Law Enforcement Fighting Proposed License Plate Law

Ohio law requires all motor vehicles to display front and back license plates.

Currently, not displaying a plate is a primary offense. Ohio law enforcement is currently fighting against two legislative proposals that would take away the legal requirement to display a front license plate. House Bill 159 would eliminate the requirements for front license plates, and Senate Bill 202 would reduce the violation to a secondary offense. Muskingum County Sheriff, Matt Lutz, said dozens of crimes are solved each year using front license plates.

“If the front plate’s eliminated it’s taking 50 percent of our chances of identifying vehicles in crime,” Lutz said. “We have new license plate readers on our cars that are really set up to locate stolen cars, missing cars, missing people.”

Lutz said front plates have led to numerous higher crime arrests. License plates help law enforcement track down missing children in the Amber Alert System, and also help bus drivers and citizens identify hazardous drivers so they can alert police.

“We’re talking about the criminals taking front plates off of their cars to help us from identifying them, so no secret that no front plates have led to a lot higher crime arrests because we’re able to stop those cars, identify the suspect, sometimes that leads to somebody driving when they shouldn’t be because they have no license,” Lutz said.

Lutz said plates are a key tool for law enforcement to identify and apprehend criminal suspects. Not having plates would make fighting crime more difficult, and could put an officer’s safety at risk.