Tom Bowman
Role at the time: Policy counsel, Center for Democracy & Technology, in a statement sent to Dispute Index
Response to this claim
Michael Soyfer of the Institute for Justice said earlier court decisions on plate-reader cases were too narrow, and that Judge Hill's opinion gives proper weight to the breadth of the systems, which collect information about many people and can reveal intimate details of their lives.
“This decision is an important next step from the Supreme Court’s pivotal recognition this year in Chatrie v. U.S. that Americans have a reasonable expectation of privacy in the whole of their physical movements. Previously, courts generally did not require a warrant for police to search the information collected by license readers, despite the fact that the technology allows easy reconstruction of Americans’ movements over time. License plate readers enable indiscriminate mass surveillance, and as other courts should, Judge Hill’s decision brings constitutional protections in line with that reality.”
Read the full email
This decision is an important next step from the Supreme Court’s pivotal recognition this year in Chatrie v. U.S. that Americans have a reasonable expectation of privacy in the whole of their physical movements. Previously, courts generally did not require a warrant for police to search the information collected by license readers, despite the fact that the technology allows easy reconstruction of Americans’ movements over time. License plate readers enable indiscriminate mass surveillance, and as other courts should, Judge Hill’s decision brings constitutional protections in line with that reality.
Why we used this label
The reference point is the proposition that the warrantless query was a search that violated the Fourth Amendment. Bowman praises the decision and says other courts should follow it, which supports the proposition, so we used Condemned. The closest competing label is Challenges the characterization. It loses because he endorses the holding rather than only disputing how earlier courts described the technology.