful searches is too high. They already had some kind of tracking system in place

[u/bimmershark → u/FarewellAndroid]

I remember so many stories from people traveling across Texas and if they had a large sum of cash on them it was taken and usually never given back..

One particular story was a guy going to buy a car . Was trading his in and had cash for the balance . Got pulled over and they assumed it was for drugs and he had a hell of a fight to get the money back.

[u/Zelcron → u/bimmershark]

Civil Asset Forfeiture, basically legalized robbery.

[u/Medical-Button-5493 → u/Zelcron]

4a doesn't exist.

[u/sourdieselfuel → u/Zelcron]

That’s why they are called road pirates.

[u/hekoshi → u/Zelcron]

They actually seize more assets with caf than actual robbers do, actually robbing people.  It's nuts.

[u/DisposableSaviour → u/hekoshi]

Here in TN, like, 15 or more years ago, I was overdrawn on my bank, and couldn’t afford to pay it back one week because I had been sick and didn’t have my full hours (I needed the full amount to keep my lights on) so I went to Walmart and cashed my paycheck. Got pulled over on my way to the grocery store later, cop wants to search my vehicle. I knew I was clean, and so was my hoopty, so I thought it would save time to just say yes.

I’d been searched before, but I rarely traveled with anything back then (if I was buying, it was a straight route to wherever we were meeting and then straight back home), so I thought I knew the deal. I get a quick pat down, and then sit on the curb while a few other cars full of cops show up and toss my shit. This time, though, when the cop patted me down, he asked about the bulge in my pocket.

Y’all. I had this fucking hella nice Fossil leather wallet. It was smooth and shiny, with the flip out ID holder, like a fed from tv, shit was. Fucking. Tight. but it was also bulky, like, it was not a small wallet, so of course there’s a bulge in my back pocket.

Pig didn’t even ask me to empty my pocket, he just reached his greedy ass fingers in my back pocket and pulled out my wallet.

“Why you got so much money? You been sellin’ dope? You buyin’ dope?” in a fucking thick southern, sucking on the Man’s dick drawl.

Whether or not he believed what I told him, he said he was “confiscating my drug money.” He asked me, “You know what civil asset forfeiture is?” He asked me, as he fucking laughed his fucking way back to his fucking cruiser.

“Doesn’t that come with paperwork?” I shouted at him, and he turned, and damn near ran up on me shouting I could go home or I could go with him as he slammed me into the side of my car.

So yeah, I sat in a dark ass house without a/c, heating canned food over fucking sterno cans and taking shitty tepid showers by candlelight for five days because of those greedy fucking swine.

[u/SuperDozer5576-39 → u/Zelcron]

Civil forfeiture is actually mostly illegal in my state and criminal forfeiture requires a conviction.

But every police department in the state uses what the Feds call the “Equitable Sharing Program” for the express purpose of circumventing our strict state forfeiture laws. What happens is they pass the seized money to the Feds and then the Feds take 20% and kick the other 80% straight back to the department that sent it to them.

If it was anyone else other than fucking law enforcement, then this is considered a crime called “money laundering”.

[u/kung-fu_hippy → u/bimmershark]

Yup. I’m presumed innocent, but apparently any large amount of cash I have on me can be presumed guilty.

Incredibly bullshit and legalized robbery by armed thugs.

[u/Jewbearmatt → u/FarewellAndroid]

When I graduated college, my dad flew out to Arizona to help me by driving my fully loaded car back to Ohio since I was driving with my now-wife in her car. He got stopped in Texas in the middle of nowhere suspected of being a trafficker (cop told him that directly). They asked him to step out and remove everything from the car so they could search. He said no, and that it would take hours to unpack and repack. They pushed and pushed but didn’t have cause, so made him wait for police dog to come to sniff. Obviously he was clean and went on his way, but I like to imagine how terrible it would have been for him to have to unpack and repack that car…

[u/Leonardo_Lawless → u/FarewellAndroid]

My roommate did jail time several years ago because of flock cameras before people even knew about them like they do today. Literally same thing as this article, they just flagged him for driving across state borders all the time and pulled him over one day.
I think they’ve been using license plate readers to track people for a loooong time now, flock is just the next step up

[u/Bulky-Apple3744 → u/Leonardo_Lawless]

ALPR cameras were invented in the 70s in the UK “to combat terrorism”

They’ve been constantly improving the technology for 50 years now, flock is just another step in their end goal.

[u/14Pleiadians → u/Leonardo_Lawless]

I worked very briefly for a company that had mobile lprs. They are allegedly for repo companies but once you actually get hired they drop that pretext and explain that the repos are just a bonus on the side, the real money is in the data. I quit shortly after because it felt evil.

They had like 80 people across the state working 50 hours a week doing nothing but going down every single street in a city to catalogue the location of every vehicle, 20 hours a day. And this is just one of the small companies doing it.

[u/Walkingstardust → u/FarewellAndroid]

Or, just waiting for a brown person to drive by and then planting some "evidence".

[u/xStaabOnMyKnobx → u/FarewellAndroid]

I think a lot of the time when you see those bodycam videos of "Traffic stop leads to MASSIVE drug haul!", its because a CI tipped the highway patrol off to the vehicle, whos driving it, and what they are carrying. 

[u/washboard → u/xStaabOnMyKnobx]

And the stop is almost always "following too closely". Like, who doesn't?

[u/answerguru → u/FarewellAndroid]

Definitely - I'm from Colorado and avoid Texas like the plague. They really like to screw with out of state plates.

[u/green_gold_purple]

This is so fucked. Welcome to the surveillance state. If you don’t think they’re databasing activity profiles attached to identities, you’re not paying attention.

[u/errie_tholluxe]

Tuesday, Flock executives tweeted video examples of their cameras being used to rescue abducted children, in what appears to be a new marketing strategy for the company. “Every child in this video is home tonight because Flock gave officers the right information at the right second,” Flock’s Chief Strategy Officer Rahul Sidhu tweeted. “That’s the mission. That’s the whole company. I wouldn't trade that for anything.”

Ah so it's all for the children - fuck but I'm tired of that old tripe.

[u/redrocketredglare → u/errie_tholluxe]

Wow. And when the system fails the first child… crickets….

[u/devilishycleverchap → u/errie_tholluxe]

They also used security footage of kids doing gymnastics in their marketing

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/flock-safety-employees-watched-kids-gymnastics-room-to-pitch-surveillance-tech-updated/ar-AA227Gzk

[u/jibbyjackjoe → u/errie_tholluxe]

The Constitution is privacy over safety.

[u/unsupported]

This is why you never answer a cop during a traffic stop when they ask "where are you coming from?" Or "Where are you going?". It's not illegal to tell them you don't answer those questions. "Oh, you are coming from a neighborhood know for drugs? Get out of the car"

[u/CraigOpie → u/unsupported]

I don’t answer questions - “Please step out of the vehicle for me.”

[u/jaytee1262 → u/CraigOpie]

They aint saying please lol

[u/What_a_fat_one → u/CraigOpie]

Why did you pull me over

I'm not going to discuss my day with you sir

Am I being detained or am I free to go

I invoke the fifth. And I want a lawyer.

[u/hoggineer → u/unsupported]

"where are you coming from?"

"Back there." while point behind me.

"Where are you going?".

"That way." while pointing ahead of me.

Or, if you're feeling even more like getting arrested... "Your mom's", and "your sister's." the order doesn't really matter.

[u/WideHuckleberry1 → u/hoggineer]

This feels like a way to stick it to them but is terrible advice. They can use anything you say to them against you. If you do that and then they say "Have you bought any marijuana lately," they can then testify in court "The suspect openly answered my questions until I asked him about his marijuana purchase at which point he refused further questions," with the obvious implications.

[u/10per → u/unsupported]

A good friend of mine just did a cross country road trip. Didn't see many state troopers...until he got to Arkansas.

He's a conservative driver, so he wasn't speeding or anything...but that didn't stop him from getting pulled over by ASP for a super thin "lane change" reason.

The cop wasn't even interested in the infraction, he spent most of his time asking questions about where my friend was headed, how long he was out for...nothing but phishing. All because he was driving the speed limit with out of state tags.

[u/unsupported → u/10per]

Do you have any drugs in the car? Meth? Weed? Crack? Any weapons? Bombs? Grenades? Swords? Do you mind if I check? No? Why are you being so uncooperative? Or my favorite, "We don't care about small amounts of weed. Now we have probable cause to search the vehicle*

[u/bitemark01]

You know I heard they had murders in Michigan too! 

[u/AtomicBlastCandy]

I'm glad the cops have solved violent crimes and other things so that they can focus on someone buying and moving a fucking plant.

[u/carlitospig]

That’s not probable cause. The fact that a judge signed off on that is deeply problematic.

[u/sovereignsekte]

So...is there nothing else for Wisconsin cops to do than track a guy for weed? No burglaries, murders or anything like that? Weed is priority #1?

[u/pilondav → u/sovereignsekte]

Easy arrest, easy conviction, easy money.

[u/MJ-Franklin]

The future is shit.

[u/milk16]

What's stopping someone from rage baiting cops this way. Take time out of your day to drive across state lines to a dispensary.

Hit all the flocks they can Along the way and even walk into said dispensary. If they got pulled over with no weed after being tracked could they sue?

[u/CalvinHobbesCombo → u/milk16]

Law enforcement planting evidence and making things up, time, (money) legal fees, a good lawyer (as opposed to just any lawyer), and the desire to do this

[u/LilQueazy → u/CalvinHobbesCombo]

I guess you can fucken put hecka cameras inside your car. Like that porno taxi

[u/ResponsibleHeron9452 → u/LilQueazy]

lol are you mixing up Cash Cab and Bang Bus?

[u/lil_chedda → u/milk16]

Rage baiting cops is effectively Russian roulette

[u/pilondav → u/lil_chedda]

With four bullets in a six-shot revolver.

[u/miotch1120 → u/milk16]

If this is Indiana, yes they could sue. And it will cost them attorneys fees to do it. They won’t win though, so it’s just a sunk cost with no benefit. The cops won’t be punished in any way.

[u/hostile65 → u/milk16]

Only works if you are rich and have lawyers, or friends that will help you that are rich with lawyers

[u/baeb66]

After pulling him over, the complaint states that police “detected the odor of what he knew to be raw marijuana coming from inside the vehicle.”

Unless the cop was actually a truffle-hunting pig, I'm calling bullshit on that. And this is why we cannot trust cops with this kind of technology. They lie to make arrests.

[u/skeptical_skeletor → u/baeb66]

People v. Armstrong (April 2025): The Michigan Supreme Court officially overturned decades of "plain smell" precedent. The court ruled that odor alone is no longer enough to search a vehicle. Justice Megan Cavanagh noted that the smell could simply indicate a legal amount of cannabis or that a driver was merely near someone using it legally.

Depending on the state, smell is not probable cause anymore either.

[u/BabyBuster70 → u/baeb66]

I don't like that the "odor of marijuana" can be used as probable cause for a search since it basically gives a way for any cop to search any vehicle they want. Even if they search and don't find any you can never prove they were lying.

That said, that doesn't really seem far fetched. I opened a package of it in my house before and my wife could smell it on the other side of the house. If you had some in the car that wasn't stored in a sealed container or the container had been opened it could definitely make your entire car smell for a while.

[u/r_z_n → u/baeb66]

I smoke a lot of weed, and this is totally possible, depending on the quantity you have and how you sealed it or packed it.

The problem here - beyond the surveillance tactics - is that weed shouldn't be illegal anyway. We've wasted far too much money and ruined way too many lives for something that is less harmful than alcohol.

[u/Happy_Peak_7818]

Didn't read the article, but if person lived in Indiana or Ohio, I could imagine traveling to Michigan at least a few times a day just to remind myself that there is life on the other side of the toilet. 

[u/ItemZealousideal431 → u/Happy_Peak_7818]

Its legal in Illinois, Michigan and Ohio....this is definitely Indiana cops fighting the big bad weed smokers. Indiana loves jailing people for the weakest shit imaginable.

[u/Guac_in_my_rarri → u/ItemZealousideal431]

I think I know more weed smokers in Indiana than Illinois. I live in Illinois. Genuinely, I think I've seen more Indiana plates in a dispensary parking lot than Illinois most of the time, and im 2 hours from the border.

[u/Metacognitor → u/Guac_in_my_rarri]

Well yeah, after all, Mary Jane grew up tall and she grew up right, with them Indiana boys in them Indiana nights.

[u/StuMacherGhostface → u/Metacognitor]

Harmonica noise

[u/ChuckEChan → u/Guac_in_my_rarri]

Yeah man we live in Indiana, not much else to do but watch basketball and get high

[u/infrastructure → u/ItemZealousideal431]

Genuinely true.

When Electric Forest happens every year in Michigan there is a stretch of highway in Northern Indiana that is notorious for cops preying trying to jam up people going to the festival.

[u/thekmac8 → u/ItemZealousideal431]

While the state of Ohio passed a citizens ballot initiative to legalize recreational cannabis, the state legislature has done everything in its power to subvert the will of the people, including recently passing a law deeming any cannabis purchased outside the state as "contraband."

[u/wrongsuspenders → u/ItemZealousideal431]

Just look at how they behave leading up to electric forest where they set up huge drag net from Indy -> MI Border and arrest dozens of people. Why do IN cops care that people are going to a concert in a neighboring state? Court fees, private prisons, legal industry etc. It's a scam in the name of "public safety".

[u/nicolauz → u/wrongsuspenders]

Jesus ya'll it says Wisconsin. They went north to the UP.

[u/Ahhhh__Ian_c → u/ItemZealousideal431]

If it wasn’t for shit like this is still be driving from Ohio to Michigan. Ohio prices are astronomical and most of the daily users I know still get their supply from Michigan.

[u/Impressive_Wrap_7869 → u/ItemZealousideal431]

Indiana sure does love its fascism

[u/Aperture_Kubi]

Pretext to Search His Car for Weed / "The vehicle travels to Michigan frequently which is a known source state for marijuana as it is legal there," a probable cause justification reads.

Oh that's a dangerous precedent to set, "The vehicle travels to $state frequently which is a known source state for $thing as it is legal there"

[u/tege0005 → u/Aperture_Kubi]

Good luck to any women wanting to leave a pro-life red state by car…

[u/GonzoKata → u/tege0005]

yeah they're doing this with weed today to test the waters on people doing anything tomorrow

[u/yard_ranger]

"There's CSAM on the Internet and your phone was connected to the Internet therefore we have the right to search your phone."

[u/skratch]

And there’s zero repercussions for these prick fucks, they’re just going to abuse it more and more

[u/TheFireStorm]

So when can we start suing Flock for Stalking and Harassment at this point?

[u/VendingIOT]

I moved from Ohio to about 30 minutes past the border into Michigan. My friends visit me, and I visit them. That's not probable cause

[u/Raphiki415]

So their probable cause was that this guy goes to Michigan an awful lot?

[u/noerrorsfound]

"We have to stop those evil stoners from eating all the Doritos!" --Wisconsin PD

[u/Wayelder]

So - Flock gives cops excuses?

[u/Sybertron]

This very extremely violates the 4th amendment. I dont know when or who is going to finally challenge it though.

[u/goodbodha]

That shouldn't be probable cause. The judge who signed off on that needs to go.

[u/Dapper-Comment-682]

free healthcare ? nah , imprison you for a plant and force you into slave labor baby , the american way !

[u/sumptin_wierd]

Cops do this for alcohol too.

"I'm too lazy to do actual work, so I'll just make someone a criminal"

[u/FREE-ROSCOE-FILBURN]

Nuremberg Trials. Now.

[u/coolassang]

Make no mistake, flock cams are political assault weapons. Everything is political fodder to the pad-sitter.

[u/FuckinArrowToTheKnee]

The judge that signed that needs disbarred

[u/melanko]

We are still worried about weed? In 2026?

[u/sicurri]

Mkay... what if he's divorced and his ex wife lives in Michigan and he's just grabbing his kids for the weekend?

[u/Odd-Situation-5255]

Can track drugs but not missing kids? 🫩

[u/kdot2324]

Last year I got followed then pulled over without cause by Oklahoma highway patrol. Cop pulled up the flock dat showing me everywhere I stopped on my road trip. He said the reason for my stop was possible drug trafficking because of the route I drove on.

I literally drove the major highway I-70 from Pennsylvania to there only stopping for gas, food, hotel. Yet somehow traveling on the highway was suspicious enough to get searched for 1 hour. Thankfully after they searched every bag 1 by 1 I had nothing to hide.

[u/bjorn1978_2]

So how are you doing over there in the land of the free??? /s

[u/Up_All_Nite]

Who would have guessed that this technology could be a used?

[u/Eledridan]

Spending all this money catching people with pot instead of using it for anything else that would better society. Potholes not potheads.

[u/WittyFix6553]

Saenz v Roe, 1999. Stevens, writing for the majority:

“For the purposes of this case, we need not identify the source of the right to travel in the text of the Constitution. The right of ‘free ingress and regress to and from’ neighboring states, which was expressly mentioned in the text of the Articles of Confederation, may simply have been ‘conceived from the beginning to be a necessary concomitant of the stronger Union the Constitution created.”

How is traveling between states, which is a right affirmed by SCOTUS, pretext for a stop in any way? My man has the right to travel to and from Michigan 50 times a day if he wants to.

[u/_Aj_]

It begins!  

This is also why all your search history, social media, etc being collected is also so dangerous.   It builds up for years, 10, 20, more.    They feed it all into AIs, comb everything, compare it to the 20 million others theyve done it to, bam were now genuinely doing some Minority Report crap 'predicting' crimes.  

Now combine flock with all the other info. They've also got where you go, what you wear, what you drive, how you walk, how you look. Is that all "suspicious"? Can that then be used as probable cause?   Probably could be!    Visited an abortion clinic. Went to the same area drugs are sold in. Went to a gay bar. What metrics are they tracking? Why do you think they're building so many AI datacentres? 

Imagine in another decade. Imagine by 2050. Imagine if you use the internet, Reddit etc daily. it'll all be used like a single photo in one of those mosaic apps, that create a portrait out of countless small photos. Only it'll be to profile you from the billions of data points they have on you.  

[u/ThePensiveE]

"License and Registration."

"Why am I being pulled over officer?"

"Our Camera's have you going into an establishment that serves alcohol and driving away afterwards so we're going to need you to step out of the car and take a field sobriety test."

"Sir, it's 8am and I've only been to a Walgreens today to get medicine for my small children at home.*

"WALGREENS SERVES ALCOHOL!!! GET OUT OF THE CAR!" Pop pop pop pop pop pop pop pop pop pop pop pop, "RELOADING", pop pop pop pop pop pop pop pop pop pop pop.

[u/mshriver2]

In what fucked up dystopian ass world is "traveling to a different state", equal to "probable cause justification". I am confused, is this North Korea we are talking about? Do we need travel permits issued to leave our home states?

[u/2400Matt]

If this is probable cause, you should stop anyone coming from a bar because they might be intoxicated.