ROANOKE, Va. – Local police departments are using new tools to help them crack down on crimes such as stolen vehicles and murders.
For months, Lynchburg and Roanoke have been using license plate recognition cameras.
Lynchburg has 15 cameras right now but wouldn’t share where those cameras are, citing security reasons.
The cameras are in fixed locations. To determine where to put them, Lynchburg police looked at entry points into the city and high-traffic volume locations using data from the Department of Transportation.
You might be wondering how this works. When someone drives past, the camera snaps a picture of your license plate along with a vehicle description. The information is then shared with police agencies and used to notify officers if a car is stolen or if there’s a missing person. The information is only for investigative purposes.
“It’s a deterrent so that people that know they’re checking for a stolen license plate, stolen cameras, wanted people, different things that are attached to vehicles that helps us,” said Captain Joel Hinkley with the Lynchburg Police Department.
Both police departments teamed up with Flock Safety, which provides the cameras to Lynchburg as well as other police agencies across the country. It also shares the license plate information with the other departments that use the technology, like Roanoke City.
Roanoke Police Department wouldn’t tell 10 News how many cameras they are using or where they are. However, Captain Eric Thiel said the cameras have been successful so far.
“The most impactful case was we received a collateral lead from another agency of someone who was wanted for murder and they had some information that they possibly would be traveling to Roanoke and that information was put into the LPR system. We ended up getting a hit on the license plate and within about an hour our partners that they worked with gave us that lead they were in custody,” said Thiel.
Roanoke also said the cameras are in fixed locations.
One concern people have is safety and how the data is used. Both Roanoke City and Lynchburg said the data they collect is only used for investigative purposes and the information is deleted after 30 days.
“We’re not looking at people. We’re not looking at faces anything like that. It’s a very short-term thing. So that if an incident occurs over a weekend at a business maybe a burglary or something like that happened and a vehicle was involved, we can go back in that short window and be able to identify what that vehicle was so that we can then use that as an investigative lead,” said Captain Hinkley.