SurveillanceHigh
Braselton, Georgia, Police Chief Allegedly Used Flock License-Plate Reader System to Stalk and Harass Multiple People
- Occurred
- Nov 19, 2025
- Published
- Nov 20, 2025
- Source
- AI Incident Database
Summary
Michael Steffman, then police chief of Braselton, Georgia, allegedly used Flock automated license plate readers to stalk and harass multiple people. One woman said he used the cameras to track her location. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation arrested him on charges including stalking and misuse of the systems after an investigation lasting several months. He resigned from the department.
Developers
- Surveillance technology developers
- Flock Safety
- Automated license plate reader (ALPR) developers
Deployers
- Stalkers
- Police officers
- Police departments in the United States
- Michael Steffman
- Law enforcement
- Braselton Police Department (Georgia)
Harmed parties
- Women and girls
- Women
- Victims of stalking
- Privacy
- Individuals whose license plate data were accessed for non-law-enforcement purposes
Classification
Category confidence: 95%
Severity confidence: 90%
Rationale: Police chief arrested for misusing automated license plate readers to stalk individuals, constituting a serious surveillance abuse.
Classifier: Qwen/Qwen3.5-35B-A3B-FP8