A Flock security camera on the corner of Green Valley Road in Watsonville. These license plate camera readers have come under scrutiny as fears escalate around alleged sharing of collected data with federal immigration agents. (Amaya Edwards —Santa Cruz Local/CatchLight Local)

SANTA CRUZ >> Dozens of California law enforcement agencies appear to have illegally performed thousands of searches of license plate camera data on behalf of federal agencies charged with immigration enforcement, according to a Santa Cruz Local analysis. 

Over 4,000 law enforcement agencies across the country have license plate cameras operated by Flock Security, including many in California, and the state requires agencies to list a reason for each search. 

Few searches were made with immigration-related terms after July 2025, when CalMatters first reported illegal searches made by 10 California agencies. However, many of the same law enforcement agencies since August 2025 have run hundreds of searches with no case number referenced and no reason given to the search beyond “investigation,” raising concerns that the sharing could be ongoing.

About a quarter of the searches “are some variation on some extremely general term, and that’s the same as not putting anything in there,” said D., a security analyst who first identified the potential violations in the Santa Cruz Police data. “I feel like a lot could be covered up.”

Local analysis

In Santa Cruz County, three cities operate cameras by Flock: Santa Cruz, Capitola and Watsonville. State law prohibits sharing the data across state lines or with federal agencies to prevent the data from being used for immigration enforcement. California agencies can opt to share their data with others within the state.

Santa Cruz Local analyzed searches performed against Santa Cruz Police Department’s license plate camera data from June 2024 to October 2025. In that time, 32 law enforcement agencies performed nearly 4,000 searches for reasons that included immigration-related terms. 

Many reasons included “ICE,” “HSI” and “CBP” —  likely referring to U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, Homeland Security Investigations and Customs and Border Protection. Some searches appeared to be related to federal investigations of narcotics trafficking, while others had few details. Many appeared to have been conducted on behalf of a specific federal agent.

In October 2025, California Attorney General Rob Bonta sued the City of El Cajon over its sharing of license plate data with federal and out-of-state law enforcement agencies. A spokesperson for Bonta’s office could not confirm or deny whether they are investigating other agencies. “We continue to engage with a number of law enforcement agencies with respect to SB 34 compliance and are monitoring compliance closely,” the spokesperson wrote in an email Dec. 9.

People hold signs rallying against the use of Flock security cameras during public comment at a Santa Cruz City Council meeting on Nov. 18, 2025. (Amaya Edwards — Santa Cruz Local/CatchLight Local)

Santa Cruz Police sharing policy

In November, both police chiefs in Capitola and Santa Cruz reported that they had unintentionally shared camera data out of state until Flock disabled the option in February. Both have pledged to do regular audits of other agencies’ searches. 

Santa Cruz Police Chief Bernie Escalante also said his department will pull out of a statewide sharing portal for Flock data that includes nearly all law enforcement agencies in California, because he can’t ensure agencies aren’t using the data for immigration enforcement or other illegal purposes. 

“We don’t know if we necessarily are operating under the same values,” he said in an interview last week. 

Now, the city attorney’s office is looking at the potential SB 34 violations and determining if they truly violate state law, Escalante said. SB 34 prohibits agencies from sharing license plate data with out-of-state or federal agencies.

Some searches with immigration-related terms may not be illegal, he added, and many investigations by Homeland Security don’t deal with civil immigration enforcement. 

“I think that there is some room for better context,” Escalante said.

Santa Cruz Police’s Flock transparency portal indicates that the department has sharing agreements with dozens of agencies, including Menifee Police and others that have shared data with federal officials. Escalante couldn’t immediately confirm that the list of agencies they share with is up to date. 

Escalante plans to ask each agency for an attestation, or formal pledge, that Santa Cruz Police’s data won’t be searched on behalf of federal immigration agents or otherwise shared illegally. 

The department is waiting on Flock to provide a list of contact information for the administrators of other law enforcement agencies Santa Cruz Police share with. Once that is provided, the department will send an email and give them around three weeks to return an attestation, Escalante said.

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