Tacoma will pay more than $300K to end public-records dispute over surveillance device
The City of Tacoma has agreed to pay more than $311,000 to settle a lawsuit over public records violations concerning a cell phone surveillance device used by police.
This marks the end of a five-year dispute over whether the city violated the state’s Public Records Act by withholding or redacting documents requested by three residents, and what penalties should be applied. The American Civil Liberties Union filed the lawsuit in 2016 on behalf of the Rev. Arthur Banks, the Rev. Toney Montgomery and Whitney Brady.
“The City believes it is the best interests of all parties concerned to resolve the matter and end this long-running dispute over the records,” city spokeswoman Maria Lee said Tuesday.
Known as a Stingray, the device acts like a cell tower by connecting to nearby phones, then locates the phones. Police sometimes use the technology to find suspects, but the device also has the ability to capture personal information from all phones within range of the Stingray.
The News Tribune reported in 2014 that police had used the technology hundreds of times since 2009.
Police said they always asked permission of judges before using it, but Pierce County Superior Court judges said they hadn’t known police used the orders for a Stingray. That prompted the Washington state Legislature to pass a law in 2015 requiring a warrant before law enforcement could use the device.
After the law went into effect, the plaintiffs filed a records request to see if the department was complying.
Then-Pierce County Superior Court Judge Helen G. Whitener found the city violated public records laws by deliberately withholding 11 records and imposed a cost of $182,320, plus $115,530 for attorney fees. Both sides appealed.
The state Court of Appeals upheld most of the penalties against the city but sent a few issues back to the lower court. Those included whether a billing spreadsheet was properly disclosed and whether an operator’s manual for the device should have been released.
The appellate panel determined the city did not have to turn over the make, model and pricing information about the device.
On Sept. 29, the city and the ACLU agreed on a settlement of $311,607, which includes the court-awarded penalties and another $75,000 to resolve the issues sent back to the lower court.
“We are happy the City of Tacoma and the Tacoma Police Department are being held accountable for not being transparent to the public about the use of this technology,” Montgomery, one of the plaintiffs, said in a statement. “Trust in law enforcement has reached a low point for communities, particularly communities of color. To mend that trust, it is vital that these same communities aren’t the subject of secret surveillance.”
Montgomery, Banks and Brady said they will use the money “to further support their communities” but provided no specifics.
“We are very much still disturbed by the actions Tacoma police took in using the cell site simulator and then shielding that use from the public, but we hope this case serves as a deterrent from law enforcement using such secretive tactics in the future,” ACLU attorney Lisa Nowlin said. “Law enforcement agencies are accountable to the communities they serve, and transparency – particularly with regard to surveillance technology – is crucial to accountability.”
Asked in 2020 for a tally of penalties assessed against the city in the past five years for violations of the Public Records Act, the city listed five cases with a total of nearly $3 million in penalties.
One lawsuit from a fired police officer seeking records of his termination accounted for $2,607,940 of that, and that matter was on appeal.
This story was originally published October 5, 2021 at 3:42 PM.
