BREAKING: El Dorado City Attorney Warned Mayor and Police Chief They Were Violating Arkansas Transparency Laws — Now They Threaten Investigator with Arrest
“We are not the custodian of Flock data.”
BREAKING: El Dorado City Attorney Warned Mayor and Police Chief They Were Violating Arkansas Transparency Laws — Now They Threaten Investigator with Arrest
El Dorado, Arkansas — A stunning new development has emerged in the ongoing transparency battle between the City of El Dorado and legal investigator Chief Elder Ean Bordeaux. Internal emails obtained by this outlet reveal that City Attorney Robert Rushing explicitly warned Mayor Paul Choate and Police Chief Chad Roberts that their handling of public records requests violated Arkansas law.
Despite that warning, the El Dorado Police Department escalated its response. They threatened Bordeaux with criminal arrest for simply demanding compliance with state transparency laws.
This is not a dispute about policy. This is a municipal government caught violating the law, warned by its own attorney, and then choosing intimidation over accountability.
The City Attorney’s Warning That Changed Everything
On March 19, 2026, City Attorney Robert Rushing sent an email to all city custodians that fundamentally undermined the entire position El Dorado PD had been taking.
Rushing wrote:
“The statute provides for the request of copies, not just access to view a record.”
“A citizen may request a copy… in any medium in which the record is readily available or readily convertible.”
“Most all offices have the ability to scan documents… The digital copy could then be emailed.”
“The statute puts the burden on the City to comply.”
This was not a casual suggestion. This was the city’s own legal counsel explicitly telling the mayor and police chief that they were wrong. Electronic records must be produced. Scanning and email delivery are standard. The city bears the legal burden of compliance.
The warning was crystal clear.
What Happened After the Warning
You would expect a city to correct course after receiving legal guidance from its own attorney.
Instead, El Dorado PD doubled down.
After receiving Rushing’s email, Lieutenant Trey Phillips continued to claim that records did not exist, despite internal documents showing otherwise. Phillips continued to refuse electronic production. He continued to claim that El Dorado PD was not the custodian of Flock records, even though department emails showed officers coordinating installation, accessing the system, and running searches.
When Bordeaux persisted in demanding compliance with Arkansas FOIA, Phillips sent an email threatening criminal charges under Arkansas Code 5-71-209, the state’s harassing communications statute.
The threat was explicit. If Bordeaux continued to enforce statutory compliance with state transparency laws, El Dorado PD would seek a warrant for his arrest.
Let that sink in. A police department threatened to arrest a legal investigator for doing his job, ensuring that the city follows the law its own attorney said it was violating.
The False Narrative El Dorado PD Is Pushing
Throughout this email chain, the department has pushed a story that simply does not hold up. The core claims are:
“We had no policy governing Flock, so nothing we did was wrong.”
A police department that acquires a surveillance system is still bound by the Fourth Amendment, Arkansas state law (specifically Arkansas Code 12-12-1803, which restricts ALPR use to ongoing investigations), Flock Safety’s own Terms of Service that require participating agencies to have written policies, and federal civil rights law.
When a department operates surveillance technology without a governing policy, it does not mean the officers had unlimited authority. It means every search is presumptively improper, undocumented, and unaccountable. That is not a defense. It is an admission of systemic failure.
“Flock is just like a police officer visually checking a license plate.”
This is false. A police officer glancing at a tag while driving is not the same as a system that captures license plates automatically, records GPS location data and timestamps, stores that data for 30 days, allows retrospective searches, enables searches across multiple networks and jurisdictions, and creates a digital map of movement.
The department’s own emails disprove this. Records show El Dorado PD coordinated installation with Flock’s Project Management Office, attended Flock mapping calls, approved camera locations, received daily deployment status reports, added personnel as system administrators, controlled user access and search permissions, and executed searches and viewed images.
If you control access, manage placement, receive operational updates, and use the system for investigations, you are a custodian of the records generated by that use. The department cannot claim it had no control while simultaneously exercising control.
The City Attorney’s Email: A Smoking Gun
The most damaging piece of evidence in this entire exchange is the email from City Attorney Rushing.
After receiving that email, the mayor did not retract his illegal $5,000 fee demand. The police chief did not begin producing records. Lieutenant Phillips continued to claim that records did not exist.
The city had its own lawyer telling them they were breaking the law. They ignored him.
The Threat of Arrest: Crossing a Line
When Lieutenant Phillips wrote that the police department “may seek a warrant for your arrest for harassing communications,” he was not just being aggressive. He was misusing criminal statutes to chill protected legal activity.
FOIA enforcement communications are not harassment. They are protected actions taken in the course of statutory compliance. Threatening criminal charges to deter a lawful FOIA request is a misuse of police power, retaliation for exercising statutory rights, potential witness intimidation, and an unconstitutional attempt to chill transparency.
This threat did not stop Bordeaux. It became Exhibit A in the litigation record.
What the Law Actually Requires
The Arkansas Freedom of Information Act is not complicated. It requires a three-business-day response window, production of electronic records in electronic format when requested, no fees for labor, scanning, or overhead, rolling production of records as they become available, and custodians to forward requests when they are not the proper custodian.
El Dorado violated every single one of these provisions.
The mayor demanded a $5,000 cashier’s check to hire temporary staff for scanning, a fee explicitly prohibited by Arkansas Code 25-19-105(d)(3)(A). The city and police department refused electronic production. The city missed statutory deadlines, failed to issue lawful delay notices, and never began rolling production.
These are not technicalities. They are the core of the statute.
What Happens Next
Chief Elder Ean Bordeaux has now issued formal litigation hold notices, demanding preservation of all records. He has submitted invoices for investigative labor caused by the city’s non-compliance. He has warned that he will proceed with filing for declaratory judgment, injunctive relief, and fee recovery.
The city’s own attorney warned them they were violating the law. They chose to threaten arrest instead.
The court of public opinion is already paying attention. The previous piece on El Dorado’s corruption laid the groundwork. This escalation, from legal warning to arrest threat, is the kind of story that does not fade away.
Rena Borden, the original FOIA requester, has authorized litigation. Her email states plainly:
“I can provide multiple FOIA requests demonstrating that the mayor has been dishonest regarding public records, including matters related to Crime Stoppers.”
This is not going away. The city had a chance to correct course when its own attorney told them they were wrong. They chose a different path.
The Bottom Line
El Dorado PD is pushing a narrative that collapses under the weight of its own documents.
No policy does not mean no limits. It means no accountability.
Flock is not just a camera on a pole. It is a surveillance system that courts are increasingly treating as requiring a warrant.
The city attorney already told them they were violating the law.
Threatening an investigator with arrest for demanding transparency is not a defense. It is evidence.
This matter is now heading to court. The city’s own emails will be entered into the record. And the question a judge will ask is simple: why did your own attorney have to tell you what the law was, and why did you ignore him?
That is a question El Dorado is going to have to answer.
ALL Power to The People.
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