It’s the equivalent of having dozens of police officers driving down the street running every plate they see. A new camera system being used by Lawrence Police allows the department to do just that — using a sophisticated computer program to scan dozens of plates as a cruiser drives down the road, alerting the officer when it runs across one with a problem.
The system is sure to raise the old “Big Brother” debate, since it gives police the ability to check up on cars at a much higher capacity than they might otherwise be able to do when simply running plates of suspicious cars or cars committing traffic violations. What does this mean? 1) The city will be able to better patrol autos that have expired registrations or other problems that might fly under the radar. 2) If you haven’t renewed your registration and were just counting on flying under the radar for a few extra weeks, well, you might want to rethink that strategy.
Noah R. Bombard is the new media editor for The Eagle-Tribune in North Andover. He is a former award-winning newspaper and magazine editor who has been covering news in Massachusetts since 1997.