Akron’s police oversight board has given the city’s independent police auditor the green light to put the department’s Flock network under a microscope.
On Sept. 16, the board voted unanimously to authorize the office of Independent Police Auditor Anthony Finnell to begin scrutinizing the network, including all searches and queries performed by any APD user from Jan. 1, 2024 to Aug. 31, 2026. The office requested the top-priority documents be produced by Nov. 6, with all other records to come by Dec. 15, and asked the department to “promptly” notify his office if it won’t be able to meet those dates.
“The audit will evaluate APD’s Flock/(Automated License Plate Reader) program from the perspectives of legal and policy compliance, authorized use, privacy and civil-rights protections, access controls, data sharing, alert verification, supervisory oversight, accountability, transparency, and operational effectiveness,” Finnell wrote in a Sept. 18 email to Akron Police Chief Brian Harding. “The review will include both an assessment of APD’s overall governance framework and transaction-level testing of system activity.”…