Law Enforcement’s Take on Flock Cameras in Montana

Last week, I caught up with Cascade County Sheriff Jesse Slaughter and we discussed how the jail system works with revenue, budgeting, and then some.

This week, I was able to catch up with Sheriff Slaughter and talk to him about the growing concern about flock cameras.

Sheriff Slaughter Speaks on Flock Cameras

I've shared a few videos from our conversation on the KMON Radio Facebook page, but I took the liberty of providing you with the full conversation about flock cameras, right to privacy, and law enforcement's transparency with the community.

***

Chris: So let's dive into it because I found this extremely interesting and I'm sure folks will too... about flock cameras.

Sheriff Slaughter: Yeah.

Chris: These things are popping up everywhere. People are talking about them, our good buddy, Nick, down the hall, he shared a story about these flock cameras and how there's now assistance on how to know where they're at.

So, my thing is with you guys being law enforcement: When I see a flock camera here the idea that it scans and saves data in that I go, "Oh okay, so they're working with law enforcement." Is that true?

ALSO READ: Help Greats Falls Americans Hockey Players This Upcoming Season

Sheriff Slaughter: Yeah, in some states, in some areas they are. The Montana Constitution's enhanced privacy law really prohibits facial recognition and License plate readers.

Chris: Really?

Sheriff Slaughter: Yes, that is your private information in the Montana Constitution. So, I mean private to a point, right, you know? Can a law enforcement officer run your plate? Yes, they can but believe it or not, they have to have a reason to run your plate. We're not allowed to randomly run plates. Like, we're not allowed to like go through a parking lot and just run all the plates to see who has a, you know, see if we can cross-reference it for a warrant or something.

Chris: No kidding?

Sheriff Slaughter: If we know that that person ran to that hotel, you know, drove there, he got away or whatever and all the white sedans, you know, he was in a white sedan.

Can we run the plates on the white sedans today? Yeah, we can do that because we have a reason to run it. But we can't even, in law enforcement, we can't even run plates randomly.

Chris: I didn't know that.

Reason for Running a License Plate

Sheriff Slaughter: We have to have an identifiable reason. We have to look at the car, all that... that tags the wrong color, for the year. I'm gonna run it and see if it's expiring.

Chris: Can you do that for out-of-state as well when you see a few-?

Sheriff Slaughter: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, but you still have to have the same you still have to have same reason. You can't just randomly run plates.

Chris: Really? So, like if you see a plate here from Florida... But you've got a vehicle you never seen before... you, out of curiosity, just can't be like...?

Sheriff Slaughter: No, you can't.

Chris: Really?!

Get our free mobile app

Sheriff Slaughter: No.

Chris: Wow, cause I would have thought that like folks that come in and never change their plates or their tags and you guys are just curious to see if they're abiding by [the law], you know?

Sheriff Slaughter: You're talking about gainfully employed. You're gainfully employed in Montana and you have an out-of-state plate or out-of-county plate. Is that what you mean?

Chris: I'm not as yet familiar about the law as you are!

Sheriff Slaughter: It would have to be something where, you know, you drove by a job site all the time and you saw an out-of-state plate there. Or, you know, you'd have you still have to have a reason because there are traveling workers and they get to drive their car.

Chris: That's true.

Sheriff Slaughter: It's still America.

Chris: That's right.

Sheriff Slaughter: I don't want us to become like a police state, where that's what we're worried about.

Chris: That's good!

Sheriff Slaughter: Especially like when we talk about blue collar jobs or nursing or something like that. A lot of these people travel for their work. So, if they're here for 30 days, you're gonna jam them up? By the letter of the law you could right but you know, I can't remember - it's 30 days now - I don't know, it just left me if that was the actual time.

Chris: Sure, but I get what you're saying.

Sheriff Slaughter: You know, are you gonna go jam up that hard-working person who's you know, contributing to probably a local company? That's making your community better? You're gonna go over there and go "I'm gonna write you a ticket"? You know, I think there's the there's that whole letter of the law spirit of law thing. I think if they established, you know, that they don't live here and they're now working here, that's the right thing to do.

Chris: Yeah, of course.

ALSO READ: New Grizzly Bear Management Plan Hits Montana

Sheriff Slaughter: Yeah, you also have to look at from educational perspective too.

Private Property and Surveillance Technology

Chris: Yeah! You know so, going back to flock cameras, Jesse, so these are popping up everywhere, right? And you said that we have to be careful about facial recognition, taking data... if they're doing that, how are they able to do that and get away with it if it's against the Montana Constitution?

Sheriff Slaughter: So, like federal property private property. That that's how they do it. Like I think there's a last time I looked it up I think there's like four in Great Falls and they're private property.

Chris: So, do they have to get permission from you guys or at least let you know that they're putting [them up], they don't have to even contact you?

Sheriff Slaughter: No, they don't. And this is the thing people always have to remember: you don't have as much rights as you think you do with a private company versus a government entity. Now, to all the listeners out there, go do a deep dive into Flock camera and figure out who funds them and where their money comes from. Go down that rabbit trail. I'm not gonna go there, but you go [look for] yourself.

Do I think that there's a place in this world for license plate readers and facial recognition? Yeah, I do. Have I used those? To solve missing children cases, sex trafficking cases. Yes, I have. They weren't in the state because they were traveling to other states to conduct their crime and coming into Montana. So I've used other states resources for it.

There is some court cases that are pending about the usage of these and will they have a downstream effect, and will we even be allowed to use an out-of-state license plate reader or facial recognition to make a case in our state? There's questions like that out there.

So, as a law enforcement officer you want to be extremely careful how you use that technology. And you want to consult with your you know, county attorney about: "Okay, is this a lawful use of this?

There's always the argument out there: "Well, we need all this technology because if someone ever kidnaps a child or there's a sex trafficking case." But I think also, Montana is different. Montana's like... you're not really free unless you have privacy. If you talk to lawmakers in Montana, in it and on both sides of the aisle, Democrats and Republicans, that if all of your data is being captured and all your travels being monitored... Are you truly a free person? Or are you just totally being monitored by the government wherever you go? And so, I think you know there there's tons of news articles about the Flock cameras, about people rising up against them, about all this different stuff.

I want people to do everything lawfully and legally. And argue those things in court and argue these things in front of their legislature.

Chris: Yeah.

Sheriff Slaughter: It's a catch-22 for me. So in my alter ego is the sheriff, you know when I'm not just Slaughter, right? I see a ton of great uses for it where we could solve crimes and prevent crimes and help people, you know but as a citizen, I don't want any part of them. I don't think it's right that we track and surveil. It's difficult to know if you're surveilling someone who didn't do anything wrong, right? Or are you surveilling someone who's a real bad guy? You know, and I think it's a fundamental, you know founding father constitutional question: How much of the Constitution are we shredding away with all this tech?

I mean, you know, we talked about data centers not too long ago, right? Well, data centers are how they create all this AI technology that does a lot of surveillance and a lot of tracking of our information.

Are Ring Cameras Different From Flock Cameras?

Chris: So, let me ask you this then what would be the difference between a Flock camera and someone deciding to set their Ring camera up on their home to just face to the street?

Sheriff Slaughter: Yeah, it's a great question, right? And that's why that whole thing (about) we're on private property. You can you can have that technology because it's your property, your domain. Usually, Ring cameras don't do a really good job of picking up stuff outside your property boundary. They're kind of limited in their scope.

You know like my camera I have Ring cameras and they don't activate when a car drives by on my street. But if someone steps on my porch they do, you know what I mean? So, it's they're a little bit more contained.

Chris: Yeah.

Sheriff Slaughter: I heard this and actually heard it from a comedian, and I thought it was super funny. They were like, why are we so worried about our data? And there's way more to this; it's kind of a funny joke.

She's like I grew up in the 80s and they used to throw a giant book on your porch. And it had your home address and your phone number. You can just look up someone's name you could just go down everyone in your entire community.

READ MORE: The Top 5 Most Dangerous Gangs in Montana

Chris: Wasn't that the whole premise of the first Terminator movie?  Arnold goes to the phone book to find Sarah Connor or something like that? He's going through and he just takes out everyone in the phone book. And yeah, that's scary when you think about it.

Sheriff: But I mean when I heard that I kind of laughed and I kind of thought to myself I'm like, holy cow. We had we had AI surveillance in the 70s and 80s it was a phone book, you know and everybody and you had to like, you had to like petition to the phone company to be unlisted and it was a process. It was you know, you were auto, like you if you didn't say anything, you had to write a letter.

Chris: The guy had to show up on his horse. You hand it to him.

Sheriff Slaughter: Yeah no, but I think I think this is a fundamental question and I think it's a question as a society in a community we need to start asking. This is the hard part that people have to understand: having freedom is inherently dangerous.

It is really, really a difficult concept. So, if you want total protection, and you know you bought into the like 15-minute city, total surveillance, everything's monitored, everything's watched... You know or do you want freedom? Which if you do, you know, there's an element of more danger to your life.