The suit was filed Thursday in Marin County Superior Court by the American Civil Liberties Union and the Electronic Frontier Foundation on behalf of three local activists. Since 2014, they said, the sheriff's office has forwarded scans from automated license plate reader cameras to out-of-state and federal agencies including U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which has used the information to track and deport immigrants.
A 2015 state law prohibits California law enforcement agencies from sharing license plate reader scans or information with out-of-state agencies and requires the California data-collectors to adopt privacy policies. The state's 2017 "sanctuary" law bars local law enforcement from taking part in federal immigration enforcement and from most types of cooperation with immigration agents.
Research that led to the lawsuit shows that "the freedoms that people think they possess in Marin County are a mirage: People cannot move about freely without being surveilled," Lisa Bennett, one of the plaintiffs, said in a statement released by her lawyers.
ACLU attorney Matthew Cagle said other California counties also share license-plate data with ICE. This suit, the first of its kind, "should put other agencies in California on notice," he said.
Doyle's office did not respond to a request for comment.
Law enforcement agencies use cameras on overpasses, light poles and patrol cars to automatically photograph passing vehicles and their license plates and record their locations. Doyle's office acquired the reader technology in 2010, has 12 cameras and recorded photos of 821,000 vehicles in 2020, the suit said.
It said the sheriff's office shares those records with ICE, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, 17 other federal agencies and 424 out-of-state law enforcement agencies. ICE notifies the sheriff's office of particular "plates of interest," and the office shares any information it has collected, the suit said.
An ACLU report cited in the suit said ICE records for several months in 2018 showed that the agency, using license plate records from local governments, conducted more than 30,000 searches a month, and used some of the results for arrests and deportations.
Rather than targeting known or suspected lawbreakers, the suit said, the sheriff's office provides other agencies with license plate and vehicle-location information connected to "immigrants, activists, and other people not suspected of any violations of the law."
The suit seeks a court order barring further sharing of the records.
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