Routine Aerial Surveillance Program Does Not Violate Fourth Amendment

Leaders of a Beautiful Struggle v. Baltimore Police Department: This civil case challenged the constitutionality of the Aerial Investigative Research program run by the Baltimore police. The program involves aircraft flying over the city during daytime hours collecting data on the movements of people below. They cover 90% of the city, but operate at a level of resolution that "reduces each individual no the ground to a pixelated dot," unable to identify particular individuals or vehicles. The data is analyzed at a central control room in the wake of particular incidents - shootings, robberies, etc. - to search for suspects and witnesses (using additional information gathering techniques). Leaders, among others, challenged this program as a violation of the Fourth Amendment. The district court denied their request for a preliminary injunction, finding that the program did not violate the Fourth Amendment.

A divided Fourth Amendment affirmed the denial of the injunction, concluding that the plaintiffs failed to make a "clear showing" needed for such relief. The court concluded that the surveillance program did not violate any reasonable expectation of privacy as the program was "short-term surveillance of an individual's public movements." It did not matter that the data harvested by the program could provide police leads to use to track down people using more traditional methods (which the plaintiffs did not challenge). The court distinguished the data at issue here from cell-tower information in the Supreme Court's decision in Carpenter, noting that whereas cell-tower information can track a particular individual over days (or more), the surveillance program could only track movements in public for 12 hours "at most." The court did make clear that its decision "should not be interpreted as endorsing all forms of aerial surveillance." The court also held that the program "seeks to meet a serious law enforcement need without unduly burdening constitutional rights." The court also concluded that the program did not violate Leaders' First Amendment right to free association.

Judge Gregory dissented, arguing that the majority's reading of the program was too narrow and "accepting" of the defendants' promises on the limitations of the program and that Carpenter is "not only relevant to this case. It controls the outcome."