Criminal investigators can use your phone to track you, NJ court rules

🔴 Decision allows New Jersey police to use a "geofence warrant"

🔴 Involves a case of armed robbery in Milltown

🔴 Judge disagrees, says it turns Google into "an arm of law enforcement"

MILLTOWN — A narrow appeals court ruling gives more power to New Jersey detectives who want to use cell phones to place suspects at crime scenes.

On Tuesday, the Appellate Division ruled that law enforcement can use geofence warrants to track potential suspects and witnesses in investigations.

While the New York Times reports that geofence warrants have been used since 2016, this is the first time a higher New Jersey court has grappled with whether they are constitutional.

Get our free mobile app

Armed robbery in Milltown

Tuesday's decision approves investigators' use of location data to link a suspect to a March 16, 2022 armed robbery at a Millton gas station.

Court documents said the robber held a handgun to a female clerk's neck, punched her several times, and threw her to the ground. He got away with $673.

The suspect was later identified as Van Salter, according to court documents.

A geofence warrant found that Salter's cell phone was at the gas station during the 14 minutes when the robbery took place, according to court documents.

What are geofence warrants?

Cell phones constantly track location data, which can be useful for navigation or exercise apps. That data has also been useful for law enforcement for nearly a decade.

Geofence warrants allow detectives to demand that cell phone providers, including Google, provide detectives access to that information.

Investigators can see any device near the crime scene during a specific time. Using that information, they can work backwards to figure out who owns the device and identify possible suspects.

In Salter's case, the female clerk at the gas station said to police that before the robbery, she had heard the robber speaking to someone who was not there.

The clerk assumed her attacker was speaking on the phone using earbuds, which police used to obtain a geofence warrant and search Google's database.

Judge dissents in cell phone tracking case

Only Superior Court Judge Katie Gummer dissented in the 2-1 decision.

She said the police obtained their warrant through several assumptions, including that he had a phone; it was a smartphone; it was linked to Google; and he had it on him at the time of the robbery.

Detectives argued that most people have smartphones and that's enough to establish probable cause. But Gummer said that was a "leap too far."

"If we accept that standard, Google, and every other cell-phone service provider, effectively would be turned into an arm of law enforcement," Gummer said.

Report a correction 👈 | 👉 Contact our newsroom