OPP increase efforts to nab suspended drivers

Provincial police in northeastern Ontario say they will soon have some new equipment to help identify cars on the road that belong to suspended drivers.

The cars will have special cameras to scan licence plates.

According to the Ministry of Transportation, more than 5,000 people in Greater Sudbury have a suspended licence, which is also the provincial average.

The ministry added that out of those suspended drivers, more than 200 people have lost their licences due to impaired driving or driving while disqualified.

The others have been suspended for non-criminal matters, such as unpaid fines.

A traffic sergeant for the Ontario Provincial Police said suspended drivers who continue to operate a vehicle is a problem that affects all drivers.

"If that person is involved in an accident, it’s up to the other person’s insurance to cover them," Al Kuzendo said.

"[It raises] the rates for everybody."

Currently, most suspended drivers who choose to get behind the wheel are pulled over for other reasons.

"We don’t target offenders by parking in front of their houses and waiting for them to start driving," Kuzendo said.

The new vehicles will be equipped with three cameras that will track vehicle plates and run the information through a computer, Kuzendo explained.

"They identify plates that aren’t valid," he said. "Those are additional resources that we just didn’t have before."

Kuzendo said the first of the cars with new technology will be on the road this fall.