Automated License Plate Reader technology that state officials showcased when announcing plans for eliminating registration stickers has been instrumental in helping city police recover stolen vehicles, address “mismanagement” of registration stickers and investigate vehicle thefts, according to interim police Chief Jerry Speziale and 1st Lt. Ken Zipovsky.
While the equipment allows police to effortlessly scan registrations, Speziale believes its crime-fighting and intelligence-sharing components are even more beneficial to law enforcement agencies.
“I’d like to see us tying it to the intelligence piece and hot spots policing,” Speziale said. “You know where the vehicle was and what it’s doing.”
Hazleton police acquired its lone plate reader about three years ago through the Pennsylvania Auto Theft Prevention Authority, Zipovsky said.
“It’s a great tool for us to have,” Zipovsky said.
The estimated $20,000 roving device is mounted to a police vehicle and scans registrations on parked and passing vehicles, Speziale explained. The scanned information is then run through a database that alerts police of violations.
Speziale wants to replicate programs that were initiated during his tenure with the Passaic County Sheriff’s Department in New Jersey, where data from the mobile devices is run through a “hot list” that is updated daily and cross-checks the information it retrieves with warrant lists, stolen vehicle lists, and other databases maintained by the FBI and other branches of law enforcement.
“It runs through a search and then kicks out only those that are wanted,” he said. “It captures (data) and runs it through a quick-search spectrum and if it captures you and you’re wanted, it shows (police) the picture of the person and (we) turn around and stop them.”
Police using mobile devices don’t necessarily have to stop a person at the moment they generate a hit in the data system, Speziale said. Investigators often take the time to verify the accuracy of the data or the person it is tied to, he said.
Portable units have other benefits, he said.
In Paterson, N.J.y, where Speziale serves as police director, officials are mulling a proposal for installing mobile plate readers on trailers and monitoring vehicles that frequent known drug locations or other crime “hot spots,” the chief said.
If, for example, the plate readers helped police determine that a vehicle from Rockland County, N.Y., was spotted in a known drug location in Paterson, police could use that information to build a case that could result in the vehicle owner forfeiting the vehicle, Speziale said.
Officials, however, are investigating whether that concept would create civil rights issues.
Police in Paterson would also alert law enforcement from the vehicle owner’s hometown that the car was spotted in a known drug location, he said.
“It’s like notifying someone’s mom or us saying, ‘By the way, did you know your car was here at 2 a.m.?’” Speziale said.
The proposal could cut down on demand for drugs if people realize a car could be stopped, the owner notified and the people inside arrested.
“In Pennsylvania, I don’t know how they feel about these notifications of third parties and owners of vehicles,” Speziale said. “There’s a fine line with civil rights with these things.”
Speziale and Zipovsky agree that Hazleton’s department could benefit from obtaining additional license plate readers.
“What I’d like to do in Hazleton … is lock down the entrance and exit ways,” Speziale said.
Registration stickers will be eliminated beginning Jan. 1, 2017, in Pennsylvania, according to Department of Transportation officials.
PennDOT recently pitched a proposal for creating a grant program with the money it saves from registration stickers. Grants would be awarded to law enforcement for buying and maintaining license plate readers.
Details about the state’s plan for eliminating registration stickers are available by clicking the “Registration Stickers” tab under “Vehicle Registration” at www.dmv.pa.gov.
©2016 the Standard-Speaker (Hazleton, Pa.) Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
