Dan's Papers - January 18, 2008

If your car registration is up to date, if the car you are driving is not stolen or does not have any outstanding parking tickets, or if your license is not suspended, then this story will cause you no worry.

By using a reported $22,400 provided by Suffolk District Attorney Thomas Spota through the County Asset Forfeiture Fund, The East Hampton Village Police Department, under the direction of Police Chief Gerald Larson, has made East Hampton the first small town in Suffolk County to deploy high-tech cameras. Mounted on the top of police car, they can target violators. Sgt. Kevin Duchemin of the Village of East Hampton Police Department said that their new Remington Elsag cameras have a capacity of reading and running a background check of 450 license plates per minute, and in just the last four weeks, the new technology has led to the arrests of over twenty motorists.

The two cameras, mounted on the top of the Village police cars - they look like lights - read the plates. The data is then checked against a hot list compiled by New York State Motor Vehicles, which is fed automatically into the laptop computers that all Village police cars already have installed.

The new cameras can read up to twelve feet away, which is not a significant distance, but when positioned correctly - for example, at the elbow turn heading into the village on Route 27 - during the busy summer season the 25,000 car capacity per hour at that location will come in handy. Already, on a recent off-season Saturday, Sgt. Duchemin recorded over 1,200 plate readings on Daniel's Hole Road in just a half hour.

The new cameras will not be reading inspection stickers. However, once the car is stopped for a violation, it is the duty of the police officer to check the validity of license, registration, inspection sticker and insurance card. Also, once stopped, drivers are responsible for the legality of the car, whether it theirs or not. The violations are charged against the driver, not the car's owner. No one is sure how this will affect the summer traffic. Currently, there is only one car rigged with the camera and, according to Sgt. Duchemin, there are no immediate plans to purchase more.

Opinions vary on the new technology. A source in the Town of East Hampton Supervisor's Office described the new equipment as "very expensive." As of now, the Town of East Hampton Police Department has not chosen to purchase the new cameras. However, a patron at Citta Nuova said he supports Chief Larson because these cameras will make it easier to apprehend stolen cars before they head up island. He added, "My car is properly registered, inspected, and if I ever get a ticket I pay it on time. I am not worried."

Another patron didn't like the "big brother" aspect. He voiced concerns about future technology affecting privacy issues. "I just don't like the concept. What happens if those identity problems occur, like at the airport where people with the same names are detained incorrectly." He then laughed, noting that his wife never pays parking tickets, which could lead to her arrest. East Hampton local Ben Dollinger, after being informed about this new camera, ran out to check his truck to make sure his registration and inspection stickers were up to date.

Village police sources believe the new technology will help with the apprehension of outlaws. If it helps snag drivers with suspended licenses, stolen cars and sex offenders (also on the short list the computer picks up), what's wrong with that? After all, if you obey the laws, none of this really affects you.

The money received from the fines for unlicensed drivers goes to the State of New York. A question is - on a busy day who gets stopped and who doesn't? In the first reported hour of its use in the Village of East Hampton, the two cameras mounted on top of the police car checked 939 license plates, which led to four arrests. It seems unlikely that a parked police car at the same location without the camera would have those results.

Sgt. Duchemin reiterated that as long as your car is legally registered and up to date, this device, which is made in Italy and was first used to read Italian ZIP codes, would not cause the police to stop your car.