{"id":362210,"date":"2026-08-04T05:21:03","date_gmt":"2026-08-04T05:21:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/362210\/"},"modified":"2026-08-04T05:21:03","modified_gmt":"2026-08-04T05:21:03","slug":"flock-camera-vandal-arrested-in-jacksonville-beach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/362210\/","title":{"rendered":"Flock Camera Vandal Arrested in Jacksonville Beach"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A Jacksonville Beach man was arrested for allegedly vandalizing several <a href=\"https:\/\/sjcitizen.com\/trio-allegedly-stole-two-fully-equipped-unmarked-police-cars-from-st-augustine-car-dealership\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Automated License Plate Readers<\/a>, commonly referred to as Flock cameras for the company that produces many of them.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">After an investigation revealed that several of the cameras were vandalized across Atlantic Beach, Neptune Beach, <a href=\"https:\/\/sjcitizen.com\/man-appears-to-chomp-officers-finger-during-jax-beach-confrontation-that-led-to-three-arrests\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">and Jacksonville Beach<\/a>, the investigators used operational Flock cameras to track down the suspect, 19-year-old River Blair.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.actionnewsjax.com\/news\/local\/theyre-everywhere-flock-cameras-vandalized-near-beaches\/K55OHH6QQBHZVAX5VITVXPDTGY\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">According to investigators<\/a>, camera footage shows Blair parking a red Mazda hatchback and carrying a ladder towards a camera.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Blair\u2019s alleged method was to spray paint camera lenses either silver or gold, to prevent them from recording traffic.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Blair, a Tallahassee State College student, also told police he had painted a camera in Bulloch County, Georgia, which contains Georgia Southern University.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In total, Blair is accused of damaging eight cameras across the two states, although he currently has not been charged in Georgia.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">However, Blair was pulled over in Bulloch county earlier this month while driving the Mazda connected to the Atlantic Beach vandalism.<\/p>\n<p><img data-od-added-loading=\"\" data-od-removed-fetchpriority=\"high\" data-od-replaced- data-od-xpath=\"\/HTML\/BODY\/DIV[@class='elementor elementor-74 elementor-location-single post-22612 post type-post status-publish format-standard has-post-thumbnail hentry category-news tag-featured-4']\/*[1][self::DIV]\/*[1][self::DIV]\/*[1][self::DIV]\/*[10][self::DIV]\/*[8][self::FIGURE]\/*[1][self::IMG]\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"683\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/flock-1024x683.jpg\" alt=\"a flock camera\" class=\"wp-image-22627\"   data-eio=\"p\"\/>A Flock camera. (Wikimedia Commons)<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Flock cameras capture data like license plates, make, model color and other notable vehicle features.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Over 5,000 cameras exist across the country, and they combine into a searchable database for law enforcement.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The technology has attracted scrutiny online, with many fearing warrantless surveillance and errors in the cameras\u2019 artificial intelligence.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Supporters say Flock cameras help police identify suspect vehicles, solve crimes and locate missing people. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">They also argue the cameras deter crime and are less intrusive than facial-recognition technology.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Flock has stated a commitment to civil liberties and data protection.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">According to FlockHopper, an application that tracks the cameras\u2019 locations, there are roughly 200 in St. Johns County, with many concentrated on major roadways or near county lines.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Across Northeast Florida, nearly 700 of the cameras exist.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">According to a report, the Jacksonville Sheriff\u2019s Office states the cameras are not used arbitrarily, but are used as an investigative tool.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Jacksonville Beach man was arrested for allegedly vandalizing several Automated License Plate Readers, commonly referred to as&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":362211,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[147341,116,118,117],"class_list":["post-362210","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-featured-4","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362210","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=362210"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362210\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/362211"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=362210"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=362210"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=362210"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}