Cop Allegedly Fired For Using Flock Camera To Run Her Ex’s License Plate 166 Times

A female police officer in South Carolina was fired on Aug. 3 after she allegedly used a Flock camera to run her ex-significant other’s license plate over 100 times.

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Ellie Anna Hammond, 24, was fired from the Maudlin Police Department (MPD) following allegations of misconduct between March and July, according to documents from the South Carolina Criminal Justice Academy cited by KOCO. Hammond allegedly ran her ex-romantic partner’s license plate 166 times during this time period, claiming she was performing a warrant check, traffic infraction, and welfare check, which proved not true, as the same documents indicate.

She has not been criminally charged in connection with the incident, and an MPD spokesperson told KOCO they would not comment further on her termination as it was a “personnel matter.”

Hammond joined the police force in June 2024 when she was hired as part of the Uniform Patrol division, according to the South Carolina Criminal Justice Academy. She completed her training and passed a psychological evaluation at the time.

The incident follows an Aug. 4 incident in which the Winona Police Department in Minnesota announced that all eight of the city’s Flock cameras had allegedly been stolen. Officers discovered the poles chopped down and discarded in nearby weeds, while the cameras remained missing. Flock cameras were also apparently vandalized in July in Ashland County, Ohio, according to FOX 8. (RELATED: Two Tennessee Politicians Are Taking Aim At Flock’s Growing Surveillance Empire)

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Flock Safety sells cameras with automatic license plate readers (ALPR). ALPR cameras use artificial intelligence to “capture and analyze images of all passing vehicles, storing details like your car’s location, date, and time. They also capture your car’s make, model, color, and identifying features such as dents, roof racks, and bumper stickers, often turning these into searchable data points,” according to Deflock.org.

The use of Flock cameras has raised serious concerns, including privacy, data storage, wrongful arrests, and threats of stalking, also according to Deflock.org.

A website called HaveIBeenFlocked.com allows the public to enter their license plate and see if it has been searched using Flock.

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