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A Kentucky officer allegedly used police license plate surveillance to follow the mother of his child for months. The department’s new AI audit tool found the pattern almost immediately after police activated it.[1]
Police arrested Officer Asad Zahir less than 24 hours later. Investigators say he had already searched for two vehicles registered to the woman 2,048 times.
Flock’s new safeguard exposed a months-old pattern, sure. Its late arrival raises serious questions about how effective the tool can be when departments aren’t yet required to use it.
Zahir allegedly searched the two license plates between January 1 and May 2.
Authorities say he used the searches to monitor the woman’s movements across Kentucky and Indiana while harassing her and making threatening comments. She eventually obtained a protective order against him in Indiana.
Investigators found that Zahir conducted 241 searches while the order was active between April 17 and May 6. They said he entered “drug/narcotics investigation” as his reason for searching the plates.
The woman was not under investigation for a drug offense and had no known history indicating that she should have been.
Shively activated Flock’s AI-powered Audit Assistance tool on August 24. The system flagged Zahir’s searches that day, prompting the department to revoke his access and open an investigation.
Zahir faces five counts of official misconduct and five counts of unlawful access to a computer. He has been suspended without pay, released on his own recognizance while the criminal case, and an internal investigation continue.
Flock operates automated license plate readers, or ALPRs, that are commonly mounted on poles beside public roads.
When a vehicle passes, the cameras can photograph its license plate and record details such as the time, location, vehicle color, and other identifying characteristics. That information enters a searchable database available to participating police departments.
Networks of these cameras can piece together a detailed record of where a vehicle has traveled.
Police departments have credited the technology with helping them recover stolen vehicles, find missing people, and investigate violent crimes. Shively Police Chief Andre Bottoms defended those uses while announcing Zahir’s arrest.
“The value of this technology does not excuse its misuse,” Bottoms said during a news conference.
Flock’s Audit Assistance feature looks for unusual search activity and sends potentially suspicious behavior to agency administrators. A human reviewer must then decide whether the searches have a legitimate purpose.
Flock says it has always recorded searches in permanent audit logs. Those records make later investigations possible, but their value depends on departments reviewing them regularly.
The Institute for Justice has identified dozens of cases in which officers allegedly used license plate readers to monitor romantic partners, former partners, or other people for personal reasons.
Its review found that most cases surfaced after victims reported the officers’ behavior. Only a small number were initially discovered through internal investigations.
Flock introduced Audit Assistance in April 2026. As of August, more than one-third of its law enforcement customers had voluntarily enabled it, the company said. Shively activated the feature after Zahir’s alleged searches had ended.
Flock says every law enforcement customer will have to use Audit Assistance by the end of 2026.
The company is also planning an automatic lockout feature that will suspend accounts when activity meets its criteria for abnormal behavior. An administrator will have to review the activity before restoring access.
Flock will also require officers to attach case codes to searches by the end of the year. Shively has already changed its policy to require a case number and is reviewing its access rules, supervisory oversight, and auditing procedures.
The company has separately reduced its recommended data retention period from 30 days to seven. Existing customers can keep their current retention settings, and individual communities still decide how long they store data.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation says the changes may help detect abuse, but police will still have access to a system that can reconstruct drivers’ movements without a warrant.
Flock cameras observe license plates displayed on vehicles traveling on public roads. If you want to avoid them, you’d have to avoid roads.
Covering, altering, or obscuring a license plate may violate state law and could lead to a traffic stop, too.
That said, you can still learn more about the surveillance operating in your community:
If you believe someone is using technology to stalk or monitor you, keep any messages from them, important dates, sightings, and other evidence somewhere the person cannot access. The National Domestic Violence Hotline can help you create a personalized safety plan.
If the suspected person works in law enforcement, an attorney or victim advocate can help you explore reporting options outside that person’s department.
Flock’s automated audit gave Shively Police the evidence needed to investigate one of their own. Activating it sooner may have exposed the searches sooner.
Audit logs are most useful when someone actually watches them. Departments using license plate surveillance need continuous monitoring, tightly restricted access, and quick intervention when an officer’s searches raise red flags.
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