Evolving technologies keep an eye on public as police fight crime
Technology advances have led local police departments to invest in systems that improve results in fighting crime. LEFT and TOP: License plate reader cameras mounted on major streets are linked to real-time systems that alert police to information such as arrest warrants and expired vehicle tags. Ocean Ridge Police Officer Aaron Choban keeps track in his squad car. ABOVE: Boca Raton uses a robotic dog as part of its bomb squad. Photos by Jerry Lower/The Coastal Star and provided
By John Pacenti
When Ocean Ridge police found an 84-year-old with dementia walking down a street on a recent Monday morning, they turned to their network of surveillance cameras.
Once the officer coaxed the senior to give him her name, police were able to get the license plate of her car from a state database.
“We were then able to enter the tag into our LPR (license plate reader) system, which allowed us to determine when the vehicle entered town and how long it had been present,” Police Chief Scott McClure said. “This information ultimately led to locating the vehicle parked within the town.”
The cameras — LPRs and static video — had recorded when the car had come into town that Monday, March 16, and how long the woman had been walking the streets. Soon, she was sitting in the lobby of the police station at Town Hall, waiting for a relative to pick her up.
The age of surveillance
A few feet away from the chief sits the department’s new drone — another type of technology many law enforcement agencies are using. Down the road in Manalapan, the department will receive new body cameras this month that can translate 101 languages on the spot.
Delray Beach has seen property crime plummet in areas where LPRs are deployed. In March, LPRs helped police track down those stealing wallets out of vehicles at construction sites in Manalapan and Boca Raton.
And they frequently catch suspects wanted on warrants — because those suspects are often driving stolen vehicles.
LPR technology has evolved from a passive tool for finding stolen cars into a predictive, AI-driven surveillance dragnet. Modern systems can identify cars by unique traits like roof racks, bumper stickers, or dents, even when plates are missing or obscured. These networks analyze billions of data points to flag “suspicious” travel patterns and coordinate real-time alerts across state lines.
“Anytime that we get that kind of data coming into us before a crime has been committed, it gives you an opportunity to prevent the crime,” said Manalapan Police Chief Jeff Rasor.
But civil rights organizations and some academics have raised concerns about the blanket of surveillance, saying it can easily be abused.
“It’s understandable that some folks may be a bit apprehensive about cameras,” said Boca Raton Police spokesman Dylan Huberman. “Tools like cameras are used to help prevent crime, respond quickly to emergencies, and gather evidence when incidents occur. We operate within the scope of the law to protect people’s privacy and rights.”
Huberman put it another way: “At home, you may choose to have a doorbell camera. Some people may view it as unnecessary, but others can’t imagine their lives without that sense of security.”
Flocking to Flock
The Boynton Beach City Commission at its March 23 meeting debated the ins and outs of upgrading its LPR system and awarding a 10-year, $7.7 million contract to Flock Safety — the leader in the industry, and the most controversial.
Flock Safety’s public affairs director, Trevor Chandler, sought to address privacy and security concerns directly: “Flock does not sell data,” he said, adding that image ownership would remain with the city and that Boynton Beach policy would enforce a 30-day retention period for footage.
Still, there have been incidents of LPR abuse that cause concern among civil rights groups.
The ACLU reported that in Texas, a police officer tapped into the LPRs from Flock Safety — the same company used by Ocean Ridge, Gulf Stream, Lantana and Highland Beach — to search for a woman who had self-administered an abortion.
In Kansas, police used an LPR database to pursue a man who wrote a critical op-ed about the department.
“We don’t think that law enforcement should be using license plate readers to retain information on where people are going and when, unless their vehicle is on a legitimate ‘hit list’ of wanted vehicles,” wrote Jay Stanley, a senior ACLU policy analyst, for the organization’s website in February.
“Nonetheless, police in many communities around the nation are using this surveillance technology as a mass surveillance system storing information about everybody’s movements.”
Boca case set precedent
The concerns about LPRs are similar to the ones raised about police use of cell-site simulators, known as Stingrays. These devices masquerade as legitimate cell phone towers to “trick” all mobile phones within a specific radius into connecting to them instead of the network.
A violent robbery at Boca Raton’s Josephine’s restaurant in 2012 led to a landmark ruling against such devices used without a warrant. The Broward County Sheriff’s Office was found to have exceeded the scope of its warrant by using a Stingray to locate the suspect’s cell phone inside his Fort Lauderdale residence.
The case set the stage for the current litigation against LPRs filed in California regarding the millions of times federal agencies allegedly accessed local license plate data — especially with the leader in the industry, Flock.
The increasing commingling of private industry and law enforcement has created a marketplace where vehicle location data can be shared or, in some cases, sold to determine citizens’ travel and purchasing habits, critics say.
“Flock has created an Orwellian mass-surveillance infrastructure that is practically impossible to avoid,” according to the federal complaint in California.
Since the start of 2025, at least 30 cities and counties across the U.S. have canceled or declined to renew their contracts with Flock Safety.
McClure said he learned of concerns about data being sold on newscasts.
“The big concern is, ‘Oh, they’re tracking your habits and whatnot.’ But you know your phone and other devices are tracking you,” McClure said.
“In law enforcement, we use it for investigations into criminal activity. It’s a detective’s dream. We have been able to solve several cases that would not be possible without the use of LPR readers.”
Cameras and legwork
Case in point: Sterling Maloney.
Maloney is suspected of a months-long shooting spree where he sprayed bullets into houses and businesses throughout Palm Beach County as he worked down his grudge list of his perceived enemies.
After bullets were fired at an Ocean Ridge residence, the town’s police turned to their network cameras and those of some residents to help hone in on the perpetrator from the car he drove.
“It’s a trifecta when we are able to use private cameras tied into our LPR system and our live static cameras,” McClure said. “That was an ace in the hole for us. We solved 16 shooting cases for several jurisdictions, including Palm Beach County, Boynton Beach and Delray Beach.”
Ocean Ridge has LPR readers at the entry and exit points in town.
Up the road in Manalapan, Chief Rasor has not only seen what LPRs and high-tech policing can do in the small town but also in Delray Beach, a community he served for 23 years.
When Delray Beach installed LPRs at Interstate 95 and Atlantic Avenue, property crime went down.
“Now Atlantic at I-95 is a huge intersection,” Rasor said. “We’re not talking 50 vehicles an hour, we’re talking thousands of vehicles an hour. But that was a huge advantage for the Delray Beach Police Department because it gave them opportunity.”
Rasor said suspects hitting construction sites in Manalapan and Boca Raton on Fridays to steal wallets from workers who just got paid was a crime du jour for several years. The chief couldn’t get into a lot of detail, but said recently a suspect vehicle was able to be tracked after wallets were stolen from Manalapan and Boca Raton construction sites.
Rasor said without the LPR cameras, the theft cases in Boca Raton and Manalapan would not have been solved.
Manalapan has six LPRs, but can also ask to tap into static cameras at Plaza del Mar.
Boynton deliberates
The Boynton Beach commission postponed its decision on the Flock contract until its April meeting, as some commissioners felt the issue was a late addition to the agenda and wanted more information.
Flock’s Safe City Initiative would provide Boynton Beach with an additional 31 LPRs, 80 cameras and upgraded drone capabilities, along with other bells and whistles.
“It’s becoming a force multiplier where we’re not just relying on officers and boots on the ground,” said Vice Mayor Thomas Turkin, who was ready to approve the new contract at the March 23 meeting. “If we didn’t have one of the highest violent crime rates, maybe this wouldn’t be such an urgency.”
Boynton resident Harry Woodworth, though, said there are simply no controls over this very powerful technology. He noted cities pulling back from the LPR dragnet and predicted the issue would end up in the U.S. Supreme Court.
“What I have a problem with is the lack of controls. There are no controls anywhere being discussed. The public doesn’t have a clue what this is,” Woodworth said.
Other technologies
Manalapan’s Rasor said the new body cameras his department is getting will help keep the public safe with features, such as a language translator. The chief said with so many languages spoken in South Florida — including rare Central American Indian dialects — the translator is a “game changer.”
“It’s one of the huge advantages for law enforcement that I’ve seen in a long time,” he said.
Rasor said he understands privacy concerns, but that Rubicon has long been traversed.
“I think at the end of the day, most Americans understand the cameras are part of everyday life,” he said. “I don’t think you’re getting away from it. And if you step out, you’re going to be videotaped.”
Drones, equipped with infrared and other enhancements, are another technology police departments are using.
The Florida Freedom from Unwarranted Surveillance Act, expanded in 2025, prohibits police from using drones to gather evidence or information without a search warrant signed by a judge. It is widely considered one of the most restrictive drone privacy laws in the U.S.
Ocean Ridge’s McClure said the drone provided by the town’s Starbright Civic Collective will save lives — not spy on residents. He said the civic group wants the drone to be used to help save swimmers caught in dangerous surf.
“We could launch, hover out, drop a preserver to that person and speak to them over the loudspeaker,” he said.
In Boca Raton, Huberman said, the department’s drones can help track missing persons as well as criminal suspects. The city also has 286 LPR cameras — including those in police patrol cars — and 625 static cameras.
Huberman pointed to other advancements that have been made, such as using DNA to solve crimes and using speed cameras around school zones.
Since the cameras in the three existing Boca Raton school zones were activated in October, 1,295 citations have been issued, he said.
Then there’s the city’s famous four-legged “Spot” robot, primarily used for the Bomb Disposal Unit. It can navigate stairs, open doors, and enter areas too dangerous for humans.
In Gulf Stream, police will be trained in April to use new “night vision” gear courtesy of the town's Civic Association.
Police Chief Richard Jones recounted a recent incident in which a suspect vehicle entered the Place Au Soleil neighborhood at night and several people got out.
“He knew the car was there and he knew that they were there to do no good, but because it was dark and there’s so much vegetation, that made it almost impossible” for the officer to see the suspects, who in the end were arrested, Jones said.
The night vision equipment will be installed in all vehicles that patrol after sundown.
“That will allow the officer in the car to actually see — in daytime mode — while they're driving their police car at night,” Jones said.
Coastal departments, like Boca Raton, have also turned to virtual reality, which seems scripted right out of the movie Minority Report.
“Using VR headsets, officers can run through ultra-realistic scenarios to enhance rapid decision-making during interactions with the public,” Huberman said.
“Whether it’s a traffic stop, crisis intervention, anything really, decisions to attempt de-escalation or use of force can be practiced in a more comprehensive way than ever before.”
