St. Louis, MO – November 2019 – The St. Louis Police Department is using sophisticated license plate reading (technology throughout the city to help catch criminals.  

If you've ever driven through downtown St. Louis, you might not even realize there is camera technology at intersections designed to help keep you safe by helping police identify vehicles involved in a crime.

“It does more than just read the license plate because it we can see very much detail with the car,” said John Hayden, the Chief of Police for the St. Louis Police Department.

The St. Louis Police Departments license plate reader program began in 2015 with one LPR camera. Now, the city has up to 200 throughout the city of St. Louis. These cameras have been placed up high on stoplights at many intersections throughout the city.

“Anytime we are looking for the car involved in a crime and   it goes through an intersection or goes past one of our skycaps that has a license plate reader attached to it, it alerts our real-time crime center,”said Captain Renee Kriesmann, the Commander of the 4th Precinct.  “Then the real-time crime center announces it to the officers.”

“It is really making a difference in solving crime faster,” said Major Angela Coonce who runs the Real Time Crime Center at Police Headquarters. “And helping to prevent crime.”

The St. Louis police department has arrested more than 1700 people with more than 4,300 charges resulting from those arrests thanks to the LPR technology.

“When we get an LPR hit, it's on a serious crime, it's a felony violation,” Coonce said. “So a carjacking or an assault.”

“When we get that information out, we're able to stop the cars,” Coonce said. “We've recovered over a thousand stolen cars as a result those hits. And about 250 illegal firearms have been taken off the street because of what's going on in this room.”

“Our crime is down in the downtown neighborhood 14% this year,” said Missy Kelley, the President of Downtown St. Louis Inc.  “Which is pretty significant year over year.”

“You should feel safe,” Coonce said. “We have got our eyes out there and we know what's going on.”

“This center really is the eyes and the ears of the police department,” Coonce said. “So if there's something going on, these detectives in the center know what's going on, and they're going to relay information in real time to officers on the ground that need that information.”

The success of the LPR cameras and the real-time crime center has garnered the attention and admiration of other police departments.

“People from around the country are really interested in how we're using fixed license plate readers to help solve and prevent crime in the city,” Coonce said. “It is really making a difference in improving the safety of the city.”