Former Polk County, Georgia officer arrested for misusing Cedartown PD's Flock license-plate system via task-force access

On August 7, 2026, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation arrested and charged former Polk County Police Department Officer Tracey Royston, 51, of Cedartown, Georgia, with four misdemeanor counts of misuse of a license plate reader system, booking her into the Polk County Jail. Royston had been detached to the Northwest Georgia Drug Task Force, a multi-agency unit managed by the GBI, and that assignment gave her access to the Cedartown Police Department's Flock Safety automated license-plate-reader system -- a different department's system than her own employer, Polk County PD. The GBI's preliminary investigation found Royston accessed the Cedartown system multiple times between 2024 and 2025 for purposes unrelated to law enforcement.

The Polk County Police Department asked the GBI to investigate on July 31, 2026, after allegations surfaced involving the Cedartown Police Department's Flock system. The GBI said the case remains active and ongoing and, once complete, will be referred to the Tallapoosa Judicial Circuit District Attorney's Office for prosecution. Royston is among a string of north Georgia law-enforcement officers accused of Flock misuse in 2026, with recent cases also reported in Coweta, Habersham, Fayette, Rockdale, Cherokee, and DeKalb counties.

The case illustrates a variant on the pattern the archive tracks under officer misuse of license-plate-reader systems: task-force and mutual-aid arrangements that grant officers access to a partner agency's surveillance data extend the pool of people who can misuse that data beyond the owning department's own personnel and its own internal audit process.