Lt Ruben Carter And Lt Kevin Smalls Fired After Flock Camera Audit
The short version: A South Carolina audit caught two lieutenants running thousands of unauthorized Flock searches, exposing how easily these databases get abused without real oversight.
Our Take
Credit to OhDangReally for digging into the Colleton County case, because this is exactly the story Flock Safety doesn't want you to see. Lt. Ruben Carter allegedly ran over 2,700 searches on 14 people — himself, coworkers, old associates — with zero cases attached. Lt. Kevin Smalls reportedly logged 62 searches in six months, including on vehicles tied to his own spouse. No warrants, no investigations, just access.
What really stings is the detail that audits used to be run by the same captain who administered the system. That's not oversight, that's a formality. It took an actual external review to catch this, and only after the fact — the searches already happened, the data already moved. Flock's entire pitch rests on 'trust us, it's audited,' but this case shows audits mean nothing if the people running them have a stake in looking the other way.
This isn't an isolated glitch, it's what happens when you hand law enforcement a tool that logs everyone's movements and then let them police themselves. Check our camera map to see what's watching your own county, and hit up take action if you want to push back before your local department has its own audit scandal.
This is DeFlock The USA’s original commentary. The video above is the work of OhDangReally, published on YouTube — full credit to the creator.