FAITHWIRE/Steve Warren-
A San Jose, California church still locked in a years-long legal battle with Santa Clara County officials over $1.2 million in fines for violating COVID-19 pandemic restrictions, alleges the county government conducted unconstitutional surveillance and tracked its members on the church’s property using their cell phones.
The federal lawsuit, filed Tuesday in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California, on behalf of Calvary Chapel and its Pastor Mike McClure by attorneys with the nonprofit Advocates for Faith and Freedom claims the county and Denver-based data company SafeGraph “embarked on an invasive and warrantless geofencing operation to track residents in the County.”
“Our church believes in the rights and privacy of all our members,” Pastor McClure said in a statement to CBN News. “We are not just standing up for the rights of our church family; we are standing up for the rights of religious people across this country.”
The complaint alleges the county and the company violated the Fourth Amendment protecting individuals’ privacy, as well as the free exercise and establishment clauses of the First Amendment. It also accuses the county of seeking “to punish Calvary for exercising their religious rights in violation of the County’s draconian orders,” according to Bloomberg Law.
“Geofencing is a location-based tool used by the government to track individuals through their cell phone data. This tool is generally used in police investigations of criminal activity and requires the government to obtain a warrant which is limited by time and scope,” according to court documents. Continue reading..
