Police officer accused of misusing Flock cameras

First up here at 10 o'clock, flock license plate cameras. We've talked about them before, but a lot more recently, they're used to read license plates to help fight crime. Well, now a Haines City police officer is charged with using them to keep track of his estranged wife. FOX 13's Carla Byron has details of this unusual case. According to the arrest affidavit, the Haines City Police Department became aware of Officer Christopher Goodson possibly misusing the flock camera database. On Monday evening, the department opened a criminal investigation which revealed Goodson misused the flock camera database both on and off duty. Flock cameras are one of the leading license plate reader technologies used by law enforcement as a crime fighting tool. When you're driving your car, you don't have an expectation of privacy. So, you know, reading the license plates is much different than facial recognition software, which has its limitations in different applications. So here, you know, using that technology, you're able to register where a car has passed and then, you know, depending on the investigation that you're doing, being able to track where it's been over time. The affidavit states Goodson had made 717 inquiries on the flock camera platform into his estranged wife's car between September 1st, 2024 and June 30th, 2026. Goodson told his lieutenant he was using it to keep track of his Children's location when they were with his estranged wife. Retired NYPD sergeant Greg Sanfilippo says there are ways to prevent this kind of misuse by implementing simple checks and balances. So whoever's searching this databases, it's just as easy to have a program monitoring the reason why that they're checking and the frequency of what they're checking and the nature of who they're checking into. So that's should vary depending on their on their, um, you know, assignment show. When you have someone that's looking into the same person over and over huge, big red flag, someone looking into family members, big red flag. These this is easy enough with oversight technologies and different procedures. In a statement, Police Chief Isaac Jackson said. In part, we want to make it clear the Haines City Police Department does not tolerate the misuse, unauthorized access or personal use of any investigative databases or law enforcement information systems. Moreover, I have mandated additional steps to be taken quarterly to ensure our staff are accessing this for legitimate law enforcement purposes. Goodson was placed on paid administrative leave, although he plans to resign from the department as a result of this investigation in Haines City. Carla Byron, Fox 13 News. Carla, thanks. Goodson has also been charged with two third degree felonies, falsifying official records as a public servant and unauthorized computer access.