New `eyes' help Valley officers find stolen cars
Ten neighborhood councils in the east San Fernando Valley zeroed in on a big problem in their communities and found a way to solve it. No bureaucracy, no hassles.
They each chipped in thousands of dollars from their city-funded budgets and bought three $20,000 high-tech devices that when mounted atop patrol cars scan thousands of license plates, instantly alerting officers to stolen cars.
On Thursday, the groups gathered with Los Angeles Police Department officials to celebrate their first achievements: 10 stolen cars recovered since January in the Foothill Division; three more found with the suspected thief driving. In North Hollywood, 30 stolen cars have been recovered since December, and 10 others were identified with the suspect behind the wheel.
"It has worked tremendously well," said Mary Benson, vice president of the Sun Valley Area Neighborhood Council. Sun Valley, with its many auto wrecking yards and dimly lighted industrial areas, has long been a prime area for "chop shops," garages where stolen cars are dismantled for parts.
"If we waited for there to be enough money in the budget for LAPD to install this equipment, I probably wouldn't be here speaking to you," said retiree Jon Eschbach, president of the Sun Valley council. "If there was money that came up that was available, they wouldn't start here, they would start downtown or elsewhere, and then they'd finally get to us."
The equipment uses tiny digital cameras, mounted on the roofs of patrol cars, to scan license plate numbers and compare them against state and federal databases of stolen vehicles, which are updated every day. The system alerts officers if they have passed by a car that's been reported stolen or used in a crime.
Police say the equipment has dramatically boosted their auto-theft efforts. Without the devices, officers have to manually type in the license plates of suspected stolen cars or respond to calls of abandoned vehicles.
Now they just drive around, and the computer automatically does the work at lightning speed.
The equipment arrived as police were seeing a recent uptick in auto thefts. There have been 1,510 auto thefts in the Valley so far this year, about 9% more than last year.
The North Hollywood Division is reporting the most auto thefts, 351 so far this year, and there have been 250 in the Foothill Division, Deputy Police Chief Michel Moore said.
