Police collect thousands of license plate numbers every month

A technology tool used by the Cape Girardeau Police Department has taken about 18,000 pictures of license plates per month over a year of use. This has resulted in 50 warrant arrests and the recovery of stolen vehicles and license plates and has helped police investigate some major crimes.

The department's automatic license plate reader, which is a high-speed camera attached to a patrol car that captures a photograph of cars' plates and sends it to a laptop computer inside the patrol car, runs plate numbers through a crime database that contains a "hot list" of numbers. The list contains plate numbers that are part of an active law enforcement investigation and will notify the officer driving if there is a match.

Since its launch in October 2012, Cape Girardeau police have gathered more than 246,000 scans with the tool. That number includes some duplicates since the camera recognizes plates as cars pass -- a photo of front and back plates can be taken.

Cape Girardeau police spokesman Darin Hickey said that, although the department does not directly match arrests that result from the system with records in its management system, through speaking to officers, he believes about 50 people have been arrested through police using the license plate reader. Police also have used the technology to investigate two Amber Alerts, a murder -- police used license plate numbers to help identify potential witnesses and suspects in a shooting at a nightclub -- and to eliminate a bank robbery suspect. Investigations of potential drug crimes involve frequent use of the reader, and police also have used it to solve a felony hit-and-run case and investigate fraud and forgery reports. The reader has also aided in the recovery of five stolen vehicles and 15 stolen license plates.

The department joined thousands of agencies nationwide in using the technology by way of a grant from the Missouri Police Chiefs Association.

The number of resulting arrests and cases solved in Cape Girardeau is mirrored by data stemming from the use of the license plate readers elsewhere -- a report from the American Civil Liberties Union on the readers released in July reported that "only a fraction of 1 percent of reads are hits -- and an even smaller fraction result in an arrest."

Though local police may view the license plate reader as a valuable investigative tool, groups such as the ACLU question potential risks to privacy, since millions of plate numbers belonging to people who will likely never commit a crime or become part of an investigation are photographed and stored.

"This constant monitoring and permanent recording violates our privacy in a number of respects," the ACLU stated in its report, which analyzed the use of readers by about 250 law enforcement agencies.

Potential targeting or stalking of public figures and private citizens, along with the safety of the data that is stored, are among the concerns of the ACLU when it comes to police using the readers.

Cape Girardeau police, according to Hickey, store what they collect in a database at a secure, off-site location, and follow strict city policies on proper use of computers and technology. Officers also cannot manipulate any information they download from the reader system for use in an investigation or to turn in as court evidence.

eragan@semissourian.com

388-3627

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40 S. Sprigg St., Cape Girardeau, Mo.