As Flock Faces a National Backlash, Falls Church Explains Its License Plate Readers

Automated cameras capable of recording where vehicles travel have spread across the country, giving police a powerful new investigative tool — and creating a growing national fight over just how much the government should know about where people go.

At least 69 police officials have now been accused, charged with, or convicted of misusing Flock Safety or other automated license plate reader systems for unauthorized purposes, according to an August investigation by The Washington Post. In some cases, officers allegedly searched for former romantic partners or other people for reasons that had nothing to do with legitimate police work. The newspaper found that some departments weren’t even regularly auditing how their officers were using the technology.

Flock, which operates more than 120,000 cameras nationally and says its network processes some 20 billion plate scans a month, announced additional safeguards in August amid the scrutiny, including mandatory case numbers for searches and automatic reviews for abnormal activity.

The controversy has now reached Virginia. Last week in Central Virginia, Goochland County Sheriff Steven Creasey suspended his office’s use of Flock cameras after considering community input, privacy concerns, data access, and what he called the “evolving legal landscape.” Creasey emphasized that the decision was not prompted by any identified misuse by his department.

In Falls Church, however, Police Chief Shahram Fard says there is an important distinction residents should know.

“We don’t have any fixed cameras across the city and specifically Flock, we don’t have any relationship with,” Fard told the News-Press during an extensive interview about the City’s use of license plate-reading technology.

Falls Church Police do use automated license plate readers, commonly called LPRs or ALPRs. The Department has used the technology in some form for more than 15 years.

But its current readers are mobile, incorporated into the Department’s newer Axon in-car camera system rather than positioned as fixed cameras around the City. And perhaps more importantly, Falls Church’s readers operate under a Virginia law that now places unusually detailed restrictions on what police can do with the information after a camera reads a plate. Those restrictions include:

Virginia goes even further: evidence obtained through certain violations of the ALPR law is inadmissible when offered by the Commonwealth in a criminal or civil proceeding.

Those aren’t promises from Falls Church Police.

They are Virginia law.

Virginia is not the only state regulating automated license plate readers. But its current law puts together an unusually extensive collection of safeguards governing police use of the technology — controlling why the data can be searched, how long it survives, how searches are audited, when it can justify a traffic stop, where the information can travel and what can happen when someone deliberately violates the rules.

FALLS CHURCH HAS USED LPRs SINCE 2010

Falls Church’s use of license plate readers predates Flock’s current nationwide network.

The Police Department obtained its first two readers in 2010 through a federal Department of Homeland Security grant distributed to law-enforcement agencies throughout the Washington metropolitan region.

The original equipment was mounted on marked police vehicles. Today’s system is considerably different.

Fard said the City’s current LPR technology is incorporated into its newer in-car camera system, with equipment mounted around the windshield rather than the conspicuous external readers used on older police vehicles. The City’s broader body-worn and in-car camera system is supplied by Axon Enterprises. Falls Church authorized a five-year contract with Axon for those systems.

As an officer drives, the system can read plates and generate notifications involving specific categories of law-enforcement information.

Fard said those include missing or endangered persons, wanted persons, stolen vehicles, and stolen license plates.

The system is not identifying the people inside the vehicles.

“No facial recognition,” Fard said.

That doesn’t mean license plate information is insignificant.

Virginia’s statute defines ALPR system data broadly. It can include an image of a license plate, an image of the vehicle, identifying characteristics of the vehicle, and the date, time and location at which the image was captured.

One plate reading may reveal little.

Thousands of readings stored over months or years could reveal considerably more.

Virginia law largely prevents police from creating that kind of indefinite archive.

21 DAYS — THEN IT GOES

Virginia Code §2.2-5517 requires police ALPR system data to be purged 21 days after it is captured, unless it falls under an exception for an ongoing investigation, prosecution or civil action.

The destruction requirement applies not only to the police department. The vendor has to lose it, too.

State law requires approved systems to be capable of purging the information “in such a manner” that it cannot be recovered by either the vendor or the law-enforcement agency.

Fard said Falls Church’s system complies with the 21-day requirement and that the City owns its police ALPR data.

Virginia law now requires contracts with ALPR vendors to specify that system and audit-trail data belong to the law-enforcement agency. Vendors must also certify that they will not sell or share Virginia system data except as permitted by the statute.

But while the ordinary plate information generally disappears after 21 days, Virginia deliberately keeps something else longer:

The record showing who searched for it.

Audit-trail information must be maintained for two years.

“Every search is stored,” Fard said.

Virginia requires enough information to create that audit trail before an officer queries system data. The statute limits searches to specific purposes, including qualifying criminal investigations, active investigations involving missing or endangered people or human trafficking, and specified alerts involving wanted persons, missing or endangered persons, stolen vehicles and stolen license plates.

Departments must have internal auditing procedures that operate at least once every 30 days.

The plate data generally gets 21 days.

The record of who went looking gets two years.

That distinction has become particularly significant in light of what has happened elsewhere.

The Washington Post reported in August that at least 69 police officials nationally had been accused, charged with or convicted of unauthorized misuse of Flock or other LPR systems. Its investigation found that some departments did not routinely audit searches and that, in at least 15 cases, someone outside the police department — including victims, activists and journalists — first identified potential misuse.

Virginia law requires the audit.

And Virginia attached criminal consequences to deliberate abuse.

Anyone who willfully and intentionally queries, accesses or uses an ALPR system for a purpose not authorized by the statute — or willfully and intentionally sells, shares or disseminates the information in violation of the law — is guilty of a Class 1 misdemeanor.

A COMPUTER HIT IS NOT ENOUGH TO STOP YOU

Virginia has also placed a legal barrier between an ALPR notification and the flashing lights in someone’s rearview mirror.

The statute explicitly states that an ALPR notification “does not, by itself, constitute reasonable suspicion” to stop a vehicle.

Before making a stop based on the notification, the officer must either develop independent reasonable suspicion or confirm that the license plate or identifying characteristics of the vehicle match the information in the database that generated the notification.

Fard emphasized the same requirement during his interview with the News-Press.

The system can alert an officer.

The officer still has to verify what the system found.

That safeguard matters because a database can be outdated, a plate can be stolen, a vehicle can change owners and the person behind the wheel may have nothing to do with whatever information caused the alert.

Virginia law does not allow the computer’s answer, standing alone, to justify the stop.

WHAT ABOUT THE FEDS — OR ICE?

Perhaps the most consequential restriction involves what happens when somebody else wants the data.

Virginia law says police cannot sell ALPR system or audit data. It also prohibits a law-enforcement agency from sharing that data with, or disseminating it to, a database belonging to another state, the federal government, or a private or commercial entity.

The law does permit specific forms of disclosure, including sharing with another law-enforcement agency for purposes authorized by the statute if the receiving agency complies with Virginia’s requirements. It also permits disclosures involving prosecutors, criminal discovery, court orders and court-issued subpoenas, along with several other narrowly defined circumstances.

So the law is not an absolute prohibition against any piece of ALPR information ever reaching a federal or outside law-enforcement agency.

But neither does it permit Falls Church to simply open its system or feed its vehicle-location information into a federal or nationwide database.

The News-Press asked Fard specifically about federal authorities and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

His response was direct.

“We can’t share with the feds, which means we can’t share it with ICE,” Fard said while explaining the restrictions governing the City’s system.

Fard also said Falls Church would scrutinize requests from other law-enforcement agencies rather than treating legal authority to share as an automatic reason to do so.

His broader point: Just because the Department may be legally allowed to share information doesn’t mean it automatically should.

That distinction is especially notable for a Northern Virginia community just miles from Washington and surrounded by local, state and federal law-enforcement agencies.

Virginia law doesn’t make the information impossible to obtain through legitimate legal processes.

It does put walls around routine access.

VIRGINIA REQUIRES POLICE TO SHOW THEIR WORK

Virginia’s law also requires police agencies to account publicly for how they are using the technology.

Agencies must report annually to Virginia State Police information including how many ALPR cameras they operate, how many searches were performed and why, how many vehicles were stopped because of system notifications, demographic information about drivers stopped, whether other agencies have access, identified instances of unauthorized use and how many subpoenas, search warrants and other third-party requests for information were received.

The law requires agencies to publicly post both their ALPR policy and their annual report, with exceptions protecting personal, case-identifying and other sensitive information.

Falls Church has another reporting mechanism as well.

Under Virginia’s Community Policing Act, the City collects information from motor vehicle traffic and investigatory stops. Fard said state reporting now allows LPR-related stops to be identified as well.

The Department’s General Orders are publicly accessible, and Fard said Falls Church updated its LPR policy in September 2025 and issued a standing order July 31, 2026, following the latest changes in state law.

And if an LPR alert ultimately leads to a police encounter, another piece of technology can create another record.

Falls Church has used in-car dash cameras since 2012 and body-worn cameras since May 2022. The City’s body-camera system can be activated manually and can also activate automatically; turning on a patrol vehicle’s emergency lights is one publicly identified trigger.

Once footage is captured and uploaded, the City says officers cannot edit, change or delete it. Recordings not subject to another legal retention requirement are generally retained for 90 days.

The result is several layers of documentation: an LPR query creates an audit trail; an LPR-related traffic stop creates reportable data; and the police encounter itself may produce video.

Falls Church Has Another Lpr — And It Isn’T Police

There is another license plate reader operating within Falls Church government.

It isn’t Flock.

It isn’t part of the Police Department’s Axon system.

And it isn’t being used for criminal investigations.

This one is about taxes.

City Treasurer Jody Acosta and Commissioner of the Revenue Tom Clinton are preparing to fully reactivate a single mobile Leonardo ELSAG license plate reader mounted on a dedicated City vehicle.

The City originally purchased the system before the Covid pandemic. According to Acosta, the hardware and warranty cost $16,018, with another $5,620 for software — a total initial cost of $21,638.

The original plan called for hiring a part-time retired sheriff’s deputy or police officer to locate vehicles associated with delinquent personal property taxes. The Sheriff’s Office provided a retired vehicle that otherwise would have been sold at auction.

Covid stalled the program.

Acosta said the Treasurer and Commissioner of the Revenue have worked since last year to restart it, and the offices now have a dedicated City vehicle provided from the Police Department fleet.

The single reader has two purposes.

For the Treasurer, the City imports a list of vehicles associated with delinquent taxes from its existing tax system. As the vehicle travels through the City, the reader scans plates and generates an alert when it finds a match.

Acosta said the reader is intended as a last-resort collection tool after the City has already sent multiple delinquency notices and pursued other collection mechanisms, including DMV stops.

If a delinquent vehicle is ultimately located, the City can “seize” it in place. Its plates can be removed and a large orange notice placed on the windshield informing the owner that the vehicle has been seized for delinquent taxes. The owner must resolve the outstanding debt before the plates are returned.

Clinton’s office will use the same reader differently.

The Commissioner of the Revenue is looking for vehicles that appear to be garaged in Falls Church but aren’t registered locally for taxation.

Clinton told the News-Press that the reader captures plate information that can then be cross-referenced against DMV records. The system is being reimplemented specifically to identify vehicles that appear to have situs in the City but have not been registered locally as required.

During Commissioner of the Revenue runs, the reader will be temporarily mounted on a City vehicle. Rather than targeting specific individuals, vehicles or neighborhoods, Clinton said routes will be planned to provide broad and efficient geographic coverage throughout the City.

The reader continuously looks at license plates as the vehicle travels. Clinton said registered vehicles will not be kept in the Commissioner’s spreadsheet. Instead, collected records will be used to flag vehicles that appear multiple times, allowing staff to determine whether a vehicle may be regularly garaged in Falls Church.

The system records the license plate number and date and time and temporarily retains a photograph. Clinton said photographs captured by the reader are currently configured to automatically delete after seven days. A spreadsheet retains a record of the plate number and date so staff can compare vehicles appearing during different runs.

That provides a more precise picture of the system’s retention practices than earlier information provided to the News-Press indicating registration-discovery information would generally remain only 24 to 48 hours. The image itself is automatically deleted after seven days, while the plate-and-date record may remain in the spreadsheet for comparison between runs.

City officials say the purpose is limited to determining whether vehicles that should be registered for local taxation have been identified. The Commissioner said no tickets will be issued simply because a vehicle has not been registered with the City. Instead, the owner may receive an informational warning or reminder placed on the windshield.

Most importantly, officials describe the system as a closed loop.

The data is stored on a dedicated City-controlled server located within the City’s network. Leonardo assisted the City with installation and configuration, but Clinton said the City controls the information and access to it.

Access to information collected during Commissioner of the Revenue runs is limited to designated Commissioner staff. Clinton said the system will not be used to conduct investigative searches for particular individuals or vehicles.

Access to the Commissioner’s spreadsheet of plates and dates is not itself logged. Any subsequent searches of Virginia DMV information, however, are logged by the state.

Clinton also said information collected through the Treasurer and Commissioner LPR program cannot be accessed by the Police Department or another City department.

And unlike the nationwide sharing concerns that have surrounded some law-enforcement LPR networks, City officials say this system isn’t connected to Flock and its information will not be voluntarily provided to outside law-enforcement agencies.

Asked specifically whether the data could be shared with another locality, state or federal law-enforcement agency, including U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the City’s answer was no.

“The City will at no point voluntarily provide this LPR data to any law enforcement agencies,” officials said.

The City is also working on a webpage outlining the system’s permissible uses, access, retention, security and data-sharing practices. Officials said residents may submit Virginia Freedom of Information Act requests regarding the program, with the City responding in accordance with Virginia public-records law and any applicable exemptions.

Virginia law also treats this reader differently. Section 2.2-5517 expressly excludes systems used by state or local agencies for non-criminal justice purposes from the police ALPR requirements contained in that statute.

The Treasurer/Commissioner system therefore doesn’t operate under precisely the same 21-day police retention rule. City officials instead say their system is designed around its limited tax and registration purposes, with photographs automatically deleted after seven days and registration records maintained to compare vehicles appearing during separate runs.

The distinction helps explain why the national fight over license plate readers isn’t really about whether a camera can read a plate.

Of course it can.

The larger question is what happens to the information after it does.

Falls Church Police use mobile LPR technology integrated with their Axon in-car system. They do not use Flock’s fixed-camera network.

Police searches have to be conducted for purposes authorized under Virginia law. The searches leave audit trails. The system has to be audited. Ordinary system data generally disappears after 21 days. An alert alone isn’t enough to justify a traffic stop. The data cannot be sold. Outside sharing is restricted. Police have to report publicly on how the system is being used.

And intentional misuse can be a crime.

The Treasurer and Commissioner of the Revenue operate a separate Leonardo ELSAG reader for an entirely different purpose: identifying delinquent-tax vehicles and vehicles that may not be properly registered for local taxation. It is locally controlled, isn’t connected to Flock or the Police Department’s system, and City officials say its information will not be voluntarily provided to outside law enforcement.

Same basic technology.

Very different systems.

And as Flock’s enormous camera network faces increasing scrutiny across the country, Virginia has chosen not to wait for the technology to police itself.

It has put rules around the data — who can search it, why they can search it, how long it can exist, where it can go, and what happens when someone deliberately crosses the line.

For Falls Church residents wondering whether the controversial Flock cameras appearing across America are quietly watching the City’s streets, Fard’s answer remains the simplest:

“We don’t have any fixed cameras across the city and specifically Flock, we don’t have any relationship with.”

Flock Safety did not respond to a News-Press request for comment for this story.