A spokeswoman for Baltimore’s State’s Attorney, Tammy Brown, said prosecutors will evaluate each challenge on its own merits. She agreed that prosecutors are required to tell defendants when the police use a stingray, but “we need to get that information first.”
This is lip service.
What they're not saying, is what 'merits' they'll be considering. They will be instructed, by the feds, to drop cases rather than face discovery and have more details about stingray known:
FBI lets suspects go to protect 'Stingray' secrets
By Jose Pagliery
The FBI has a secret device to locate criminal suspects, but it would apparently rather let suspects go free than reveal in court any details of the high tech tracker.
The device, called a "Stingray," tricks cell phones into revealing their locations. A judge's court order this week threatens to reveal closely guarded details about how police use Stingrays.
Judge Patrick H. NeMoyer in Buffalo, New York, described a 2012 deal between the FBI and the Erie County Sheriff's Office in his court order Tuesday: The FBI instructed the police to drop criminal charges instead of revealing "any information concerning the cell site simulator or its use."
The Erie County Sheriff's Office declined to comment to CNNMoney on Wednesday. Police spokesman Scott Zylka said they're now working with the FBI to appeal the judge's decision and keep the FBI agreement secret.
http://money.cnn.com/2015/03/18/technology/security/police-stingray-phone-tracker/
Or worse, they'll be deputized like below:
U.S. Marshals Seize Local Cops’ Cell Phone Tracking Files in Extraordinary Attempt to Keep Information From Public
By Nathan Freed Wessler, Staff Attorney, ACLU Speech, Privacy & Technology Project
June 3, 2014 | 12:13 PM
A run-of-the-mill public records request about cell phone surveillance submitted to a local police department in Florida has unearthed blatant violations of open government laws, including an incredible seizure of state records by the U.S. Marshals Service, which is part of the Justice Department. Today the ACLU and the ACLU of Florida filed an emergency motion in state court to preserve the public’s right of access to government records.
RED FLAG #1: The Sarasota Police initially told us that they had responsive records, including applications filed by and orders issued to a local detective under the state “trap and trace” statute that he had relied on for authorization to conduct stingray surveillance. That raised the first red flag, since trap and trace orders are typically used to gather limited information about the phone numbers of incoming calls, not to track cell phones inside private spaces or conduct dragnet surveillance. And, such orders require a very low legal standard. As one federal magistrate judge has held, police should be permitted to use stingrays only after obtaining a probable cause warrant, if at all.
RED FLAG #2: The Sarasota Police set up an appointment for us to inspect the applications and orders, as required by Florida law. But a few hours before that appointment, an assistant city attorney sent an email cancelling the meeting on the basis that the U.S. Marshals Service was claiming the records as their own and instructing the local cops not to release them. Their explanation: the Marshals Service had deputized the local officer, and therefore the records were actually the property of the federal government.
https://www.aclu.org/blog/us-marshals-seize-local-cops-cell-phone-tracking-files-extraordinary-attempt-keep-information
It stinks. Real bad.
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