(The Center Square) – Georgia’s child welfare agency no longer has its Chevrolet Traverse spy vehicle, bought with nearly $955,000 in taxpayer money and equipped with a powerful cell phone surveillance tool.
On Tuesday, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, a statewide law enforcement agency, took the keys, GBI spokeswoman Sara Lue confirmed for The Center Square.
State officials will not explain the reasons for the handover, or who ordered it. The vehicle handover happened eight days after The Center Square first reported that the state Department of Human Services, which oversees child protective services, bought a 2026 SUV at a cost of $38,700, but paid nearly $916,000 extra to have a cell-site simulator installed.
That’s a device typically used by law enforcement that impersonates a cell phone tower to trick phones in its vicinity into connecting, allowing an operator to track phone locations and potentially intercept calls and texts. Human Services is a social services agency tasked with investigating alleged child abuse and managing the foster care system, and several lawmakers questioned whether it should be wielding a stealth tool that requires a judge to sign off on a search warrant.
What few pieces of information The Center Square obtained on Wednesday conflicted. A spokesman for Gov. Brian Kemp, Carter Chapman, suggested child services never took possession of the Traverse, but when The Center Square asked about contrary information from a Carfax report, he refused to communicate further.
Lue said she didn’t know the reason GBI took possession of the vehicle, or where it was picked up from, but would try to find out. The Department of Human Services, which oversees the Division of Family and Children Services, did not respond at all on Wednesday to emails or phone calls seeking comment for this story.
Lue did say that the GBI will pay for the vehicle, presumably reimbursing Human Services for the total $954,578 cost of the Traverse and the installed surveillance equipment.
While the GBI said it took possession of the Chevrolet Traverse on Tuesday, Chapman emailed a statement shared earlier with an Atlanta TV station, indicating Human Services never took possession of the cell phone spying tool.
“The state has not taken delivery of the vehicle and GBI will take possession upon delivery and be responsible for the operation of the vehicle,” the statement from Kemp’s office said.
But a purchase order for the Chevy, obtained by The Center Square through a public records request, is dated April 27. The Center Square also ran a Carfax report with the Traverse’s VIN number, found in a transaction record. The Carfax report says the Georgia “Motor Vehicle Dept.” purchased the vehicle on May 21, with a warranty starting that same day, and with a title issued on May 26.
Asked to explain the discrepancy, Chapman, of the governor’s office, wrote back, “I’d refer back to that statement I shared.”
Information sparse
Earlier this month, Human Services Chief of Staff Chris Apsey would not confirm that purchasing records showed the department had paid nearly $1 million for a cell-site simulator. He said the equipment, whatever it was, was purchased for use by the department’s Special Victims Unit, a team tasked with tracking down missing foster children and rescuing them from sex traffickers.
“It’s an operational problem, which I hope you can understand as to why we don’t want, or can’t, talk about this further,” Apsey said on Oct. 6.
But the price and specifications in the purchasing records are identical to records of a GBI cell-site simulator purchase, which The Center Square obtained earlier this year. Both were add-ons to vehicles purchased from Hardy Chevrolet GMC in Dallas, Georgia, and both cost exactly $929,184.05 for vehicles that included a “TSE cellular communication package.”
Including installation, Human Services’ purchase of the Traverse and cell-site simulator totaled $954,578.
The revelation had some lawmakers raising Fourth Amendment concerns.
“Because we have the right not to be illegally searched or our property seized,” state Rep. Beth Camp, R-Concord, who chairs the House Judiciary Juvenile Committee, told The Center Square earlier this month. “This is the reason people don’t like Flock cameras.”
Lue said the GBI obtains search warrants or court orders before using a cell-site simulator in the field, and it wasn’t clear if SVU team members obtain warrants, or if other law enforcement agencies have been obtaining warrants for on SVU’s behalf. Lue said the GBI has not assisted Human Services in obtaining warrants.
Based on other records obtained through the Georgia Open Records Act, The Center Square reported in September that Human Services spent $639,000 on four other police-grade technologies that surveil web activity, extract the contents of cell phones and track cell phone locations. A cell-site simulator was not among them.
Following that story, Human Services responded to written questions about the other surveillance tools. A statement authored mostly by Commissioner Candice Broce, according to her spokeswoman, explained, “Search warrants can be necessary, and those are certainly pursued by partner law enforcement. It is my preference that (Human Services) officers not directly apply for search warrants.”
Department spokeswoman Kylie Winton did not respond to emails or a phone message on Wednesday. Chief of Staff Apsey also did not return calls from The Center Square.
Other records reviewed by The Center Square indicate that Human Services, while facing budget challenges, has been using federal Temporary Assistance for Needy Families money to fund the Special Victims Unit, including the purchase of the Chevrolet Traverse and the cell-site simulator.
In written answers to questions provided to the Georgia legislature’s Joint Study Committee on Evaluating Escalating Costs in Georgia’s Foster Care System, Human Services said the SVU team has cost $2.87 million in fiscal year 2026. A list of expenses included $954,578 for vehicle purchases.
Written below is a note indicating SVU is funded at some level by TANF money, saying “SVU was referenced in our federally approved TANF State Plan …” In one of its statements for The Center Square, the department called using TANF money for surveillance tools “a permissible use.” The SVU team is also included in the department’s TANF spending plan submitted to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
The foster care costs oversight committee, which has been asking questions about Human Services spending, is scheduled to meet again Thursday morning. Rep. Camp co-chairs that committee.