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By Jennifer Vigil, Times of San Diego, a member of the San Diego Online News Association
Photo: a San Diego intersection where there are two automated license plate reader cameras on the streetlights. (File photo by Gabrielle Wallace/Times of San Diego)
October 4, 2025 (El Cajon) - California is suing El Cajon over the city’s lack of compliance with a state law prohibiting the sharing of license plate data with federal and out-of-state law enforcement agencies.
The Attorney General’s Office on Friday filed a petition for a writ of mandate in San Diego Superior Court asking a judge to order El Cajon to stop sharing data recorded by Automated License Plate Reader systems.
The state contends that California law bars law enforcement agencies from sharing such data with similar federal agencies and those from other states.
But El Cajon, according to the AG’s office, continues to offer the information “despite clear guidance and multiple warnings.”
State Attorney General Rob Bonta cited the Trump administration’s mass deportation effort, along with the loss of control over how ALPR data “is used or shared” as reasons for the lawsuit.
“That’s why the California Legislature passed SB 34 – to ensure information about Californians remains here in California,” he said in a news release. “Yet El Cajon has knowingly and repeatedly refused to comply with state law, jeopardizing the privacy and safety of individuals in its community.”
The state Legislature passed SB 34 in 2015, as the Electronic Frontier Foundation put it, to “require basic safeguards for the use of ALPRs. These include a prohibition on California agencies from sharing data with non-California agencies. They also include the publication of a usage policy that is consistent with civil liberties and privacy.”
The bone of contention between the state and city of El Cajon, though, according to KPBS News, centers on the definition of “public agency” as stated in SB 34.
In October 2023, Bonta issued a law enforcement bulletin providing guidance regarding the use of data collected or accessed through an ALPR system. The bulletin clarified, among other things, SB 34’s use of the term “public agency.”
El Cajon police chief Jeremiah Lawson disagreed.
“I think we just have a different interpretation of how SB 34 reads than some other folks,” Larson told KPBS.
The El Cajon city attorney has yet to respond to an email seeking comment on the state’s suit.
EFF Director of Investigations Dave Maass said in a statement that El Cajon has been “recklessly putting Californians at risk by sharing data with many out-of-state agencies.”
He added that the foundation commends “the California Department of Justice for enforcing this law in court to protect every driver on our roads from agencies who think privacy laws are optional.”
ALPR are computer-controlled camera systems that capture images of license plates and record the time, date and location where a particular vehicle was encountered. Police rely on the data for investigations, but privacy advocates have long warned of the potential for it to be misused.
The systems are generally operated through third-party vendors that deploy cameras and collect and store ALPR data that then may be accessed by a range of federal, state and local law enforcement agencies, including Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
El Cajon police, according to the Attorney General’s Office, have shared data with law enforcement agencies in Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Washington, and Wisconsin.
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