East Hampton Village’s new Flock license-plate reader cameras are having an immediate effect here. Out of 18 arrests reported by village police in the last two weeks, 14 were made with the assistance of the cameras.
In December, the village bought 10 such cameras, which can not only tell police whether a car is legally registered and insured but can also record its make, model, and even bumper stickers. A Flock camera figured recently in locating and arresting a larceny suspect.
During the week ending on April 6, a plate-reader was credited in four out of six arrests. In all four, the camera reported suspended registrations, three of them for lacking insurance and the other for a lapse in insurance payments. One of the drivers was found to have a license suspension as well.
Last week, 10 out of 12 arrests in the village were due to a license-plate reader. All 10 drivers had suspended registrations, mostly for failure to keep up with insurance payments but also, in one case, for unlicensed operation.
On the evening of March 30, following up on a camera reader, village police stopped a car whose driver was found to possess “a vial with 1.17 grams of a white powdery substance, later determined to be cocaine. He was charged with criminal possession of a controlled substance in the 5th degree, a class-D felony, and with a suspended registration, a misdemeanor.
The same misdemeanor charge was levied against 11 of the drivers pulled over thanks to the new plate-readers. The fine for that offense is “not less than fifty dollars nor more than one hundred dollars, or by imprisonment not exceeding thirty days.”
Lack of insurance is the second most common road-related offense. Two of the drivers arrested recently face misdemeanor charges of aggravated unlicensed operation, which carries a maximum fine of $500.
Myriad other charges were levied against those arrested as well, including two for driving an uninspected vehicle, two for tinted side windows, and one for having inadequate or no stop lights. Nine of the 14 cars were impounded by police.
Even assuming these were all first registration-or-insurance offenses, the Flock cameras could net $1,300 in fines, from drivers who likely would not have been pulled over without that surveillance.