KINGWOOD – More than 100 license plates were collected by the Preston County Sheriff’s Department during a six-week period after deputies pulled over vehicles when they spotted something out of place with the plate.
Sheriff Dan Loughrie said that number is not unusual.
Loughrie said suspicious plates are checked to make sure they are on the vehicle they are registered with. If not, the license plate is confiscated.
Sergeant J.A. Wyatt, detachment commander of the Kingwood State Police Detachment, said they also stop vehicles if the license plate gives them probable cause to check.
License plates might be confiscated if they are fraudulent, are not for the vehicle they are on, if they are evidence in a case such as false registration, or have been reported stolen.
Sheriff’s Utility Officer P.S. Stevens said sometimes the entire plate is not stolen. She said people use tin snips to cut the license sticker from plates. The sticker is heated with a hair dryer or some other heat source and peeled off. The sticker is then put on another license plate.
Loughrie said some of the plates were confiscated because people tried to change the numbers on them. There are other cases where someone takes a license plate and puts it on another car without the owner’s knowledge.
“Even if the person that takes your license plate is living with you, you don’t get your license plate back,” he said. “If a license plate is lost of stolen, it should be reported so it will show up in the system.”
Stevens said a license plate can be taken from even the most secure area.
“I know someone whose license plate was stolen at college. They parked their car in a well-lighted area but the lights went out. When they went to put something in their trunk their license plate was missing.”
Although all of the plates were confiscated in Preston County, some were out of state plates. “We get a number of plates that are from other states,” Loughrie said.
Stevens said some people change license plates before they should. “There are people who buy a car on Friday and take the plate off their old car and put it on the new one, thinking they will do the paperwork next week,” she said.
Loughrie said confiscated plates are turned in to the Division of Motor Vehicles (DMV) in Charleston. He said this is done when an officer has to take evidence to Charleston for analysis. “You can’t mail firearms or drugs,” he explained. “They have to be hand delivered.”
The DMV did not respond in time for this report to questions about how many plates are confiscated statewide.
Wyatt and Loughrie said it is important to immediately report a stolen license plate or sticker to the sheriff’s department at 304-329-1611 or the state police at 304-329-1101.
