City and county police are automatically running checks on every license plate that they see, Ted Strong writes in the Daily Progress. Each department has a single camera rig that’s attached to a police car—it detects the numbers on each and every license plate that’s within the cameras’ range and checks to see if it’s in their database of wanted vehicles. The city started using the system this summer, the county earlier this month. An electronic log of every license plate spotted by the system is retained—the city keeps the data for three months, the county for two. The system doesn’t scan for plates with expired inspections or registrations, for lack of a database to interface with.
News and meta-news about Charlottesville, VA, since 2001.
Sideblog
Police announced this afternoon that their investigation into what was initially believed to be a fatal fire on Rugby Avenue is now a homicide investigation. #
The Virginia Supreme Court has denied George Huguely’s appeal. His second-degree murder conviction will stand, WRIC reports. #
In a carefully worded story, and not citing specific sources, WTVR reports that forensic evidence belonging to Jesse Matthew Jr., the main suspect in the disappearance of Hannah Graham, matches forensic evidence collected during the investigation of Morgan Harrington’s 2009 murder. #
In the wake of Hannah Graham’s disappearance, and the evidence that came from private security footage, city officials are revisiting the question of installing security cameras on the downtown mall. #
Both Charlottesville Registrar Sheri Iachetta and former Electoral Board member Stephanie Commander have turned themselves in to the police on
foursix and four felony counts of embezzlement, respectively. #Ten years ago, the National Institutes of Health budget doubled and schools like the University of Virginia built massive new research facilities. A decade later, those buildings remain largely underutilized. NPR visits UVA in this story on the effect of federal binge and spurge spending in the sciences. #
In 2012, Council approved a new student housing complex on West Main—now some council members are questioning whether what they were shown matches what was built. #
The Architectural Review Board has approved a bike-themed mural on West Market, below the McGuffey Art Center, although at least one member expressed concerns that it might look like the bicyclists were riding away from Charlottesville’s downtown. #
City Police Chief Tim Longo is meeting with city leaders to work on protocols regarding the use of military surplus police weapons in Charlottesville. #
A 100-year-old Colonnades resident received military honors for her service in the WWII Women’s Army Corps #
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This is a good idea, I guess, as long they’re honest about what the data is being used for.
If my car got stolen, I’d certainly want robots checking every license plate.
I wonder, though: why are they storing this data? If the license plate isn’t on the list of wanted vehicles, then it’s on to the next one. What purpose does storing the data serve?
A friend of mine told me that VA Beach police used a similar system to catch a guy that murdered one of his co-workers. After the murder, the guy stole the victim’s car which the system had flagged as “wanted”.
RFID tags in your tires… paranoia or not…
I remember being told many years ago that police in Fairfax County (and I assumed elsewhere) did this manually at traffic lights. They used their in-car computer or SCMODS or whatever they had to run the plates of all the cars around them, just in case.