GONZALES - A new high-tech patrol unit is on the road in Ascension Parish.

"This is going to really enhance our ability to find bad guys, track them off the street, and put them in jail," Sheriff Bobby Webre said about his office's new License Plate Recongnition System.

The patrol car has four cameras that can read plates in all directions.

"They run ten plates a second so it's very high speed, very beneficial," Deputy Matthew Johnson said.

Johnson is one of the two deputies assigned to the plate-reading patrol unit. The new software package will hit on any plate that has been identified with a crime anywhere in the country, including missing-persons cases or Amber Alerts. 

"They are infrared so they will read at night time just like it's daytime," Johnson said.

Ascension already has several stationary plate readers located in various locations that led to almost 100 arrests last year. The sheriff is opening a mobile unit that's expected to lead to even more arrests. Plus, more plate-reading units are in the sheriff's office's plans later down the line.