Fourth Circuit Allows Baltimore Police Department's Aircraft-Based Surveillance Program To Continue

In Leaders of a Beautiful Struggle v. Baltimore Police Department, the ACLU and ACLU of Baltimore filed a lawsuit against the Baltimore Police Department challenging the constitutionality of the Baltimore Police Department's (the "BPD") Aerial Investigative Research program (the "AIR"), which was instituted in 2016 in response to rising crime in Baltimore. The plaintiffs include Leaders of a Beautiful Struggle, a think tank advancing the public policy interests of black people in Baltimore.

The AIR uses three small planes to provide aerial observation of 90% of the city, the results of which are used to track movement of individuals and suspects in the vicinity of a violent crime. The BPD implemented the AIR without informing the public, elected officials, or the city solicitor. The system was used for about three hundred surveillance hours before being temporarily shuttered, but the BPD later reactivated the AIR system with additional safeguards in place to