Over 50 vehicles were stopped as part of a roads policing operation in Newport on Friday 6th May.
The large-scale operation involved specialist officers from Gwent Police’s Road Policing Tasking Unit, assisted by officers from Avon and Somerset and representatives from key enforcement agencies including VOSA, the Environment Agency, Departments for Work and Pensions, DVLA and UK Borders Agency.
Vehicles in the vicinity of the M4 motorway and using the network of roads surrounding it were scanned by special Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) units during the course of the day, which alerted officers to any offences the vehicle or its occupants may be committing such as driving with no insurance or tax.
ANPR systems have the ability to instantly check thousands of vehicles every hour by scanning a number plate against various databases of intelligence.
This includes information provided by police officers, Crimestoppers, the DVLA and other forces about vehicles used by disqualified drivers, people wanted on warrant and those who are suspected of committing crime. If a suspicious vehicle is identified by ANPR, police units intercept to carry out checks on the vehicle and occupants. The expertise of the other agencies involved can then be called on.
Results from the day included:
51 vehicles stopped
12 vehicles prohibited for being driven in a poor condition
8 vehicles seized for having no insurance
5 vehicles were clamped by DVLA for offences (such as failure to notify change of ownership/ false number plates) resulting in fines exceeding £1,000
2 notices of warning issued for not wearing a seatbelts
2 notices of warning issued for lighting offences
7 fixed penalty notices issued for defective tyres
1 fixed penalty notice issued for a number plate offence
Sergeant Andy Elliot, who co-ordinated the operation on behalf of Gwent Police said:
“ANPR technology enables us to quickly and easily identify people using the road networks to commit crime.
Bringing together the expertise of partner agencies during an operation such as this means we can deal with a wide range of offences at one site.
ANPR is a vital roads policing tool used day-in, day-out to detect, disrupt and generally make it difficult for crime groups to operate using transport networks in the region. The results of this operation demonstrates the efficiency of this technology and we will continue to use it to target travelling criminals in Gwent.”
