Three Coweta County Sheriff's Office employees have resigned after an internal audit flagged their accounts inside the department's Flock Safety license-plate camera system, officials say. The three stepped down during meetings with their department heads before the audit process — or any formal internal investigation — had run its course. The sheriff's office has not released the employees' names or detailed what the audit turned up in their search histories.
According to CBS News, department heads asked the three to resign rather than let the review finish. In a statement, the sheriff's office said "protecting system integrity and maintaining community trust is a serious responsibility," and added that it expects anyone with access to sensitive law enforcement technology to use it "lawfully, ethically, and according to agency policy." The office confirmed it opened an internal investigation into the employees' activity but has shared no further specifics about the audit itself.
The Georgia Bureau of Investigation confirmed it has now launched its own independent investigation into the allegations, initiated at the sheriff's office's request, per the same report. The case remains active, and no additional details about what triggered the account flags have been made public. The sheriff's office also said it is rolling out additional training for Flock system users, aiming to ensure the camera network is used appropriately going forward.
A Statewide Wave of Flock Camera Fallout
Coweta County's resignations land in the middle of a much larger reckoning playing out across Georgia law enforcement. Officials pointed to a string of similar cases already surfacing statewide, including allegations touching three Cherokee County sheriff's deputies and three Richmond County police officers, according to the same reporting.
In Savannah, six police department employees — four officers and two civilian staffers — were placed on leave and referred to the GBI after an audit flagged potentially unauthorized searches, as Hoodline detailed in its Savannah Flock camera probe coverage. In Albany, five former police officers were fired and arrested on felony oath-violation and misdemeanor data-misuse charges after an internal audit uncovered repeated non-official Flock searches, according to Police1.
In Habersham County, a deputy was fired and arrested in late July after an audit showed he had used the Flock system to monitor someone he had a personal relationship with, as reported by FOX 5 Atlanta. By late July, at least 20 law enforcement personnel across Georgia had faced criminal charges, firings, or GBI investigations tied to Flock audits, per the same station's reporting.
Why the Audits Are Suddenly Catching So Much
The current spike traces back to an automated feature Flock Safety rolled out in April 2026 called "Audit Assistance," which continuously scans user search behavior and flags atypical patterns — such as repeated queries on a specific plate or personal acquaintance — for agency administrators, according to GlobeNewswire. Before that rollout, oversight of license-plate database queries relied largely on manual, reactive checks rather than algorithmic flagging.
Georgia law also limits how those queries can be used in the first place. Under Justia Law's summary of O.C.G.A. § 35-1-22, agencies may collect automated license-plate data but are barred from accessing it for anything beyond an authorized law enforcement purpose. Notably, Flock's cloud system automatically deletes unflagged plate scans after 30 days unless they're saved as evidence, even though state law permits retention of up to 30 months, according to Gwinnett County Police.
Possible Felony Charges Loom Under Oath Law
Georgia public officers who willfully misuse government database access for personal reasons can face felony prosecution under O.C.G.A. § 16-10-1, Violation of Oath by Public Officer, which carries one to five years in prison upon conviction, per Georgia Criminal Lawyer. Prosecutors elsewhere in Georgia have paired that felony count with misdemeanor data-misuse charges, as happened in the Albany case. Whether the GBI will pursue similar charges against the three former Coweta County employees remains unknown, and the sheriff's office has not indicated whether it expects criminal charges to follow.
