Police using tricks to catch speedy drivers

Motorists accustomed to using a lead foot or zipping through red lights should beware: Maine law enforcement officers are using trickery and high-tech gadgetry to crack down on traffic scofflaws.

Techniques range from radar cameras being installed in Lewiston-Auburn to radar-equipped troopers disguised as construction workers.

Maine State Police Maj. Randall Nichols said law enforcement agencies are focusing their efforts on the most dangerous roads.

In Lewiston-Auburn, five intersections have been identified for camera radar devices designed to catch red-light runners.

Peek Traffic Corp., which has set up similar equipment in Charlotte, N.C., has been contracted to mount the equipment, process the photos and turn the evidence over to local police departments.

The Androscoggin County Transportation Resource Center is using $128,000 in grants to get the program started.

Motorists who approach a red light at predetermined speed activate the camera, which takes snapshots of the license plate of any car that tries to beat a red light, said Don Craig, director of the center.

Violators will receive warning notices mailed from the Lewiston and Auburn police departments, Craig said.

For now, no fines will be imposed during the six-month pilot project. “The goal is safety, to get people to be aware of the dangers and to stop running red lights,” Craig said.

Lewiston and Auburn aren’t the only places where new techniques are being used to crack down on traffic violators.

Maine State Police have tried putting empty cruisers along the median of the Maine Turnpike to slow down traffic, and they’ve also had radar-equipped troopers hidden in “disabled” vehicles or disguised as surveyors and construction workers.

“We try to create an impression that a trooper could be anyone, anywhere, anytime,” Nichols said. “Is that a construction worker or a trooper? Is that a surveyor or a trooper?”

State police are using such unconventional techniques as part of an initiative called Strategic Area-Focused Enforcement.

The initiative focuses resources on areas identified as having high rates of accidents and fatalities. Troopers are developing a plan of action for Route 4 in Turner, Nichols said.

“We’re to the point in law enforcement where resources are becoming more and more scarce, and the demands are greater,” he said. “We have to be much more creative and smarter in terms of how we deploy our resources.”