Misread / false hit

On September 15, 2026, Angela Lipps filed a federal lawsuit against the City of Fargo and Detective Lucas Heck, seeking $10 million in damages. The complaint alleges Heck relied on a flawed facial recognition match and ignored exculpatory evidence to bring bank fraud charges, leading to her arrest at gunpoint and detention for nearly six months. The charges were dismissed in December 2025 after bank records showed she was in Tennessee during the thefts. The suit says Fargo lacked policies governing facial recognition use at the time.

In August 2026, Business Insider reported that Flock Safety cameras generated 1,427 alerts to the Roseville, California, police department in 2023 and 2024 for vehicles flagged as stolen or tied to felonies, and that a department analysis found 71% of those alerts came from the software misreading the plate. Records showed a 9 read as an 8, and the department reported bad reads to the company dozens of times over four years. Flock said its cameras read more than 96% of characters correctly in optimal conditions and blamed Roseville’s older hardware, higher camera mounting and rear-only capture. No alert led to a stop or arrest because officers must verify plates before acting. The city has spent roughly $450,000 on Flock products since 2020 and continues the contract.

Flock Safety’s license-plate readers sent 1,427 alerts to Roseville, California police in 2023 and 2024 flagging vehicles as stolen or used in a felony. A police department analysis found that in 71% of those alerts, Flock’s software incorrectly read the license plates. The city has used Flock cameras since 2021 and has spent around $450,000 on Flock products since 2020. Roseville police said none of the incorrect alerts resulted in a traffic stop or arrest because officers verify plates before stopping.

Eva Pizzarelli filed a federal lawsuit in June 2026 alleging Cumberland, Rhode Island police wrongfully arrested and prosecuted her after an officer used a Flock Safety license-plate camera photo to identify her as the driver of a fleeing vehicle. The suit says the camera captured a photo of a person inside the vehicle, not just a license plate. Pizzarelli was arrested April 8, 2025, held over six hours, and charged with reckless driving and eluding police. Charges were later dismissed. She seeks $750,000 in damages. The ACLU of Rhode Island has urged the town to end its Flock contract.

On 22 May 2026, prosecutors declined to prosecute Lindsey Brooke Isaacs on all eight charges, including three counts of vehicular homicide, after a second review found no collision damage on her black Dodge Durango. She had been arrested on 17 April 2026 after a Flock Safety license-plate reader placed her vehicle three miles from a fatal crash on Interstate 4. Witnesses described a maroon Durango. Isaacs spent 13 days in jail and has filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against two Florida Highway Patrol troopers. Flock Safety said its cameras “provide investigative leads; they do not identify perpetrators.” Isaacs said investigators misinterpreted the footage.

In March 2026, Fargo Police Chief Dave Zibolski told reporters that the department identified ‘a couple of errors’ in an investigation into bank thefts that led to the wrongful arrest of Angela Lipps. West Fargo police used AI facial recognition to identify Lipps based on a photo from a fake ID used by the suspect. Zibolski said use of the West Fargo AI facial recognition system would not have been allowed and has since been prohibited. He said the department would take ‘more steps’ and ‘more scrutiny’ in future cases.

In October 2025, Brandon Upchurch settled his lawsuit against the city of Toledo for $35,000. The suit stemmed from an April 2024 stop in which a Flock Safety license-plate camera misread a ‘7’ as a ‘2’ on his truck’s plate, prompting officers to stop him at gunpoint. A police dog bit him, he was jailed, and charges were later dismissed. The Toledo Police Department issued a verbal reprimand to officer Adrian Wilson for failing to verify the plate before the stop. Upchurch’s attorney said the judge remarked, ‘Flock Flocked up.’

In July 2025, US marshals arrested Angela Lipps at her home in Tennessee while she was babysitting. She was held for nearly four months without bail, then extradited to North Dakota and charged with four counts of unauthorized use of personal identifying information and four counts of theft. The charges were dropped after her lawyer provided bank records showing she was in Tennessee at the time of the fraud. The complaint alleges a Fargo police investigator used AI facial recognition software that returned Lipps’s social media photo as a lead. The detective requested an arrest warrant despite Lipps not resembling the suspect and having never been to North Dakota. The lawsuit seeks $10m in damages.

In June 2025, Morristown, Tennessee, police stopped a grandfather and grandmother as they drove to a doctor’s appointment with their 3-year-old granddaughter. The grandmother’s Ford Expedition carried a vanity plate reading ‘LOVEY’; a Ford F-150 reported stolen in Claiborne County carried a plate reading ‘L0VEY’ with a zero. A license plate reader treated the two as a match. Officers drew guns on the grandfather as he got out; the grandmother said a laser sight rested on her chest while she told officers there was a baby in the car. Officers found the discrepancy and released them. The Institute for Justice lists the case as a Flock camera ‘O’ for ‘0’ misread among at least 27 ALPR-error stops since 2018. No lawsuit or payment is reported.

Detroit agreed to pay $35,000 to settle a federal lawsuit after police used license plate reader data to wrongly detain Isoke Robinson and her son in September 2023. Police impounded Robinson’s 2013 Dodge Charger for over three weeks. An internal affairs investigation found officers ‘improperly identified’ the vehicle and that it was not released timely; some officers were referred for possible discipline. The city admitted no wrongdoing. The suit alleged police worked backward from reader data, using the car’s description rather than a license plate number. The ACLU said the case highlights concerns about the use of the city’s 100-plus camera system.

On April 11, 2024, Toledo police officer Adrian Wilson stopped Brandon Upchurch after a Flock license plate reader misread the plate JLL 7637 on his red Dodge pickup as JLL 7362, a tan Chevrolet Malibu reported stolen. Wilson read the actual plate to dispatch, confirming the mismatch, but continued the stop. Backup officers arrived, and a police dog bit Upchurch. He was charged with obstructing and resisting arrest; charges were later dismissed. An internal investigation cleared the officers of wrongdoing regarding the dog attack, but Wilson received a verbal reprimand for failing to verify the plate. Upchurch sued for at least $75,000; a settlement has been agreed but awaits Toledo City Council approval.

In April 2024, a Flock camera in Toledo misread the number “7” on Brandon Upchurch’s license plate as “2”, matching it to a stolen vehicle. Police stopped Upchurch and deployed a dog, which mauled him. He was arrested and later released. Charges of obstructing official business and resisting arrest were dismissed. Upchurch filed a civil lawsuit and settled for $35,000 with no admission of wrongdoing.

On February 5, 2024, the family’s attorney announced that the City of Aurora, Colorado, had agreed to a $1.9 million settlement with Brittney Gilliam, who was pulled over in 2020 with four children in the car and ordered out at gunpoint. Officers had believed the car was stolen. The plate number matched a stolen motorcycle, but the motorcycle was registered in Montana and the car carried Colorado plates. Reports say an automated license plate reader flagged the plate and officers did not check the state before conducting a felony stop. Children were handcuffed on the pavement. Video of the stop circulated widely. The city paid the settlement from public funds. Reports do not name the ALPR vendor.

In February 2024, Steven Melvin, an Iraq War veteran, was stopped at gunpoint in Lake Wylie, South Carolina, after a Flock Safety license plate reader misread one letter on his plate, flagging his car as stolen. Deputy Kyle Brogden held him at gunpoint for over five minutes while verifying the error. Internal records show the cameras had correctly read the same plate 13 times before. Melvin was released, no charges filed. On June 29, 2026, he filed suit in state court; the case was removed to federal court. The sheriff’s office seeks dismissal, arguing ‘a mistake of fact leading to a seizure under the Fourth Amendment does not amount to a Constitutional violation.’ The case is pending in federal court.

Seattle’s Office of Inspector General published a surveillance technology usage review covering ALPR deployments in 2021 and 2022. The report found 976 misreads in 2021 and 948 in 2022, approximately one misread for every five unverified hits. It documented two erroneous vehicle stops caused by outdated or misleading hotlist information. In one, a stolen license plate had been swapped onto a similarly described vehicle, leading to a firearms-drawn stop of an innocent driver. In another, officers stopped a vehicle reported stolen but recovered earlier; the recovery had not been recorded. The OIG recommended that SPD develop a deployment strategy that accounts for disproportionality in data collection.

On Dec. 21, 2022, the city of Fayetteville, North Carolina, agreed to pay $60,000 to settle Jacqueline McNeill’s lawsuit alleging civil rights violations by police detectives. McNeill was arrested July 20, 2022, after license plate reader technology misidentified her vehicle as involved in a violent crime. She was held for several hours before detectives realized they had photographed two similar cars and arrested the wrong person. As part of the settlement, the department made no admission of liability, retired Police Chief Gina Hawkins provided a written apology and said the incident would lead to better training.

On July 23, 2022, Española, New Mexico, police stopped a car driven by Jaclynn Gonzales, then 21, with her 12-year-old sister as a passenger, after a Flock Safety camera flagged the plate as belonging to a vehicle stolen from Rio Rancho. The plate ended in a 2, which the camera read as a 7; the two plates differed by one character. A sergeant ordered Gonzales out at gunpoint before dispatch had confirmed the plate. An officer asked the child whether she had weapons, handcuffed her and placed her in a patrol vehicle. Officers then checked the plate and VIN and found the mismatch. Both sisters sued the city in state district court on January 3, 2024. The Rio Grande Sun reported the city settled the case in June 2025, paying $20,000 to each sister, part of eight settlements totaling more than $1.3 million.

In April 2021, Jason Burkleo was driving to his security job in Atherton, California, when the town’s automated license plate reader misread his dirt-obscured plate, reading the letters ‘H’ as ‘M’, and matched it to a reported stolen vehicle. Police treated the alert as a high-risk felony stop, ordered him at gunpoint to throw his keys out the window, get out and lie on his stomach, and handcuffed him. Burkleo sued the police department and the officers, alleging unreasonable seizure and excessive force. The case settled for $45,000. EFF lists the case among documented ALPR misreads that ended with guns drawn on innocent drivers.

On May 3, 2020, Reno Police Department used DataWorks Plus facial recognition software to match a surveillance photo to an innocent individual, resulting in a wrongful arrest. Officers relied on the algorithmic match without independent corroboration to secure an arrest warrant. Criminal charges were later dropped. The City of Reno settled the resulting civil rights lawsuit for $100,000 and agreed to policy changes requiring independent corroborating evidence before facial recognition matches can be used as probable cause.

On March 30, 2009, San Francisco police pulled over Denise Green, a 47-year-old black woman, after the department’s automated license plate reader misread her plate and matched it to a stolen vehicle. Between four and six officers pointed guns at her and ordered her out of the car. After she was searched and her car searched, the police let her go. The ACLU later reported the reader had misread a ‘3’ as a ‘7’. A district court found against her; the Ninth Circuit reinstated the case in May 2014. In 2015 the Board of Supervisors passed Ordinance 181-15 authorizing a $495,000 settlement of her lawsuit.