The sheriff will stop sharing license plate data with federal agencies like Immigration and Customs Enforcement, according to the terms of a settlement signed last week by the American Civil Liberties Union, the Marin County Sheriff’s Office and local activists. The A.C.L.U. sued the sheriff last year on behalf of three immigration activists, alleging the agency was violating California law by allowing ICE, Customs and Border Patrol and various out-of-state law enforcement entities to view data captured by automatic license plate readers.
“I’m deeply concerned about mass surveillance. I’m happy to see that there are now limits,” said Lisa Bennett, co-chair of ICE Out of Marin and a plaintiff in the suit. “This is one small way where we can now show [Sheriff Robert Doyle] is not cooperating with ICE.”
Computerized cameras known as A.L.P.R.s are mounted on phone poles and signposts to capture license plates of passing drivers. Some view them as an invasion of privacy, and their efficacy is also questionable: In 2020, the sheriff’s roving A.L.P.R.s scanned more than 820,000 license plates, but just 216—about one quarter of 1 percent—led to further investigations.
“It puts everyone driving around the county under a blanket of suspicion, but it’s a rather inefficient way of trying to find who’s breaking the law,” said Saira Hussain, an attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation who is one of the litigators of the lawsuit.
The suit focused specifically on the way the sheriff’s office shared the data captured by its 12 cameras. The agency temporarily stored license plate numbers in an online database maintained by the firm Vigilant Solutions, where more than 400 law enforcement agencies could check them against “hot lists” of vehicles of interest. These “sharing partner” agencies were actively selected by the sheriff, A.C.L.U. attorneys said, and included the National Targeting Center, a division of Customs and Border Protection, and the National Bulk Cash Smuggling Center, a division of ICE, both of which target smuggling operations.
Sharing license plate information with these federal agencies violated Senate Bill 34, a California law limiting such sharing to in-state public agencies, the suit alleged. Sharing plate information with ICE also violated the California Values Act, which barred the state’s local agencies from any immigration enforcement, the A.C.L.U. argued.
In response to the suit, Sheriff Doyle changed his practice. On May 10, the agency updated its A.L.P.R. policy, removing the federal agencies and out-of-state police departments from its list of sharing partners. Ms. Bennett said the sheriff stopped sharing with those entities soon after the lawsuit was filed last October.
Brenton Schneider, a spokesman for the sheriff’s office, said the agency is “pleased with the settlement of the A.C.L.U. lawsuit.”
“We have evaluated the policies and procedures surrounding the use and sharing of information from our A.L.P.R. system and made changes to ensure no information is shared with out-of-state agencies unless allowed per the terms of the settlement agreement,” he wrote in a statement. He confirmed that the agency stopped sharing with ICE and C.B.P. last year, after being served the lawsuit, but said the office does not believe it violated the law.
Ms. Hussain said Marin County was not alone in this practice. “There are many other agencies throughout the state that continue to share driver information with out-of-state and federal agencies,” she said. “They would be wise to take notice of this settlement.”
In 2020, a report by the California State Auditor admonished several local law enforcement agencies, including the Marin County Sheriff’s Office, the Sacramento County sheriff and the Fresno Police Department, for lacking official policies governing the sharing of A.L.P.R. data.
For Marin immigration activists, the lawsuit was just one element of a larger campaign to fully hew Sheriff Doyle’s department from immigration enforcement and create more oversight for the agency. They have pressed the sheriff to stop transferring undocumented jail inmates accused of serious crimes to ICE, and have pushed county supervisors to adopt a stringent citizens’ oversight committee with subpoena power over the agency.
An oversight committee in conjunction with an inspector general would create much-needed recourse for vulnerable Marin residents who experience or witness abuses by deputies, said Tara Evans, a Stinson Beach activist and plaintiff in the lawsuit. She and the other plaintiffs are strategizing with A.C.L.U. lawyers about how to secure more oversight under Assembly Bill 1185, which granted significant civilian oversight abilities to local governments.
“Undocumented immigrants are not going to report any abuse of power because they live in fear of retaliation,” Ms. Evans said. “There is no avenue at this time where they are protected.”