AMICUS BRIEF IN Schmidt v. City of norfolk

On April 20, 2026, the Policing Project filed an amicus brief in the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals case Schimdt v. City of Norfolk. The case challenges the City of Norfolk’s warrantless automated license plate reader (ALPR) surveillance program. It is on appeal before the Fourth Circuit after the district court dismissed the case, finding that that ALPR program does not violate the Fourth Amendment because the City’s use of ALPR' cameras to conduct warrantless surveillance does not constitute a “search.”

The amicus brief urges the appellate court to recognize that the City of Norfolk’s use of the program constitutes a search under the Fourth Amendment — and is thus subject to constitutional scrutiny — because of the technology’s sprawling surveillance capabilities and its potential integration into a much broader surveillance ecosystem.

The brief frequently refers to the Policing Project’s 2020 Civil Rights and Civil Liberties Audit of the Baltimore’s Aerial Investigative Research (AIR) Program, which was cited by the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in a 2021 case finding the City of Baltimore’s aerial surveillance program unconstitutional. In this case, however, the district court found that the City of Norfolk’s ALPR program was insufficiently invasive to trigger the same scrutiny.

The Policing Project submitted this brief as the authors of the 2020 audit and experts of the Baltimore AIR program. The district court, the brief explains, was incorrect to distinguish the invasive capabilities of the City of Norfolk’s ALPR program from the City of Baltimore’s aerial surveillance program.

Read the full brief here.