Savannah police officer fired for giving Flock login to her ICE agent husband
A police officer in Savannah, Georgia, was fired after an investigation found she shared her Flock system login with her husband, an ICE agent. He ran 983 searches covering 97 license plates.
Amber Harpe, an officer with the Savannah Police Department (SPD) in Georgia, was fired in August after an internal investigation found she had given her login details for the Flock system to her husband, Tyler Harpe, an agent with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Flock is a system that lets users search for information on vehicles by license plate. The case matters because it shows how police data tools can end up in the hands of outsiders, even though the department says it does not share its Flock data with ICE.
What the investigation found
SPD said that sharing access to the system violated its security protocols. According to WJCL, Savannah's local ABC affiliate, Tyler Harpe carried out 983 searches related to 97 license plates while he had unauthorized access. The plates were overwhelmingly registered to Hispanic drivers.
The couple defended their actions. They said the access was not used for personal reasons and that the searches were strictly for law-enforcement purposes.
The decision to fire her
Interim Major Max Nowinsky originally recommended a relatively light penalty for Amber Harpe: an eight-hour suspension. Major Michelle Halford and Assistant Police Chief Robert Gavin disagreed and removed her from the force.
Harpe was one of six SPD employees fired after an internal investigation uncovered misuse of Flock. Four of them were later arrested, but Harpe was not among them.
