License Plate Reader credited for numerous arrests in Boone County
A license plate reader system is being credited for helping law enforcement track down the suspect in a deadly Virginia shooting that left a news reporter and photographer dead and another person injured.
A trooper was using the system when it flagged the car the shooter was driving.
ABC 17 News looked into the License Plate Reader, or LPR, Boone County uses. The sheriff’s department said the system has helped get many dangerous people off the streets.
“For several years now, its been going and active and very fruitful,” said Sergeant Brian Leer with the Boone County Sheriff’s Department. “We have taken off the roadways hundreds of thousands of dollars of stolen vehicles out there.”
So how does it work?
Leer said if an officer is at an active crime scene and has the license plate of a suspect’s car, it can be entered into the computer on the scene and it will immediately show up in the system.
“So if someone’s across town and he’s heading that way, it hits on the vehicle,” he said.
And it’s information that all law enforcement agencies across the United States can access through the National Crime Information Center.
“Anywhere in the country, if law enforcement puts a plate into the system, which is the intelligence database that all law enforcement share, that’s in the hot list,” Leer said.
The cameras are on the patrol cars and Leer said there are several cameras strategically placed around town.
Many people have raised privacy concerns about the LPR system over the last couple of years.
But Leer said the system is not collecting any personal information on drivers.
“The camera doesn’t even touch the driver’s license system,” he said. “It’s just comparing it to the hot list.”
The hot list is the list of license plate numbers that have been flagged for things like active warrants, wanted suspects and stolen vehicles.
The LPR system has helped lead to an arrest in Boone County as recently as last Friday.
The sheriff’s department said it has also been able to catch homicide suspects from other states who happened to be in the area.
