Five IMPD Officers Charged as State begins enforcing surveillance policies.

Marion County Prosecutor Ryan Mears called it “just the beginning.”

On Wednesday, September 23, his office charged five Indianapolis Metropolitan Police officers with turning the city’s Flock license-plate network into a private lookup. The Washington Post — the paper that first asked IMPD about one officer’s thousands of hits — got the confession in public: “A lot of this was initiated by The Washington Post.” Axios Indianapolis and the Indianapolis Star filled in the names. ABC News put the stalking counts on a national wire.

This is not a policy memo. It is five charging documents.

The names

All five are accused of fraud and official misconduct. One is accused of stalking. These are allegations in court. They are also the clearest Indiana proof yet that a plate camera is only as honest as the person with the password.

• Michael Rogers, 16 years on the job. Three counts each of fraud and official misconduct. Accused of thousands of improper searches. The Post had already reported he appeared to track plates tied to his wife and two acquaintances — 3,759 lookups over ten months, about twelve a day.
• Jonathan Schultz, 18 years. Twenty-six counts: stalking, fraud, official misconduct. Prosecutors say more than 1,000 plates, including women he met in public, then engineered encounters. WISH-TV reported the affidavit: he allegedly told one woman he was an FBI agent running surveillance in a parking lot. Eleven people in all, seven of them women.
• Cassandra Crawley, seven years. Eight counts each of fraud and official misconduct. Hundreds of improper searches alleged.
• Matthew Binford, four years. One count each of fraud and official misconduct. The Star says the affidavit has him searching an ex-wife’s plate 1,012 times between September 2024 and April 2025, plus his own plate 149 times. Reasons logged: “stolen,” “carjacking,” “parole,” and single letters. She told detectives she already knew. She had asked him.
• Abigail Cramer, five years. Six counts each of fraud and official misconduct. Hundreds of improper searches alleged. She resigned.

Chief Tanya Terry suspended the four who remain and recommended termination. “These individuals’ actions went far beyond a clerical error or a violation of department policy,” she said. “These actions crossed into criminal conduct and shook the foundation of trust that our agency is built upon.”

IMPD says the alleged misuse happened before the August rewrite that requires a case or incident number on every search. The rewrite arrived after the Post called. The charges arrived after the audit the call forced.

Southern Indiana already knew the shape

Jackson County did not wait for Marion County’s press conference. Former deputy Skylar Thompson was already charged after 2,055 lookups of one plate under a duty the sheriff says he never had. Chesterton killed its contract. Goshen showed up in the EFF LMAO logs. 404 Media showed person detection on the device. Greene still has the five-year bill.

The map

• Washington Post
• Axios
• IndyStar charges
• IndyStar Binford
• WISH-TV
• FOX59
• Cities dropping Flock
• ACLU of Indiana
• Eyes Off Indiana
• Have I Been Flocked
• EFF LMAO
• 404 Media leak
• Lawrence petition
• Greene petition
• Flock Block Indiana

Greene County Council can still tell itself the five-year contract is about stolen trucks. Marion County just charged five officers for using the same stack on spouses, exes, and strangers at the gym. The difference is not the vendor. The difference is who finally read the log.