Man warns others after license plate stolen in south St. Louis

ST. LOUIS, Mo. (First Alert 4) - First Alert 4 has reported for years about concerns of cars driving with expired temporary tags. A new growing concern for some in the city is license plates being stolen from cars.

Tuesday morning, Stuart Murray was leaving for work in South City when he noticed his license plate was missing.

“That was not a great start to my work day,” Murray said. “I thought it was enough to keep stuff out of my car just as a good practice.”

Murray filed a police report with SLMPD and went to the license office to get replacements.

“The gentleman that helped me was like, ‘It’s getting warm out, it’s happening more often.’ They’re probably seeing 8-10 people a day coming in for stolen plates, which I thought was wild,” Murray said.

We learned if you have a personalized plate and a thief takes it, when you go to get a replacement, you will get the same plate.

“I was actually really surprised having personalized plates that the state’s solution was to re-issue me the same plates so now there are potentially two sets of plates out there with the same number,” Murray said.

First Alert 4 asked law enforcement if you and the thief are driving around with the same plates, could you get stopped? We’re told the answer is yes, but that likely will only happen if you’re committing a traffic violation where you’d get pulled over. When officers run the plate, it will come up with the car it should be ed to. If that’s you, you’ll be able to be on your way.

Murray said he’s taking it into his own hands to try to keep his new plates safe.

“I had to go online and order a set of special screws you can’t take off with a regular wrench or screwdriver. That’s about as protective as I can get still parking on the street,” Murray said.

First Alert 4 reached out to SLMPD to get stats on how often stolen plates are being reported in the city. We are waiting to get that information.

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