How License Plate Readers Turned an Ordinary Driver Into a Suspect
Perhaps the most troubling aspect of Alek Schott's case isn't the alleged fog-line violation. It's what happened before the deputy ever activated his emergency lights.
According to Schott's attorneys, law enforcement had used roadside surveillance cameras and automated license plate readers to identify his vehicle for investigation.
Schott was the president of RMS Controls, an oil industry business. He was returning from an ordinary work trip near the Mexican border in his black Ford F-250.
But his travel apparently attracted the attention of a law enforcement surveillance system.
His attorneys described a combination of automated license plate readers, an anonymous tip, and investigative tactics that ultimately resulted in Deputy Joel Babb stopping Schott on Interstate 35.
The deputy claimed Schott had crossed the fog line.
At trial, however, the evidence showed the alleged traffic violation never happened.
This raises a much larger constitutional question:
Can police use a network of surveillance cameras to identify someone they want to investigate, then follow that person until they find a reason to stop them?
The answer requires distinguishing between what technology allows police to do and what the Fourth Amendment permits them to do.
What Are Automated License Plate Readers?
Automated license plate readers, commonly called ALPRs, are cameras that capture images of passing vehicles and use software to identify license plate numbers.
Depending on the system, they may also record the vehicle's location, date, time, and identifying characteristics.
Companies such as Flock Safety provide this technology to law enforcement agencies and communities throughout the country, including Florida.
These systems can serve legitimate purposes. They can help officers identify stolen vehicles, locate cars associated with criminal investigations, or search for vehicles connected to missing-person cases.
But the same technology can also create an extensive record of where ordinary citizens travel.
Imagine driving from Palm Beach Gardens to Miami for a meeting, stopping in Boca Raton for lunch, and returning home later that afternoon.
Along the way, cameras may record your license plate at multiple locations.
Individually, each camera records a vehicle traveling on a public road.
Collectively, however, those records can potentially reveal patterns about where you work, whom you visit, where you worship, and how you spend your time.
The concern is not simply that police can see your license plate. It's what happens when thousands of observations are collected, stored, searched, and used to decide who should be investigated.
Does a License Plate Reader Alert Give Police Probable Cause to Stop You?
Not necessarily.
An automated license plate reader is an investigative tool. Its detection of a particular vehicle does not, by itself, establish that the driver committed a crime.
The legal significance depends on what information the system actually provides.
For example, a reliable alert identifying a vehicle as stolen may supply an objective basis for a traffic stop.
But what if the alert simply identifies a vehicle that traveled near the border? Or one that drove through a particular neighborhood? Or one that followed a route law enforcement considers suspicious?
Ordinary travel is not automatically criminal activity.
A person's decision to drive near the Mexican border, visit a particular city, or return from a business trip does not, standing alone, establish reasonable suspicion of criminal conduct.
Police generally need specific, articulable facts supporting reasonable suspicion of criminal activity to conduct an investigative detention.
And that is what makes Schott's case so important.
According to his attorneys, surveillance information and an anonymous tip contributed to the decision to target his vehicle. The deputy then claimed a fog-line violation that the trial evidence showed had not occurred.
The surveillance system may have helped officers locate Schott.
But locating someone is not the same thing as having legal authority to stop them.
Can Police Follow You Until You Commit a Traffic Violation?
Here is where the law becomes more complicated.
Under Whren v. United States, 517 U.S. 806 (1996), an officer's subjective motivation generally does not invalidate a traffic stop supported by an objectively lawful reason.
That means an officer who suspects someone of drug trafficking can follow that vehicle and stop it after observing a legitimate traffic violation.
The officer's underlying interest in investigating drugs generally does not make the traffic stop unconstitutional.
But the officer still needs a lawful basis for the stop.
If the alleged traffic violation never occurred, the government cannot rely on an invented violation to justify the detention.
And if officers are relying instead on information gathered through surveillance, that information must satisfy the applicable constitutional standard.
There is a significant difference between using technology to investigate a specific crime and using technology to identify people for speculative roadside searches.
What Does Florida Law Say About License Plate Readers?
Florida has specifically addressed automated license plate recognition technology.
Under Florida Statute § 316.0777, automated license plate recognition systems are subject to statutory requirements, including restrictions relating to the use and retention of collected data.
Florida law recognizes that license plate information can raise privacy concerns, even when the images are captured on public roads.
However, the existence of these statutory protections does not mean that every use of an automated license plate reader is unconstitutional.
Nor does a license plate reader alert automatically authorize police to stop or search a vehicle.
The Fourth Amendment analysis remains focused on the justification for the government's actions.
Was there reasonable suspicion for the stop?
Was there probable cause for the search, or another recognized exception to the warrant requirement?
Did officers unlawfully extend the detention?
These are separate questions, and each deserves examination.
When Does Surveillance Become an Unconstitutional Dragnet?
Schott's attorneys characterized the investigative tactics used against him as a form of unconstitutional "dragnet" policing.
Attorney Christie Hebert explained:
"They targeted ordinary people with the idea that if they can get into as many cars as possible, they would find evidence of some crime and that's not what the Fourth Amendment allows."
That concern deserves attention.
The Fourth Amendment was designed, in significant part, to protect individuals against unreasonable government intrusions.
Technology has dramatically increased the government's ability to collect information about ordinary people.
But greater technological capability does not necessarily mean greater constitutional authority.
In United States v. Jones, 565 U.S. 400 (2012), the Supreme Court held that installing a GPS tracking device on a vehicle and using it to monitor the vehicle's movements constituted a search under the Fourth Amendment.
In Carpenter v. United States, 585 U.S. 296 (2018), the Court recognized significant privacy interests in historical cell-site location information that could reveal a person's movements over time.
Neither decision establishes that ordinary roadside license plate scanning is automatically unconstitutional.
However, both illustrate the constitutional concerns that arise when modern technology allows the government to assemble detailed records of a person's movements.
Whether prolonged, aggregated automated license plate reader surveillance constitutes a Fourth Amendment search remains a developing area of law.
Why This Matters for Criminal and DUI Defense in Palm Beach County
As surveillance technology becomes more common, criminal defense attorneys need to examine more than what happened after an officer activated the emergency lights.
We also need to understand what led police to identify the vehicle in the first place.
At The Law Office of Matthew Konecky, P.A., that may mean asking:
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Was the vehicle identified through an automated license plate reader or another surveillance system?
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What information caused law enforcement to target the vehicle?
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Was there an actual alert connecting the vehicle to criminal activity, or merely an inference based on its travel patterns?
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Did officers independently observe a lawful reason to stop the vehicle?
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Does dash camera footage support the traffic violation described in the report?
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Was the detention extended to investigate an unrelated crime without additional reasonable suspicion?
In an appropriate case, obtaining dispatch records, license plate reader alerts, investigative communications, and available video footage may help establish what officers knew before the stop.
These questions are especially important when the traffic violation appears minor or questionable.
A police report may begin with the sentence, "I observed the vehicle fail to maintain a single lane."
But the real story may have started long before the officer ever saw the vehicle.
The Fourth Amendment doesn't disappear simply because the government uses sophisticated technology to decide whom to investigate.
And as Alek Schott's case demonstrates, when law enforcement cannot establish a lawful basis for a traffic stop, the Constitution still provides an important safeguard.
