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Season Seven: Flocking to Freedom
147 Plays1 day ago
In this episode, we talk about a couple of closed cases and technology in every day law enforcement.
Check out Deep Gold from Season Four:
Part One: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/deep-gold-episode-one-legends-are-spun/id1494313600?i=1000632853249
Part Two: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/deep-gold-episode-two-at-what-cost/id1494313600?i=1000633742619
Part Three: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/deep-gold-episode-three-hit-or-miss/id1494313600?i=1000634559395
Part Four: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/deep-gold-episode-four-into-the-deep-blue-freeze/id1494313600?i=1000635188580
Part Five: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/deep-gold-episode-five-finders-weepers/id1494313600?i=1000635342857
Part Six: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/deep-gold-episode-six-in-territory-not-meant-to-be/id1494313600?i=1000635638789
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Music in this episode was licensed for True Crime XS. Our theme song is No Scars from slip.fm
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Sources:
Various News Sources Mentioned by Name
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Transcript
Introduction and Content Warning
00:00:00
Speaker
The content you're about to hear may be graphic in nature. Listener discretion is advised.
Weather, Behavior, and Crime Rates
00:00:25
Speaker
This is True Crime
00:00:57
Speaker
It's that time of year that like is so strange for me where the weather turns, but also the news changes. And like I think weird things happen to people when like it starts to warm up and people start coming out of their houses more. They're getting over cabin fever. Yeah.
Barbara Waldman Cold Case Solved
00:01:15
Speaker
Yeah, I think that's part of it. I wanted to to start off, i have I have a couple of stories to talk about and then some news on the case that we've already covered.
00:01:22
Speaker
I wanted to start with this case out of, i think it's Long Island, the way it was presented to me. I was trying to put the pieces together, but it's a piece of news that popped up on March 11th in Oceanside, The Daily Voice.
00:01:38
Speaker
It's pretty short piece that Michael michael Mashburn wrote up. It's about... a pretty old killing. It's like 50 years ago, 52 years ago. And we never really talked about this case, but I did have it on a list to cover because at some point there was an announcement about it. and i'll talk about that. But it says a killer ID'd in Barbara Waldman cold case.
00:02:07
Speaker
So Barbara Waldman was a woman who, back in 1974,
00:02:12
Speaker
was killed inside her home. She's 31 years old and she's found murdered inside her residence on Sally Lane in Oceanside. There was a press conference that came out this last week from the Nassau County Police Department, which is, they've been in the news for a lot of stuff. The the biggest thing they're in the news for right now is the Long Island serial killer.
00:02:39
Speaker
The case had remained unsolved for five decades, but recently investigators have used genetic genealogy to develop a DNA profile.
00:02:50
Speaker
Now, this DNA profile, it was announced that they were going to be looking for information on this case, and I thought it was pretty interesting when you see like homicide squads working with the FBI, and then you see them throw in the word investigative genetic genealogy.
00:03:10
Speaker
It's very common now. It is. It's like it used to be unheard of, and now it's like a weekly occurrence. But this is one of two cases that was announced this week to have been solved.
00:03:22
Speaker
And obviously, this the DNA labs that are taking care of this are all out of Texas. primarily Othram. ah The announcement I had seen was that in 2024, investigators had brought them some forensic evidence on one of these cases.
00:03:38
Speaker
And so that turned out to be the Barbara Waldman case. But the ABC in New York, they had put up just a staff report ah article on Friday the 13th of all things. And they confirmed that it was her. Now they released a composite sketch at one point in this case.
00:04:03
Speaker
They never had viable suspects. The case was cold for most of that 50 years, but they kept going back to it.
Cold Case Remains and DNA Profiling
00:04:13
Speaker
And I think that,
00:04:14
Speaker
when they were able to get a DNA profile, ah well, materials that were sufficient for a DNA profile over to Othram. I think that's what really solved this case. They identified a man who lived a few blocks away from Barbara Waldman. He had been working as a sanitation worker, and I think the way they're describing him is basically he's a garbage man.
00:04:36
Speaker
um His name was Thomas Generazio, and they confirmed that they believe he Killed her. Unfortunately, he died in 2004.
00:04:48
Speaker
four At the same time this was being worked on, they also announced that progress had been and been made in another New York case where the New York State Police had been working same way, leads on a cold case.
00:05:06
Speaker
But this was from 1970 cold case. In March of 1970, decapitated remains were found near Andover, New York, on a rural road in Allegheny County.
00:05:20
Speaker
According to the New York State Police Cold Case Database, they had determined that the remains were those of an adult male whose head and hands had been removed and an X had been carved into his chest.
00:05:32
Speaker
At the time, they were pretty sure he had probably been the victim of gangland violence. So... We used to see this in movies. It's very common in the TV show Sopranos. They have the the pine barrels. The idea is someone's involved in organized crime.
00:05:50
Speaker
The hands and head are removed to prevent identification, and a body is dumped. I don't know what the significance of an X carved into a chest would be, but it all led to the New York State Police saying, we believe this is the victim of some kind of organized crime execution.
00:06:13
Speaker
Just like the other case with Long Island, in 2023, investigators teamed up with Othram and they started kind of doing the opposite. Whereas in Barbara Waldman's case, they were trying to identify dna material from evidence that they had collected back in 1974.
00:06:36
Speaker
And they were trying to figure out who had taken her life. They knew who she was. In this case, they have the body. They don't know who the body is.
00:06:48
Speaker
So it's a little different. But they're able to create a profile from... known samples of the body. And the FBI starts a follow-up investigation in 2024 and 2025, and they find potential relatives of this John Doe. This guy has been a John Doe for, I think they identify him 2025, that would essentially be 55 years.
00:07:18
Speaker
yeah They're able to get a positive identification on him, and they determined that he was 35 years old at the time that he died. He'd been living in Genesee, Pennsylvania, and his name was Clyde Coppedge.
00:07:30
Speaker
So he's not from the area, but I did notice that the New York State Police's ah BCI, their Bureau of Criminal Investigation, they put out an announcement that they were looking for information in that cold case, and the State Patrol at Amity was looking for the public to help. So in the off chance, you know something about Clyde Coppedge in 1970.
00:07:57
Speaker
ah He was found March 20th, 1970, so it has to be before then. they are looking to explain the circumstances surrounding his death.
00:08:10
Speaker
585-344-6200 gets you to the New York State Police. They have funds available that they are looking to test materials and potentially link evidence to, I think they have a number of suspects in mind now that they know who he is, but they have not announced that they've solved it, and they are still asking for for the public to participate in providing information if they have it.
00:08:35
Speaker
So I threw that on here. you guys... know anything about Clyde Coppage. I don't think they're looking for more information on Barbara Waldem, particularly since Thomas Generazio has been dead for 22 years now. It feels weird to say 22 years and only be talking about 2004.
00:08:59
Speaker
I know. It really does. ah Clyde Coppage was never reported missing, it doesn't look like. Yeah, I didn't see any evidence that he had been. I was wondering if you came up with anything there.
00:09:10
Speaker
um But that's, my guess is someone knew exactly where Clyde was, which is why he didn't get reported missing. Right. And it's interesting because it can that can really help investigatively, I think.
00:09:29
Speaker
Yeah, we're we're living in that that avalanche you've been describing for six years. It's like happening all around us. and like The number of cases that come through, i don't i don't even have time to cover them all in true crime news, even if I were just to give them three or four minutes each. Yeah.
00:09:45
Speaker
Right. No, yeah, it's a lot. And DNA is, you know, obviously in this case, the man's
AI and Technology in Policing
00:09:52
Speaker
identified. And I think that's really important. I all i think it's a little more important than necessarily identifying the killers, even though,
00:10:04
Speaker
like that's important, a lot of them are gone now as well, right? Yes. We've had a couple of serial killers unmasked who were kind of known to police for something, but they definitely were not known for serial killers. And that that's interesting to me because they do not get nearly the publicity you would think they would.
00:10:27
Speaker
since there's nothing to really talk about. But we've had a few true predators unmasked. At some point this year, we're going to talk a little bit about the Colonial Parkway murders. I'm hoping to have a guest on for that.
00:10:40
Speaker
um But that... series of murders at this point is basically solved. There's a couple of crimes that have been solved along the wet ah along the way that they turned out to be people that had, you know, four to six victims.
00:10:55
Speaker
um We've had a guest on about another double homicide that I think we're going to talk to that guest again. And because that case is now wrapped up and it's it's different than than we all thought it might be.
00:11:09
Speaker
I guess for me, I think, are you always kind of looking like what's going to go wrong with DNA? Yeah. I've wondered that from the very beginning because all of the evidentiary means to identify suspects have unraveled in one way or another at some point.
00:11:33
Speaker
Yeah, I think that's a pretty true statement. And I wanted to talk a little bit about that. Because one of the things that's going to start popping up this year, frauds have gotten more interesting. The people that are going to prison for fraud have gotten more interesting.
00:11:45
Speaker
Police struggle to keep up with technology. The court struggles to keep up with technology. And some of the technology that's come out kind of goes wrong from time to time, just like you're describing. I think DNA is a little, there's a little more certainty to it.
00:12:00
Speaker
I think fingerprints is still a thing that like is a valuable identification tool. It has to be used in conjunction with other tools now. But are you familiar with like like the the concept of AI ah being used with ah license plate readers and cameras?
00:12:22
Speaker
I am. Yes. So we get a couple times a year, I go to training and they will talk to us about like the most recent technology. And one of the things that I see like almost every day are these flock safety cameras.
00:12:40
Speaker
Have you seen them yet? Or you just know? I just know about them. I, I've never seen one. I'm not somebody that ah looks for cameras, but I, well, I used to at least have people in the car with me that would spot them. Yeah. um So I deal with flat cameras a lot.
00:12:58
Speaker
A lot of what's happening with that company is pretty...
00:13:06
Speaker
there's parts of it that are very open to the public and you can, you can see the transparency happening, but some of the things that they're doing are sort of, i would say they're sketchy, but it's not that it's just that there may be problems in the future with how they're used.
00:13:23
Speaker
Well, one interesting thing that I, uh, now this was on television, and I can't actually remember what it was, but, um, I have seen in some of the body cam type,
00:13:35
Speaker
TV shows that come on now, like police body cams are going. i have seen where if they have like a full... uh, license plate number from like an alleged suspect, right.
00:13:48
Speaker
That they can be like, well, the last time it was picked up on a reader was here or whatever. Right. And I always thought that was an interesting thing. Now that's just a little bit, that's just almost like a tip, right. Cause you still got a lot of work to do from there. But I thought that was interesting.
00:14:08
Speaker
Yeah, i I saw it used in a homicide trial earlier this year, and it was from a couple of years ago. as Actually, i say i say that. um it was ah It was four years ago.
00:14:19
Speaker
that So I was looking at old technology and how it applied, because it takes a while for homicides to come to trial. And in that case, they had used the Flock camera in an area that now no longer supports the Flock cameras anymore.
00:14:34
Speaker
like the one of the towns has completely ended their contract. ah For those of you who don't know what we're talking about right this second, flaw Flock, F-L-O-C-K, was founded as a research group back in 2017.
00:14:50
Speaker
They started out as Flock Group Inc. They're currently doing business as Flock Safety. If you look up the base description of them, I think what they're going to be described is an operator of security hardware and software.
00:15:03
Speaker
They are an American manufacturer. They've been here the whole time, headquartered out of Atlanta, Georgia. ah They have a couple of different interesting things that they've done.
00:15:15
Speaker
But one of the most interesting things is their ShotSpotter. um They have a gunshot surveillance locator system. They also have video surveillance that they're doing. They have automated license plate recognition and reader systems. They have all the supporting software.
00:15:34
Speaker
They operate these systems through primarily government agencies, primarily law enforcement agencies, but there are also they contract with certain commercial brands, neighborhood associations, and quite a few private property owners. So places where there are large amounts of commercial properties who are owned by like sort of a leaseholder, like you may see a sporting goods store and a box store and a shoe store and a bunch of little businesses, but like that might all be owned by one person who also can contract with Flock.
00:16:12
Speaker
According to the claims on their website, In the end of 2025, FLOC was claiming to operate across 49 U.S. states, over 5,000 communities, and they said they were performing 20 billion vehicle scans in the United States each month.
00:16:31
Speaker
Now, they use FLOC safety's Flock Safety uses a network of cameras. They utilize image recognition, facial recognition, and they utilize machine learning.
00:16:46
Speaker
They can share data with local police agencies and departments. And they're in they're currently like getting big on integrating this into predictive policing platforms like Palantir. um palantine is a Palantir is a different technology that we'll talk about a later day But currently, they're the biggest they are the biggest one who is um operating.
00:17:14
Speaker
And they say that they're not primarily ah primarily a law enforcement third party, but they are. They're 100%. That's all they do. um They claim that their system aid and criminal investigations.
00:17:27
Speaker
i I think your description of it is probably the best one. like They do give a ah lot of quote-unquote tips, and those are shared with law enforcement. Don't you think that the fact that they say that like we're not a you know ah sole law enforcement subcontractor or whatever, I don't really know what they would say.
Privacy Concerns with Surveillance Tech
00:17:47
Speaker
I think that's what causes the problem to begin with. If they would just say it, it wouldn't be a big deal. Yeah.
00:17:53
Speaker
Yeah, if they would just admit to it, like that's how they started. So this all started as a side project between three alumni from Georgia Tech. They decided very early on exactly what they wanted to do. They built these first flock surveillance cameras like by hand in one of their garages and finalized it on a dining room table.
00:18:15
Speaker
There was a DeKalb County, Georgia detective who spoke with one of the founders, the CEO, Garrett Langley, And he said, this technology that you have out right now helped solve a home breakout.
00:18:30
Speaker
And the quote that Garrett Langley has out there is that he called the CHRO and the CTO of the company. And this was a really small project. And he said, you guys need to quit your day jobs. This is what we're doing.
00:18:44
Speaker
By 2024, were cities across their fixed cameras in public locations. And by April of 2024, they employed almost 1,000 people.
00:18:58
Speaker
They've had some stumbling along the way. in June of 2024, shortly after they now make all these big announcements, a circuit court judge in Norfolk, Virginia, ruled that their collection of location data constituted a search under the Fourth Amendment and could not be used as evidence in a criminal case when collected without a warrant.
00:19:22
Speaker
They basically called their ALPR, which is their automatic license plate recognition readers, the equivalent of a tracking device. And tracking devices have been found to be unconstitutionally used by police.
00:19:35
Speaker
One of the rulings that you can find on this is the United States versus Jones. The company at this time in 2024 started to receive pushback from communities who did not understand the operations of Flock.
00:19:50
Speaker
They also acquired Aerodrome. And it's interesting the way that you described the law enforcement problem ah like of not admitting that that's what they're there for because that's where they make their money from. I mean, they may be paid by the municipality, but they are paid by the municipality to assist the local law enforcement agencies.
00:20:09
Speaker
It's literally the only reason anybody would want the information they gather. Right. Right. That is 100% correct. Aerodrome is a manufacturer of drones for law enforcement agencies.
00:20:23
Speaker
So they start raising money in 2024 and 2025. They get really big. By the end of 2025, they announced that they're in partnership with Amazon's Ring.
00:20:35
Speaker
And they are doing this thing where they develop a software for the Ring camera is sold to everyone as finding missing or lost pets across the US because they're enhancing with AI surveillance.
00:20:56
Speaker
They aired this really stupid Super Bowl ad 2026 and that canceled. and that is cancel And that's because Ring has limited affiliations with law enforcement.
00:21:09
Speaker
They are the most affiliated of the doorbell cameras. but What got canceled? This ah search party integration that they were going to do. So it's not going to happen anymore? It's not going to be shared with law enforcement. Oh, I see what you're saying. I didn't see the commercial, but I use Ring as ah just a monitoring system, so I don't subscribe or anything. But I saw all these things about, you know, ah do this to be part of Search Party or whatever, whenever I would open to look at, you know, who's at my front door or whatever. Right. Right.
00:21:45
Speaker
That's interesting. But I did hear the commercial was in really bad taste or something. The animals were kind of seen as metaphors. like I love the idea of being able to find lost animals that way. The problem is the age that we live in and the people in this situation are only really looking to...
00:22:06
Speaker
monetize what they can do with law enforcement because that's where that's just the state of the world right now the most money that you can possibly get needs a military or law enforcement attachment to the contracts um they run these things off of solar panels they're very interesting i have one very close to my house i have ah gotten close enough that people have asked questions um They integrate into Axon. Axon is another big, they ran evidence.com for years.
00:22:33
Speaker
ah They are another big law enforcement subsidiary, I guess, because they can they wholly depend on the law enforcement and There was a product that was being developed, allegedly called Nova, through Flock. And what's interesting about Nova is I was actually pitched a version of this, and I... i Full disclosure, I do not use a Flock product, but I do use a product that allows me to do what they're describing they want to do.
00:23:01
Speaker
They're calling it a public safety data platform, and it would make available to... apparently the public things that currently you either have to be a sworn officer or a licensed private investigator in almost all 50 States to get the data that they were talking about. And that data is information about data breaches, public records, commercially available, uh, data that would allow you to financially like, this sounds crazy, but imagine tracking someone through their rewards card for a grocery store.
00:23:39
Speaker
That's exactly what that's for. Right. That's what this is for. Also announced a program called The Raven. The Raven was originally... similar to ShotSpotter.
00:23:50
Speaker
It was supposed to be an audio gunfire locator. And I said ShotSpotter is a flat project. I may be wrong on that because i when I was looking back through my notes, I may have been thinking of Raven.
00:24:02
Speaker
But Raven records audio in five-second increments, and it uses artificial intelligence to analyze sound clips for audible gunfire. When a gunshot is detected, the device estimates the location and alerts police.
00:24:16
Speaker
They did announce that there was a version of Raven coming out that would listen for sounds of human distress and then alert police. I don't know that that model has made it to the public.
00:24:30
Speaker
But I sat through what I believe was a pitch about it. They did not specifically say Raven. um That's something that happens at these training sessions I go to. They want you to like be thinking about their products.
00:24:45
Speaker
And the reason I'm talking about Flock so much is there was this little Business Insider article that came out March 9, 2026 by Nicole And I want to tell this story because it's kind of similar to what you and I were expecting would eventually happen with DNA.
Errors in License Plate Technology
00:25:01
Speaker
But I think it's happening a lot earlier with Flock.
00:25:05
Speaker
the The article in Business Insider is titled Flocked flocked Up. The subtitle is How a License Lake Camera Misread Unraveled One Man's Life. So I'll tell you the story. I tried to send it to you, but I think there was a paywall on your side. Yeah, and there was. It just says, in April 2024, Brandon Upchurch and his cousin were driving home from a convenience store when they noticed flashing lights behind them.
00:25:32
Speaker
When Upchurch pulled over, officers from the Toledo Police Department drew their guns and ordered him out of his red Dodge Ram pickup truck. Upchurch, initially refused to turn off the engine or exit the truck, repeatedly asked the officers why he was being pulled over.
00:25:47
Speaker
One officer named Adrian Wilson warned that he would deploy his police canine if Upchurch didn't get on the ground. As Upchurch began to get down, Adrian Wilson released the dog.
00:26:01
Speaker
The dog latched onto Upchurch's dread box and rammed his head into the ground, sinking its teeth into its ah into his arm. Wilson later said he thought Upchurch had tripped while he was getting ready to run.
00:26:17
Speaker
That's when one of the officers says, your car has a stolen license p plate on it. But his plates weren't stolen. And Upchurch insisted this to the officers.
00:26:28
Speaker
He was transported to a hospital for his injuries, and then he was sent to the county jail where he remained for hours. The charges, which were later dismissed, were obstructing official business and resisting arrest.
00:26:41
Speaker
Upchurch, it turned out, was right. The license plates weren't stolen. He was the truck's registered owner. Police records reviewed by business insiders show what went wrong. a camera made by the technology startup Flock Safety misread the 7 on Upchurch's plate for a 2 and pinged Adrian Wilson.
00:27:02
Speaker
In body camera footage, Wilson can be heard telling another officer after the arrest that he thought the camera mishit. Flock's license plate readers are used by law enforcement agencies, businesses, and homeowner associations.
00:27:16
Speaker
Its rise hasn't been without controversy, much of which has been focused on privacy issues. Earlier this month, Amazon's Ring announced it would end its partnership with Flock amid blowback over a Super super Bowl ad for Ring cameras.
00:27:31
Speaker
Flock described the decision to end the partnership as mutual. Less attention has been paid to the text accuracy. Business Insider reviewed police records, lawsuits, and local news coverage across the country and found that the Toledo episode isn't isolated.
00:27:47
Speaker
In a dozen instances, misreads by Flock's automated license plate readers or a lack of verification by officers resulted in people who hadn't committed crimes being stopped at gunpoint, sent to jail, or potentially mauled by a police dog, among other outcomes.
00:28:04
Speaker
When the tech works as designed, it can help locate suspects involved in crimes, track down vehicles, and improve investigative efficiency. The system gives law enforcement agencies access to huge swaths of data, and officers receive alerts about vehicles of interest while they're on patrol, such as drivers with warrants, fake plates, missing people, and vehicles flagged as stolen.
00:28:25
Speaker
Andrew Guthrie Ferguson, a law professor at George Washington University who specializes in police surveillance technology, told Business Insider that in general, errors are a part of policing and errors will be a part of policing technology.
00:28:38
Speaker
The issue is creating incentives to limit the errors in the technology. Right now, the incentives are not aligned to improve accuracy and transparency and accountability. Flock monitors and collects misread rates, but it declined to provide Business Insider with specifics about the data.
00:28:55
Speaker
When customers flag misreads, that data is pulled into the company's training set to improve its model, and the company works with local law enforcement to understand the cause of the incident. According to the spokesperson for Flock, we have strong confidence in our models and continuously improve them through ongoing optimization and testing.
00:29:13
Speaker
She said they do not publish a single accuracy figure because performance can vary depending on plate design, lighting conditions, and environmental factors. She said we respect and value concerns and feedback raised by community members and are continuously building on our technology.
00:29:26
Speaker
We have the utmost sympathy for any victim of harm, and that is why we are committed to the work we do to solve and deter serious crimes and provide security for communities. So I'm going to pause here for a second just talk a little bit about this and kind of get away from the article.
00:29:40
Speaker
So this is going to be a huge deal. It sounds like it sort of already is. Yeah. yeah i maybe Maybe that's a misstatement on my part. Maybe your statement's better. it It already is a big deal. It doesn't lie in the AI itself. It lies in the officer's actions.
00:30:00
Speaker
Because in the case described by in the article, if the law enforcement officer had taken the time to verify the license tag and do his own search, he would have found it wasn't stolen. I don't know about, i actually don't know about the general stance of this,
Legal Challenges of AI in Policing
00:30:24
Speaker
but I think it's absolutely ridiculous that going after a car would result in like slamming people to the ground and letting dogs run.
00:30:36
Speaker
off on them, especially since like the police officer can't say, AI told me and that be his probable cause. Correct. The only thing the police officer could do is get the tip from AI, and i'm not and I'm saying this is what legally they should do right and when they act like saying that ai told me you know it was a stolen tag well that's not a valid arrest or a valid search and seizure under the fourth amendment he you have to take that knowledge and you have to get your own verification from it and that's the problem
00:31:18
Speaker
ah That's part of the problem. i don't disagree with that being the problem in general. That's definitely... You described it perfectly you described it perfectly when you said, like, the the tip needs to be verified by human intelligence.
00:31:36
Speaker
Exactly. But that's how all AI works. The other problem, though, is it's very likely... that we're entering an era where we've tipped the scales in terms of data collection.
00:31:51
Speaker
And problem is you have an unregulated company, not a government agency, collecting and selling the data data.
00:32:04
Speaker
on
00:32:07
Speaker
Literally everyone in America, almost like 90% of people are traveling throughout the day through, even if it's just in their town. So we're collecting hundreds of millions of people's data every day.
00:32:18
Speaker
And this company is able to stay around and make money off of it because they're selling it. Right. ah So every single camera that's up had to have been placed there by the lawful inhabitant of what the parcel it's on. Yeah. The owner.
00:32:36
Speaker
the owner. I mean, but in some cases, like I'm sure companies, uh, like, especially in like strip malls, they can have a camera up even if they don't own the building.
00:32:47
Speaker
I see a lot of the cameras by big home improvement stores. Right. And those people generally don't like, those are, those real estate models can vary by jurisdiction.
00:33:00
Speaker
Like sometimes the Lowe's or Home Depot or whatever own it And sometimes there's a landlord. Sure. Uh, but that so in that case, having the right to put the camera up based on the owner's decision to have it, right? Right.
00:33:23
Speaker
Uh, the view from the camera, I mean, unless it's peeking in somebody's window, It's highly unlikely that there's a right to privacy.
00:33:36
Speaker
i'm much i' ah so i think that you're making the mistake that Flock is currently making. Data collection and privacy are two different things. You can know everything I do in public.
00:33:47
Speaker
You can't sell it. Well, that brings so that's an interesting ah way to look at it. The way that you can sell it is you make an agreement with me and I allow you to sell it
00:34:01
Speaker
Well, yeah baby but that's sort of what I was saying was if you're out and like, I know that that the EU has really strict um rules, putting random people's pictures on social media. Right.
00:34:22
Speaker
And to my knowledge, we don't have the same rules here. no we don't yet. And yeah, and it's always, as far as that goes, saying like who owns the picture that's taken by the camera, right? Right.
00:34:41
Speaker
To the extent that that comes up, that that's an issue, like what you're saying, ah you could very well be right. The problem is this is ah reactive, right? As opposed to ah preparing to have it not happen.
00:35:04
Speaker
Yes. And so because it's reactive, it's literally the extent that you can make somebody pay for it. That's what the, re like, and then you have to get, because you could sue them and say, hey, you're yeah you're selling my my. Right.
00:35:23
Speaker
location my right picture, video, whatever, you're selling it without my permission. And you've got to go through the entire court system, overcome like several things. it Who knows what would happen, right? Right.
00:35:40
Speaker
And, but I'm saying it's almost like they can do it until someone tells them they can't. Yeah, no, that's exactly what it's going to be. um i was a little shocked at some of the numbers they threw out this article.
00:35:54
Speaker
And i I wanted to ask you about that related to what you just said. um They said a deputy police chief in Tennessee told his department in email that he had requested access to all of the cameras within a 500-mile radius for the officers to search.
00:36:09
Speaker
So agencies can opt in to share their data with other departments. In some cases, this gives the officers the ability to search for a specific plate or car across tens of thousands of cameras across the country.
00:36:22
Speaker
So we have this police chief. He asked for a 500-mile radius, and the system says it will give him 80,000 cameras to search. Now, in Wisconsin, another sheriff's office that had opted in, they have access to over 1,000 networks of cameras.
00:36:42
Speaker
They were reading 2.9 million vehicles a month in 2025. Now, I'm sure that's a lot of repeats. But... It's interesting to me because where where i get lost in all of this is how – like will they have to shut it down in terms of reactivity and start over?
00:37:08
Speaker
i don't think that it's ever going to get to that point. but i don't you're goingnna i don't think you're going to have a like a court order saying that that can't happen. If you look at it on a smaller scale – If I catch someone on my security system cameras, right, and I, well, again, though, it's the selling of it, right? That's what I'm saying. So it's not it's not that they can't collect it. But here's the problem. When 404 Media reports that Flock is developing this product called Nova, that's the public safety data platform.
00:37:50
Speaker
When they report that is being sold to people beyond licensed and sworn individuals,
00:38:00
Speaker
that's fine. But if you're selling my travel pattern and my rewards information, pay me for it. do you think that um Do you know if there's an opt-out?
00:38:12
Speaker
Um, I have not actually been on the platform yet. I don't think there's any way there's not, I would have to like contact them, make myself known and then see if they had my data and then opt out if they did have it. And that's not the way all, I know that's also reactive. So that's not the way that that's not really what I mean though. What I mean is when you have the camera set up, I assume terms of service indicate that, Hey, This camera footage is going to be available in this way, right?
00:38:44
Speaker
Okay, yeah. The software, yeah. And, well, but, like, they have to disclose, like, we there's a possibility we could sell it to whoever we want to.
00:38:55
Speaker
And is it at that point ah the owner of the footage... So the person who's putting out the camera or however it's laid out in the terms of service, they have to um give it like ah basically either consent straight up or implied consent.
00:39:17
Speaker
to have that happen. Right. And so unless the only thing that you could do about it is if everybody opted out all at once and then say, Hey, you're going to have to you know, compensate us for it. But as far as the people on the cameras getting compensated, i don't ever see that happening. Yeah. It's going to have, it's going to have to happen for them to continue to use it because ah and here's it'll it'll happen one way or the other.
00:39:45
Speaker
So,
00:39:48
Speaker
Right now, the Falcon cameras that they're using, it is estimated they have a 15% error rate. And that is resulting in false arrests. aye So those people are starting to be compensated.
00:40:05
Speaker
So we're seeing that kind of play out. um They give an interesting example in here about a couple that's literally just taking their three-year-old granddaughter to a doctor's appointment, and they get pulled over by a bunch of cops. it's all on It's now all out on one of those body camera cameras.
00:40:26
Speaker
channels that you were talking about, but they got a misread from one type of camera and then a hit from another type of camera. And the two things together had mis misread a zero as an o So the second camera actually captured them and the data from their car and attached the person.
00:40:47
Speaker
And it it basically put a NCIC hit together with it and like sent out what is the equivalent of MOLO with a specific car and the cars listed as stolen, even though it's being driven by its registered owners.
00:41:05
Speaker
um They get pulled over and now they're they go viral because it's a terrible traffic stop and the way everything goes down because they literally have no idea what's happening. That sounds like ah that, you know, obviously that's a glitch, but it sounds like they need to have more things, more steps involved there to verify things. I mean, it looked like it from what I could tell, it had at least six steps.
00:41:32
Speaker
Okay, but what I'm saying is, like, you can't, again, they the end of that would be Ebola was issued because ai had probable cause to believe that this was what was happening. And that's not how it is supposed to work.
00:41:51
Speaker
Right. And so the disruption that that's causing i is
00:42:00
Speaker
It's border, I mean, I would say it's violating people's constitutional rights.
Training and Future of AI in Law Enforcement
00:42:05
Speaker
when But it it requires the action to be taken by law enforcement.
00:42:13
Speaker
So it law enforcement needs to be trained. And I think just get the simple statement that AI can't be your probable cause, I think that that could fix a lot of these problems.
00:42:27
Speaker
Right. And, you know, we've had like multiple... um Sort of technological, definitely law enforcement issues over the years. that At one point, Spotify was being linked If you go back further in time, there were groups that were creating private prisons. Cellbrite is a big company that's had controversy over the years. Everybody remembers Edward Snowden and the prison program. Yeah.
00:43:00
Speaker
the stingray phone tracker when it first came out because it created like a cell tower that your phone would connect to they've all had different controversies that are weirdly still slowly making their way through the court i know california ah in the last year or so they made a state law I think in 2024 they made a law that prohibited the sharing of this information flocks collecting, including license plate meter data with federal agencies.
00:43:34
Speaker
And it was revealed in the last year or so that some state and municipal agencies have been sharing it in contrast to state law. Yeah. Which is, it's interesting that you then have the law enforcement breaking the law,
00:43:50
Speaker
Well, that's just me from that that's one of the that's one of the craziest dumpster fires of life, honestly, where you've got the people enforcing the law, breaking the law. And, you know, i personally...
00:44:11
Speaker
i I have to laugh sometimes. I mean, the situations are rarely funny, but I love how you can tell somebody that, like, well, sir, you're actually breaking the law and they have no idea what you're talking about.
00:44:29
Speaker
Like in the case where law enforcement has now broken the law. And, Are you saying that California told, like, you can use it, but you can't share it?
00:44:43
Speaker
Or did they tell, like... They said, one of the statutes in California states that if you're a municipal or state agency of California, so local, county, state, whatever, if you are a accredited law enforcement agency, you can use this material for your investigations.
00:45:05
Speaker
You cannot share the data that's being collected that are parts of your contracts or agreements with federal agencies of any kind. Is that because they want um the federal agency to get its own subscription?
00:45:24
Speaker
No, it i mean it's, it's too, they they've couched it as protecting the data of California citizens. Okay. It's a little confusing that they're able to use it.
00:45:39
Speaker
Correct. Okay. Okay. That's why they, that's why they wrote it in 2024. The bottom line is they didn't like some of the administration's policies in 2024. Okay. And they were looking to hopefully mitigate like problems they had been having. And i I want to say that when I saw it originally, I think it was the IRS that was trying to use it.
00:46:01
Speaker
um I know that I've seen Customs and Border Enforcement out there and ICE enforcement out there that have tried to use that data in California. But I think it was the IRS that like set off a series of lawsuits. And they also had a higher – so because of the population in California, just the number of people and the concentration of those people, they had a higher number of misreads.
00:46:24
Speaker
And the misreads were coming from, I think some of them were coming from NCIC, like where the information was being shared to NCIC. And then when it came back from NCIC, they were like somewhere in there, they were losing the interpretation that would have prevented some of this. And there were several jurisdictions that were forking out five and six figure settlements where people had been stopped and arrested for no good reason.
00:46:51
Speaker
Because they didn't verify. Right. Because they got their probable cause from AI. Correct. And you keep saying that, but that is so true. And that is that is what the problem is. i I regularly have very random conversations with all kinds of different people about the dangers AI. And AI in and of itself is not dangerous. It's the application and it's people's use of it that could be the problem.
00:47:23
Speaker
that's It's always going to be that way. Yeah, they've I've seen... um i've I've been seeing more and more flock information coming our way. We're talking specifically about this particular case because it does it does some wrecking of this guy's life.
00:47:39
Speaker
um the The outcome for him was... ah It's two years later. He's still trying to recover. The bite to his arm i caused some serious injuries. He was doing lawn care at the time and working as a forklift driver. He had trouble continuing on based on his story. He gave up his dogs because he's now scared of dogs.
00:48:04
Speaker
um He was eventually evicted. he sold the truck that he was driving that day because he was not able to keep up the payments on it. um But, you know, his story may be like kind of the outlier at this point, but the real part of it that was a problem, he settles with the police department and the officers. So Toledo Police Department and Officer Adrian Wilson settle with Brandon Upchurch for $35,000. But during this,
00:48:37
Speaker
but during this he made a really poignant statement. And it was, if the officer had done their job, if that camera had worked, I probably still have my house, still have my truck, still have my dog, still have my business, but my life is struck by lightning all because of this camera's misread. It's actually struck by lightning because the officer didn't verify it
00:49:05
Speaker
Right. Right. Which is, and I think, i mean, I think there's going to be a learning curve for that. Don't you? I don't see why on earth anybody would take on a, like, I don't know what it would be, a felony traffic stop for a stolen vehicle without knowing beyond the computer told me so.
00:49:28
Speaker
I mean, I do get where... When you put in to check it yourself, you're relying on a computer as well, but at least you know you put the correct digits in.
00:49:39
Speaker
Now, if it's and a mistake at a different level, that's something else, right? Yeah. the the One of the biggest things, I think, ah with the advancement of AI is...
00:49:55
Speaker
It makes absolutely no difference how much ai technology we have when the data is bad to begin with. And when people don't know how to use it. and so Correct.
00:50:09
Speaker
it's really an interesting thing that's going to probably slam together at some intersection in the future where we're not going to have ai will do so much that we won't have a competent society to actually use it effectively because interesting Because you still have to have, i mean, does it take critical thinking skills to say like, oh, I need to verify that before I act on it? Because to me, it's just common sense.
00:50:47
Speaker
um I think, it you know, we've had this conversation where we need police for certain things. They're largely batting cleanup at this point. And i think it's as i think it's a very stressful job at every level.
00:51:00
Speaker
But I think ultimately the intelligence of, i think it's waning. The in incentiveation oh like the incentivizing police work over the last couple of years, it like was huge during the pandemic. I sat in on so many city council meetings where they were upping and upping and upping the pay to keep officers on the job and to retain officers.
00:51:25
Speaker
And they... they sort of priced out an entire city near me. It's not my city, next city over. um they They priced out like the entire city because now it's budget time.
00:51:40
Speaker
They can't like retain everyone they have on the police force, and they don't have good police because of how they were desperate to retain People who ultimately wanted to leave, they should have let them go.
00:51:55
Speaker
They should have let those guys go. And the smart ones did leave. They went on and they're doing other things. They work in private security. They went to work for government agencies that were not the local police. And like we have trouble keeping smart cops around to begin with.
00:52:11
Speaker
And now we also have trouble keeping smart cops who are up to date on technology around. I was going to say, I'm going to be completely honest here and say, if you're smart, you're typically not a police officer.
00:52:30
Speaker
well Because you realize what you're doing and you're like, ah yeah, I don't want to do that anymore. Right. Right. Yeah, i you know I don't have a lot on this yet. It's interesting because when I look at it all, ah i I wonder, like do we even understand what's happening?
00:52:55
Speaker
with I don't think so, based on the article. Because, i mean, he says something really poignant, and he blames it on AI. Right.
00:53:07
Speaker
Right. But it's not AI's fault. Well, he blames it on the camera. Well, right. But you're right. It's the officer's fault. and i think he But I think in his heart, he knows that because he went to, like, whatever lawyer he got that guided him through the settlement process, which I think he settled too low, but it's neither here nor there.
00:53:26
Speaker
um he He focuses on the police department and the officer. So at least that part was correct. What are you going to do? Sue a camera? Right, right. oh No, you would sue the company that owns the camera, and or the company that's contracting the camera, is what I'm saying.
00:53:43
Speaker
Well, and see, something like that, like, that might get somewhere, ah but that is going to be a gigantic feat as far as...
00:53:54
Speaker
Right. And I don't think it's going to be about a settlement either, do you? it's going to be about the use of the camera. Right. But I'm saying that this is a situation, I'm sure we've all come across these situations, where you've got, I'm not saying, I'm going to be neutral here. I'm not going to take a position. All I'm saying is, you've got a company who has laid the foundation and the pathway and the connection to have this ah data and information, which is the footage coming in from the cameras, right?
00:54:28
Speaker
And then they do what they want with it. And you're in a situation where they basically said, we're not going to ask for permission, but we'll, you know, we'll apologize. if Right.
00:54:43
Speaker
Or they may not apologize. I don't know, but they didn't ask for permission to do this. And in order to get all that untangled, it would take like so much litigation that I don't see happening.
00:54:59
Speaker
Like from any perspective. If you go back and look at like sell bright, prism Like the litigation went on. The litigation just wasn't as shiny and interesting as like the big scandal surrounding those things.
00:55:16
Speaker
But the litigation basically said you have to have someone who's responsible for this. And ultimately, some things they put on a judge. They put on your local judge. And like, you know, wherever you're sitting right now listening to this, someone in your...
00:55:31
Speaker
jurisdiction has the ability to sign paperwork for your home to be searched, for you to be arrested. um That varies like depending on the seriousness of the situation.
00:55:43
Speaker
So if it's just for you to be arrested, it could be that it's a magistrate. And an officer who believes that you've committed a crime can take you before that magistrate, and they can decide whether or not to detain you. And at some point, you have to see at least a district court judge, or maybe a circuit court. i think some places still have justice court.
00:56:00
Speaker
So you may be seeing a justice of the peace or another magistrate. But like you have to see someone who's going to decide that you're held there. If someone wants to go through your home or your car or listen to your phone or get your bank records, phone records, medical records, that has to go before typically a superior court judge.
00:56:16
Speaker
So Somebody is going to have to be on the hook for this, and I think you're right. I think the litigation isn't going to be about money. It's going to be about whether or not we're violating Fourth or Fourteenth Amendment rights of innocent people.
00:56:28
Speaker
Well, the connection – so a company, in essence, sense can't – ah like FLOC can't violate people's rights. They can, but the selling of it to law enforcement is where that comes in right? Right.
00:56:43
Speaker
right Correct. Because only state actors can violate people's constitutional rights. If somebody tells you to shut up, you can't use the first amendment as a defense to why you're not shutting up because, you know, that doesn't apply there. you know,
00:57:00
Speaker
the state tells you to shut up, then they're violating your rights, right? Yeah. So and it it's free it... It goes back to what you said. You said the use of information right is where the rights get violated. So whoever is physically using that information is the person that's... And potentially their agency.
00:57:22
Speaker
They're the ones who are potentially violating the rights. Right. And I think that... It's going to be a fine line because of, like, public space versus, you know, the privacy of your own home versus, you know, is the whole camera system just a gigantic tip jar?
00:57:45
Speaker
oh Well, yeah I mean, kind of. It kind of is right now. And um I think you're onto something there. And I'll say it this way, because I think this is the way it all shakes out in the end, just to like make a prediction. I don't think it'll be one of these innocent people, unless there's like a shooting of an innocent person.
00:58:03
Speaker
I don't think it'll be them that change how these cameras and the other systems relate into all of this. and And that's everything. That's not just the Flock safety cameras, but the other things they're talking about, the other companies that compete with Flock, all of those type things. I think where that'll really come to a head litigation-wise won't be a civil suit.
00:58:22
Speaker
It will be when a murderer gets off the hook because the police misused whatever they used to track him down and arrest him.
00:58:33
Speaker
Or as, you know, that's their key piece of evidence in a crime, whether it's somehow his audio or his video or his license plate or whatever, that'll be the moment that it actually makes its way to the Supreme Court. And we're probably three to five years from that, even being a thought, let alone happening. was going to say, like keep in mind, though, you've got to have a defense attorney that raises that.
00:58:56
Speaker
Right. yourre your Well, Not only raises it, but gets an objection from a judge in a way that like it has a reason to go to be an issue on appeal when they review the trial de novo, and then to move on from there. The appeals court has to rule against it so that it then goes to the you know state Supreme Court or whatever, and then moves on to the federal courts so that the Supreme Court can eventually get hold of it. It's a long process.
00:59:19
Speaker
Right, and so that would be like 20 years from now, right? Correct. If it gets in the pipeline now, which it's not seeing that I know of. I'm saying the pipeline problem would be sometime in the next three to five years. right Exactly. that's what Yeah, I understood that. yeah And that's where it starts, but we won't you know like we won't see the outcome for years, which is interesting because it means it's really just a big cha-ching for Flock in the meantime and all their competitors.
00:59:46
Speaker
like They're just going to clean up on that um collection of data and sale of data. We might actually see the sale of data being ruled on before the use of like information.
00:59:57
Speaker
Um, but I like, again, still three to five years out minimum. I don't have a lot more on this right
Treasure Hunter Tommy Thompson's Legal Battle
01:00:03
Speaker
now. This is just a topic that's interesting to me in terms i have endless amounts of information on this topic.
01:00:11
Speaker
Oh, I could talk, I could talk on this all day. Um, but I had one more thing I wanted to bring up and unless do you have something else on this right now? No, no not, not, not right now. So you and i back 2023, we did a really deep dive into a story, read a bunch of books, talked to a lot of people. We published it in the podcast feed over multiple episodes in the fall of 2023.
01:00:36
Speaker
They all start with the words deep gold, the episodes that we did on that. We either did six episodes or eight episodes. um It's a pretty fascinating story.
01:00:49
Speaker
That story is about a guy named Tommy Gregory Thompson. To sort of synopsize what we talked about and all of that, um first of all, you should go back and listen to it. It's fantastic. It's one of my favorite series that we've done.
01:01:02
Speaker
It's really good. i I really appreciated how you put it together with the historical. It's just an interesting integration of things.
01:01:14
Speaker
Right. And, and like, you know, it was, I love the water. I love the ocean. i'm fascinated by treasure hunters. Tommy Gregory Thompson is a treasure hunter. He was known for a lot of really interesting, innovative stuff that he did in the discovery of the wreck of the SS Central America back in the eighties.
01:01:34
Speaker
um He wrote a book with, uh, uh, largely telling that story. um He had discovered it in 1988, but it took him a few years to get legal authorization to salvage the wreck. He had to raise money. He lost a lot of money.
01:01:52
Speaker
um he created ah this interesting ah RCV called the Nemo. he used... Somebody else's ship to get out there that he had purchased for somebody else's money. so a lot going on. From my understanding, there's a three-part mini-series out there called Curse Gold, a shipwrecked scandal. That came out.
01:02:13
Speaker
about a year after we did that series sometime in the next year or so. And that story is largely ah coming to a head now. But the gist of what we were talking about, which is, I'm going to say this in just a couple paragraphs, but there's a lot more to it.
01:02:29
Speaker
um He, Tommy Talentin, recovers this gold. um He sold it for $52 million. In 2009, he had an offshore account in the Cook Islands valued at around $4 or $5 million.
01:02:43
Speaker
But in 2013, the us s District Court for the Southern District of Ohio, they issue an arrest warrant for Tommy Thompson. And this is because the people that had given him money over the years all sued him.
01:02:58
Speaker
And it was a lot of people. He ends up in civil contempt and he fails to appear. An additional arrest warrant is issued for criminal contempt. And...
01:03:09
Speaker
They basically send the U.S. Marshals after him. And in 2015, he is arrested along with his ah with a cohort named the Allison Louise Anticare.
01:03:21
Speaker
They're arrested in a West Palm Beach hotel. He agrees in November 2018 to surrender four or five hundred gold coins that were made from the wrecked salvage or salvaged from it.
01:03:35
Speaker
But he claims he doesn't have access to them at the time. This could be because of some shady money dealings. And in November of 2018, a jury awards his investors $19.4 million dollars in compensatory damages.
01:03:49
Speaker
And i think maybe three or four that goes to the dispatch printing company. They had put up like. a million and some dollars towards this.
01:04:02
Speaker
And then 16 of that is going to be divided up among other investors. So April 2015. Put it into a receivership, right?
01:04:13
Speaker
Right. At that point in time, they put it into a receivership to compensate those other investors. The reason all this is happening is because back in April 2015, out ah a case that he had failed to appear for.
01:04:28
Speaker
He gets sentenced to two years in jail. He gets a fine of $250,000. That plea bargain had required him to answer questions about the whereabouts of 500 gold coins.
01:04:42
Speaker
He refused to do this. And the reasons for refusing to do this varied. Some of it were maybe there's some shady money stuff and some weird people in Belize that have taken it as compensation for something else. Maybe he's got some kind of short-term memory loss.
01:05:00
Speaker
Maybe he's just forgotten where he put them Maybe he put him someplace he can't get back to. But since December 2015, Tommy Thompson's been in jail. He's ultimately held kind of indefinitely on that original civil contempt.
01:05:18
Speaker
And what's interesting is his two-year sentence for criminal contempt for refusing to answer questions is not being told. Being served, yeah.
01:05:29
Speaker
Right. Yeah, he's not serving it at that time. It's being told. So T-O-L-L-E-D, told, means he has to finish his civil contempt sentence, which seemed indefinite, before he can start his criminal contempt.
01:05:47
Speaker
Right. And so he was being held in civil contempt because of a portion of his plea bargain was cooperation in the civil suit. Correct.
01:05:59
Speaker
Okay. Right. So December 19th, 2020, multiple people talked about him for a minute, and that was because it was the fifth anniversary of the conviction of this sort of disaster that had unfolded with the, both the civil and then the criminal contempt. ah contempt um The lawyers for the different parties all had a moment in the spotlight and they talked about, well, he'll get out as soon as he like releases the missing funds.
01:06:32
Speaker
This was all done to be like a course of compliance method to get him to, comply with the court and to comply with the judgments and the convictions.
01:06:43
Speaker
By February 2025, after the release of our series, U.S. District Judge Algernon Marbley, he agreed that it was time for Tommy Thompson's civil contempt charge to be over.
01:06:56
Speaker
Specifically, he said he was no longer convinced that further incarceration would be likely to coerce that compliance I talked about. He did, however, order that Tommy Thompson immediately start serving his two-year sentence that he had received for a related criminal contempt charge.
01:07:16
Speaker
That had been told or delayed like the whole time that this civil contempt was going on. We have news. We have very interesting news that Meg and I wanted to share with you.
01:07:28
Speaker
And that is March 4th, 2026th.
01:07:33
Speaker
Tommy Thompson was finally released from prison after serving more than 10 years. i thought that was a big deal. It is a big deal. That whole case is insane.
01:07:46
Speaker
Yeah, this is and you know, we aired this not really knowing where the true crime came in. there's certainly some things about the legal process.
01:07:58
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. This was more about the accusations that had been levied against him because he was certainly accused of crimes. He was also accused of, you know, violating both civil and criminal agreements um in terms of how he was supposed to comply and cooperate with the adjudication.
01:08:18
Speaker
But it was just such a fascinating story to talk about. you know This ship went down so long ago. And again, i point people back to deep gold because I'm not going to go into the whole thing here. But the SS Central America, which had originally been the SS George Law, it was launched in October of 1852.
01:08:38
Speaker
And within five years, like like just a couple weeks before its fifth anniversary on the sea, it sank on September 12, 1857. had been laden with and it had been laden with 9.1 tons of gold that had been prospected during the California gold rush.
01:08:57
Speaker
That is a huge deal. Um, the fact that we're still talking about it in 2026 and it's sort of been recovered and like, there's all these interesting facets to it. it made for a great series with deep gold.
01:09:13
Speaker
Um, but you and I were texting when this happened and what did you think that he's now been released? Um, It's about time. he's right It really is. I mean, it's the it's the craziest story because you've got this guy that was a dreamer and inventor actually, like, getting, you know, accomplishing a goal, which was to find the ship and then find a way to get the gold off the ship. and then all of a sudden, i think it said as soon as he got back from his trip, like, finally finding it, that...
01:09:51
Speaker
Like the vultures started circling. I mean, he was sued repeatedly ah by all kinds of people that, you know, they had paid out claims to the passengers on the ship because there were survivors from the shipwreck.
01:10:06
Speaker
Right. Yeah. there Yeah. There was this crazy. insurance company connection. he basically stepped off on the dock and got hit with so many lawsuits. It was like, I want to say like 85, like immediately. Yeah, yeah it was 85. I think it ballooned to like 320.
01:10:24
Speaker
My position on that was he lost his mind because he was a dreamer essentially. I mean, he was a very smart dreamer, inventive dreamer, resourceful dreamer. he,
01:10:38
Speaker
Like people had invested in him basically. And I couldn't figure out like, besides it would be very overwhelming to come back from accomplishing your dream. And all of a sudden, all these people who did nothing, they want what you've, they want the spoils of your work.
01:11:00
Speaker
Right. yeah And I think that that's where his brain just broke because Based on the whole story, which, again, you'd have to go back and listen to our coverage of that.
01:11:14
Speaker
It's November of 23, right? Deep gold. October, November. Yeah, basically runs from Halloween to Christmas in 2023. Okay. And we cover we talk all about this.
01:11:25
Speaker
But it doesn't really make a whole lot of sense based on sort of the facts that are laid out that he didn't – ah that he didn't get all the gold, do something with a gold, pay everybody off. Right.
01:11:41
Speaker
It's a weird situation. And I'm telling you, it's because his brain was broken when he came back and he realized that like, I can't even really, i don't know that there was a catch all phrase for it, but it's like when you realize that, that thing that you've been working so hard for,
01:12:04
Speaker
like you could have worked really, really hard or did nothing at all. And it would have turned out the same. Yeah. Yeah. it's He almost like ends up in it's almost like a catatonia that he, that he ends up in where he he's in a state that like, i think you would feel kind of worthless that nothing you did worked.
01:12:32
Speaker
I think that's why everybody wanted to take it away from him. Right, right. And that would definitely make you paranoid. It would make you distrustful. um And i think I think ultimately, there was a level of fame that came with all this starting in the late 80s and sort of in certain circles, at least.
01:12:55
Speaker
rising to that bell curve. And I don't think, I think the top of that where Tommy Thompson was sort of peaking as being this like Indiana Jones style figure in certain circles, I think it contributed to that as well. i don't think he ever wanted that. He he really just wanted to hunt treasure, find treasure, live with treasure.
01:13:22
Speaker
That's what he wanted. Right. There were business people involved along the way that, like, if they look real hard and honestly at themselves... they share like some of this fault or responsibility.
01:13:38
Speaker
um There's a lot of people along the way that were pretty helpful. And i you know I tried talking to all of them. We did not know at the time that we were covering it that the documentary was being shot and the post-production began as we like put our episodes out. And we had tried to talk to quite a few people and they did not want to talk to us at the time. But then called like a year later and they're like, okay, we're ready to talk now that the documentary is coming out. And I wish I had timed that a little better because I think we would have gotten at least three people. It would have been cool to have their side of the story. um i ultimately ended up declining because just doing pre-interviews with them and kind of talking, and I'm i'm not going to name who they are, but I just felt like part of me realized
01:14:25
Speaker
what might be wrong with Tommy Thompson was everybody around him wanted something. Because all those people wanted something, fame or money or power or something.
01:14:36
Speaker
and And I don't really do well with that idea. Well, right. And it broke him. And I believe he's 73 years old at this point. I could be wrong. That sounds right to me, I think. Yeah. Right. And he spent the last 10 years, um over 10 years. He's 73 now.
01:14:55
Speaker
He spent over 10 years in jail for a clause in a criminal plea agreement, essentially. That came from civil agreement. that Okay, so we don't have debtors prison in the United States. Yeah, he did not cooperate, and he failed to appear after not cooperating for civil proceedings and was judged by... so basically, they had to go and get him.
01:15:23
Speaker
So they were holding him in civil contempt over that, but it became criminal contempt when they essentially adjudicated him a liar for violating the civil agreement.
01:15:37
Speaker
He has been held in civil contempt this whole time. Right. But he had a two-year sentence that he was going to be doing for the failure to appear. thanks That was the crime that was criminal contempt. Because failure to appear in and of itself is not a crime.
01:15:55
Speaker
It when you continue to fail to appear. You typically don't get two years for it. Correct. This was very unusual. Right. And on top of that, one of the things that came out in the order from February 2025 was that he had been levied $1,000 a day fine. And when i looked at it in the order, they had calculated it to the day, and it was something like $3.4 million. Right.
01:16:21
Speaker
right And then on top of that, they still expected him to participate in the recovery of the gold. He just he was either deep in a catatonic state or psychosis or something, or he is the most patient man on the planet.
01:16:40
Speaker
I think that it was out of his – I think that the whole believes in and trust thing, I don't believe it. I think somebody conned him out of it. And I don't think he has the details to give him. This is my own personal opinion. i think if he could have done anything, he would have because he's an explorer who's been stuck in jail for 10 years or over 10 years.
01:17:07
Speaker
And if he had the information, why wouldn't he have given it up? The other thing is, will they hold him again and civil contempt if he doesn't pay that fine?
01:17:20
Speaker
I do not know the answer to that question, but I am. But it's on the same level now, right? It is. i I don't, yeah, I think maybe at this point, I think he served his time for anything they could do to him related to this particular set of accusations. Well, and my whole point with, but you know, besides the fact that it's a super fascinating story with regard to what initially happened to the ship, what happened when Tommy Thompson was ah searching for it, all that's very interesting.
01:17:55
Speaker
But the reason, like, we sort of told all that was because it was very interesting that, you know, 2023, that this, you know,
01:18:09
Speaker
terrible situation could be happening. Right. And nobody was doing anything about it essentially because he shouldn't have been in jail like he was. That was ridiculous.
01:18:23
Speaker
Yeah. And I think, I think you may, you started to make a comment here that you've made before. And that is that like, we don't have a debt debtor's prison and like, you're not supposed to be able to do that to people.
01:18:34
Speaker
No, he should not be. Well, honestly, what should have happened was the plea agreement for the criminal charge should not have included anything to do with the civil charge. Perhaps they wouldn't make that agreement. And so in that case, he should have gone to trial for his criminal charges as opposed to making the plea.
01:18:56
Speaker
Because when he made the plea, that's when they had that leverage and they did it on purpose. But if he had gone to trial, it would have ended one way or the other. But he's out.
01:19:07
Speaker
He is out. He walked free March 4th. And i wanted to share that with people because um i definitely like when stories that we cover have ah at least an ending to the questions we had, even if it doesn't end the entire story.
01:19:22
Speaker
And it doesn't answer of our questions. It answered quite a few of them, and he did get out. Well, and that was what I really wanted to happen. I really wanted him to have freedom again because that whole saga and how how much research we did on it and everything, it made me feel like more powerless than i think possibly any situation I've ever looked into.
01:19:50
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah, there was a, that, and it's weird because you and I cover so many terrible things that happen to people, but that one was a situation that, I think powerless is a good word, he had lost control of his own life.
01:20:11
Speaker
by simply living what is essentially a childhood dream. And I think there's a lot of people that have dreams like that and they're they're like, they live their life toward that goal. Maybe they, you know, take turns along the way, but they're ultimately trying to achieve something. but just They want to go to space. They want to be a lawyer. They want to be a teacher. They want to be a doctor. He wanted to be a treasure hunter and became one of the greatest treasure hunters of our time.
01:20:44
Speaker
yeah Anything else on Tommy Thompson? Nope. I hope that he has a peaceful rest of his life. Yeah. So glad you got out, dude.
01:20:57
Speaker
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Speaker
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Speaker
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01:22:21
Speaker
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