Sacramento Sheriff is sharing license plate reader data with anti-abortion states, records show

In 2015, Democratic Elk Grove Assemblyman Jim Cooper voted for Senate Bill 34, which restricted law enforcement from sharing automated license plate reader (ALPR) data with out-of-state authorities. In 2023, now-Sacramento County Sheriff Cooper appears to be doing just that.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) a digital rights group, has sent Cooper a letter requesting that the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office cease sharing ALPR data with out-of-state agencies that could use it to prosecute someone for seeking an abortion.

According to documents that the Sheriff’s Office provided EFF through a public records request, it has shared license plate reader data with law enforcement agencies in states that have passed laws banning abortion, including Alabama, Oklahoma and Texas.

Adam Schwartz, EFF senior staff attorney, called automated license plate readers “a growing threat to everyone’s privacy ... that are out there by the thousands in California.”

Zron,

Man, I hate to sound like a conspiracy theorist, but this just sounds like we’re one step closer to states actually restricting travel.

Everything in the GOP is projection. I remember at the start of COVID, the republicans were freaking out about lock downs and how the next step was restricting interstate travel, and now they’re monitoring who’s leaving and entering the state and forwarding that info to states with bullshit laws.

MiscreantMouse,
MiscreantMouse avatar

Yep, the GOP has already criminalized interstate travel in Idaho, I'm sure there's more on the way.

WHARRGARBL,

Wtf? My dad used to be a state social worker for “unwed mothers” in Boise before Roe v Wade. He secretly drove teen clients to Oregon, an hour away, when they needed an abortion, and he left it to the girls if they wanted to inform anyone. No parental consent involved.

So Idaho is back to this again? I’m not even going to tell Dad.

Fuck that wolf killing, weed hating, Texas wannabe state.

admiralteal,

Fortunately, restrictions on interstate travel like this are flatly unconstitutional and won't stand up to legal challenges even through our overtly, overtly corrupt SCOTUS.

Unfortunately, I suspect a lot of real people are going to get VERY seriously hurt before that legal challenge happens.

Izzgo,

Exactly. Apparently they are NOT ok restricting travel for the cause of restricting spread of a highly contagious & deadly disease, but TOTALLY ok restricting travel of women trying to receive medical care that is against the law in their own state but perfectly legal in the state they travel to.

Arcanus,

Everything about this is terrifying as fuck.

Mystical_Toe_Cheese,

So did Senate Bill 34 not pass?

Unaware7013,

Based on this article on the bill, it looks like it was passed onto law.

admiralteal,

My city is chock full of these readers and as far as I can tell, all they do is reduce law enforcement activity.

Now, if a vehicle is stolen, they'll put out a BOLO and check the cameras. Doesn't show up on scanners? Man, that sucks, here's your case number. Do you have CCTV footage of the thieves clearly showing their faces for several minutes during the theft? They won't even reply to emails/calls to give it a proforma look, much less actually investigating the crime.

Good thing I had a good comprehensive policy.

I'd LOVE to see stats on how jurisdictions actually use this technology to do law enforcement activity. How many cases does it assist in closing per dollar spent? I am extraordinarily skeptical that they actually work for the stated purposes.

JustAManOnAToilet,

Good thing I had a good comprehensive policy.

That’s what they rely on, they just figure “fuck it, insurance will cover it” and don’t bother. Really annoying when you think about how much less you might be paying in premiums should they take this seriously (and have prosecutors willing to screw a thief to a wall instead of just plead down). I’m ready for AI powered auto-turrets loaded with wash-resistant stinky paintballs.

admiralteal,

That's American a nutshell. We replaced regulation, law enforcement, and governance with the system of insurance and lawsuits. God, this shit is what Ralph Nader was running to try and fix back in the ancient history times when the Democrats were the party of free markets and the language of progressivism barely existed.

surfrock66,
@surfrock66@lemmy.world avatar

Sacramento resident here. Jim Cooper has been a disappointment through and through. I was an advocate for Tracie Stafford when he was running for assembly and it was a losing campaign as he was the incumbent, but during that time it was such a softball. It was in the middle of BLM, and he was of the position of less police accountability as an African American man. Astonishing position, and when he went on to unseat Scott Jones as sheriff (who was a Trump fanboy) Cooper took credit for being slightly to the left of the existing far far right incumbent. It’s a sad state of affairs.

AmidFuror, (edited )

Through all this I don't understand how you can be prosecuted in your state of residence for something you did legally in another state. Does that also go for buying alcohol on Sundays or gambling at a slot machine?

Is this really prosecutable or are they just using it to harass people until the courts tell them no?

xuxebiko,

Texas passed a law in 2021 law that allows civil lawsuits against a person who “aids or abets the performance or inducement of abortion.” It does not specify whether the aid would have to happen within Texas. Oklahoma has a similar law.

Idaho's House Bill 242 makes helping a pregnant minor get an abortion, whether through medication or a procedure, in another state punishable by two to five years in prison.

Other Republican states are working to prosecute what they call "abortion-trafficking".

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/06/29/abortion-state-lines/

Nepenthe, (edited )
Nepenthe avatar

The states seem currently at war with this.

A recent bill was passed in Idaho introducing "abortion trafficking," meaning anyone who aids a minor by harboring them, prescribing or procuring pills for or administering an out-of-state abortion, or taking them across state lines to have one can be sued. There are exceptions for rape and incest (thank fucking god), but there has to be a prior police report, and parental consent is also required.

Meaning if you come from an abusive household and can't tell them for whatever reason, or you're one of the 60-84% that don't immediately report sexual abuse, you have no choice but to break the law.

This pertains only to minors, which itself is awful, but that's not wholly the point I'm making. The point is a law currently exists for prosecuting someone for doing something perfectly legal out of state, especially with abortion.

As that article notes, other states are passing their own contradictory laws in response to Idaho's. Which state's law is the one overturned will have to wait until one of them makes it to court. But it has to make it to court first. Which, as we've seen in TX, is harder to accomplish when it's a bunch of random private citizens doing the suing instead of any one official target. It's designed to be.

The Freedom to Travel for Health Care Act, which would have prohibited prosecution for out-of-state healthcare, passed the house last year before failing in the senate. It's currently been renamed and reintroduced, and passed the house again on July 15th. Doesn't mean it won't just be blocked again.

As things stand now, I think we're clearly on a precipice. Shit like this could be struck down. The supreme court seems to favor basic freedom of travel. But then, at the time it became legal in TX for private citizens to sue abortion providers, Roe v. Wade was still in effect too and this isn't technically written into the constitution any more than that was.

There's not much saying they can, but there's no hard rule saying they can't yet, either. So it seems pretty in keeping for the darkest timeline, that states are deciding for themselves regardless of what the supreme court has implied. And if what Idaho has done remains legal and is immediately paired with this Big Brother bullshit, it's going to be blindingly easy to enforce.

I could theoretically see other things going the same way, if the idea catches on. No reason not to, really, other than that gambling is not a hot button issue like this is and I don't think they'd care with the same ferocity. You could take note of every license plate outside the weed dispensary, if it means not having to do your job.

PabloDiscobar,
PabloDiscobar avatar

This is an after effect of democracy. Democracy is not all shiny and bright. If you don't pay attention to what the citizen around you are thinking then you will end up following stupid laws. Once you accept the rules of democracy your interest becomes that you spread your opinion around, not that you stay passive, not caring or respecting too much what other people think.

While you stay idle, other people, in this case religious people, are knocking on doors, pushing their ideas and eventually win vote, win elections and push their bible into laws.

Remember that faith is a powerful engine that is constantly pushing against you if you are not religious. You have to show some resistance and some initiative if you don't want to get caught off guard like the american women did with the abolition of their right to an abortion.

HandsHurtLoL,

So, no, this isn't the logical outcome of democracy.

This is a democratically elected official (the sheriff) violating a law that went through the legitimate policy making process of the CA state government. This is not the result of direct democracy, it's the result of a politician class that sees itself as exempt from ethics and law. See also: this SCOTUS, republican grifters

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