ST. AUGUSTINE, Fla. — License plate readers are popping up in more areas around the First Coast. It's technology that's helping fight crime, first on county roads but now in neighborhoods.
“It can catch cars up to like 50 miles per hour. It gets a clear shot of them and their license plate," Gran Lake Homeowners Association President Paul Proios said. "They're hard to bypass, they're very accurate."
License plate readers scan the plates of every car driving in and out St. Augustine's Gran Lake neighborhood. Homeowners Association President Paul Proios says the technology provides an extra layer of security and believe its deterred crime. The community installed them after vandals targeted Christmas decorations two years ago. Proios says surveillance cameras weren't enough.
“If you ever get someone on camera, there’s still really nothing you can do about it. But if you have a license plate camera and someone commits some type of crime, you call the police, they can identify them, and hold them accountable," Proios said.
St. Johns County Sheriff's Office Sergeant Kyle Cubbedge says the technology helped identify a blue Honda Civic and the men responsible for vandalizing both the Gran Lake and TrailMark Community amenity centers in July.
"Those license plate readers were actually able to catch the suspect vehicle that was committing these crimes on camera," Cubbedge said. "The other neighborhood didn't have that license plate reader. It's pretty apparent that it had been the same suspects because it was the same exact night. We were able to definitely show that they for sure did the one neighborhood that had those license plate readers and surveillance cameras on their amenity center."
Proios said there was about $12,000 in damage. Three men in their early 20s were identified as suspects. He said they agreed to pay for the damages.
"We were able to pretty much catch those people and be paid restitution on that," Proios said.
Detectives also used license plate readers to track down two men accused of stealing appliances from homes under construction on Silver Birch Street in St. Augustine in September.
"We were able to develop a suspect vehicle that was at the location during all these times when these appliances were going missing and the copper wire was going missing," Cubbedge said.
Two men, Jason Morris and Sterlie Mitchell were arrested on grand theft and burglary charges. Morris pleaded not guilty and was released from jail on bail. Mitchell remains in the St. Johns County Jail. Both will appear in court on September 26th.
Cubbedge says the Sheriff’s Office relies on the devices. It scans every vehicle and instantly searches law enforcement databases for active warrants, amber alerts, or stolen vehicles.
"It's one of the first tools that we look to as far as quickly identifying the suspect vehicles that are in these areas when the crime is occurring," Cubbedge said.
Since 2018, county officials credit license plate readers with helping find 129 people with outstanding warrants and 81 who were missing. The readers have also charged 552 individuals with a crime and led to 704 felony and 346 misdemeanor charges countywide.
St. Johns County Sheriff's Office says it encourages residential communities to invest in the technology. Proios says despite some privacy concerns from Gran Lake residents, most wanted more safety measures in place.
"If something bad were to happen, or somebody were to be kidnapped, we have like an edge on that. We can know what's going on. The Sheriff is notified immediately," Proios said. “I was very careful to say that we’re not going to be using this because 'somebody shouted at me, I think somebody was speeding too fast.' This is a legitimate crime happened."
The Sheriff’s Office says it has policies in place to prevent anyone from using the data inappropriately
“They (deputies) have to have a specific case that they're working on, and a specific time period that they're looking for. There's no way that they can just go in and just start looking at everyone else's license plates," Cubbedge said.
Proios believes the devices aren’t just helping solve crimes, they’re a deterrent.
"If you're going to do something bad to this neighborhood, we're going to catch you," Proios said.
Proios says the Gran Lake community license plate readers are solar powered and run off a network, constantly scanning the license plates of any car that drives by.