Embracing Innovative Tech Can Make Communities Safer

By Rick Boucher, Former U.S. Representative (VA-9) | The Virginian-Pilot

Seventy percent of Americans say they are worried about crime. According to the latest data, violent crimes such as murder, rape and aggravated assault are on the rise in our commonwealth. These are real-life tragedies that touch the lives of innocent people, affecting Virginia’s families, communities and small businesses.

Effective law enforcement depends on the timely receipt of accurate information. It’s paramount in preventing and solving crimes. Today, innovative technologies such as license plate recognition cameras (LPRs) have proven themselves as indispensable tools, helping law enforcement respond quickly in high-stakes situations.

Across Virginia, LPR technology has already helped reunite families with missing loved ones, recover stolen firearms, capture sex offenders and arrest violent criminals. In Frederick County, a deputy explained how an LPR helped him identify and arrest a suspect accused of firing multiple gunshots at an ambulance. In Fairfax County, LPRs were essential for tracking a suspect who police say lured a child into a van where he exposed himself. The subsequent investigation uncovered that he was a teacher at a local elementary school who had allegedly assaulted multiple other juvenile victims. Within five months, Fairfax law enforcement credits LPRs with helping them locate four missing people, recover six stolen firearms and retrieve 30 stolen vehicles.

The benefits of technology-backed crime prevention extend across our communities, from neighborhoods to commerce districts. For business owners, particularly family-run shops that are frequent targets of property crime, LPRs offer critical support. When an armed robbery or theft occurs, having license plate reader data allows police to track suspects who fled, building stronger cases and increasing the chances that crimes are solved. For instance, a suspect accused of multiple armed robberies in Richmond was swiftly identified using LPRs to identify and locate his vehicle in a neighboring county.

Yet, while like license plate readers have proven invaluable in addressing these threats, LPRs continue to face pushback. Take, for example, the above case in Richmond. Lawyers defending the accused unsuccessfully moved to have the LPR evidence suppressed on the grounds that it violated the defendant’s Fourth Amendment rights, which protect citizens from unreasonable searches and seizures. The judge, Robert Payne, denied this motion in October, citing several previous Fourth Amendment and LPR cases to support his ruling. He specified that LPR technology did not violate the Fourth Amendment because it, “is not meant to ‘track’ or ‘monitor’ the entirety of an individual’s movements during a particular car trip, much less through the activities of their daily life,” and that LPRs are, “‘strategically’ placed to capture images of locations, not individuals.”

While any camera mounted on a pole may raise feelings of Orwellian surveillance, much of the concern surrounding LPRs arises from a misunderstanding of how the technology works. As Payne explained in his ruling, license plate readers are not video cameras. They are narrowly tailored to take photos and do not collect any personal identifying information from individuals.

Contrary to some expressed concerns, LPRs are highly targeted tools accessed only during investigations of serious crimes. They aren’t used to track the daily movements of ordinary citizens. Rather they have been shown to enable law enforcement to solve serious crimes swiftly, often within hours.