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The black Nissan is speeding east down Alligator Alley when the driver spots a black and tan Florida Highway Patrol car parked on the other side of the interstate and hits her brakes.

The Nissan’s speed drops from the nearly 90 mph it has been traveling at for miles on Thursday morning in an effort to avoid detection by the trooper. The black and tan FHP car doesn’t budge.

The Nissan’s driver may have thought she hadn’t been spotted, but little did she know that Trooper Roldan Rodriguez has been tailing her, just a matter of car lengths behind, for a few miles now — incognito.

Just over three months ago Rodriguez, 26, was assigned to a maroon 2004 Mercury Marauder that has been designed to travel the local roads and interstate without detection by passing motorists. The Marauder, which bears no FHP insignia, has lights hidden in its grill, on its dashboard and in its back rear window.

Rodriguez has a blue, "waterfall" scented air freshener dangling from the rearview mirror.

The high-powered unmarked car allows Rodriguez to catch speeders and aggressive drivers who "drive like angels" when they see a marked unit, Rodriguez said.

"They don’t really know who’s behind them or who they are passing," Rodriguez said. "They never know where we are going to be at."

As the Nissan speeds along, Rodriguez flips on his lights and siren and pulls the driver over. He steps out of the Marauder and approaches the passenger-side door of the Nissan.

The driver of the Nissan is in denial, Rodriguez said. She claims she couldn’t have been going that fast because she wasn’t passing anyone.

Still, Rodriguez presents her with a $185.50 ticket — the cost of driving 15-to-19 mph over the speed limit.

"Unfortunately, these are the kinds of people that get under my skin a little more," Rodriguez said. "She’s got an 18-month-old child in the car."

The use of unmarked "unconventional" patrol vehicles in Collier County is not new, but it is a first for the FHP. The Collier County Sheriff’s Office has a number of unmarked vehicles in its fleet, including two 2004 Ford Mustangs that scoot around the county targeting aggressive and impaired drivers.

The Sheriff’s Office got the Mustangs from a Florida Department of Transportation grant, said Sgt. Chris Gonzalez of the Sheriff’s Office’s traffic unit.

The Mustangs — one silver and one blue — were recently transitioned from the day shift, where they were used to target aggressive drivers, to the night DUI squad, Gonzalez said.

"The benefits are enormous," Gonzalez said. "They’ve been very successful."

Though the Naples police department does not have any unmarked patrol vehicles, the benefits of keeping a low profile have not been lost on its officers, said spokesman James Hendry.

"We do have one that is marked, but without a light bar, that is assigned to the DUI detail for the purpose of maintaining a low profile when conducting DUI patrols," Hendry said.

Statewide the FHP has about 20 unmarked Marauders and one Mustang, said FHP spokesman Lt. Doug Dodson.

The Marauder in Collier County had been stationed in Fort Myers until the trooper who was assigned to it was promoted to the traffic homicide unit, Dodson said. When Rodriguez learned the car was available, he put in a request for it, which was granted.

"Most of the Marauder troopers are selected based on their productivity and based on the job that they do," Dodson said. "They are the one’s that are really passionate about catching these aggressive drivers before they hurt somebody."

While patrolling Alligator Alley, Rodriguez said he typically tries to avoid traffic patterns that marked units drive to avoid detection. For instance, if drivers regularly see the Marauder parked in the same place every day or frequently driving through the median, they may determine it is a law enforcement vehicle.

Rodriguez said he doesn’t usually target vehicles traveling at slower than 85 mph.

"I’ll be out here on the weekends and they’ll just drive on by you all day long," he said. "If I decided to pull everybody over for, say, 10 over, I wouldn’t have to go very far."

Generally, Rodriguez said he’s gotten a good response from people he’s pulled over with the Marauder.

"For the most of them, you just get the jaw drop," he said.

Most people are polite and don’t argue because they didn’t even know he was there, Rodriguez said. Some still try to get out of the ticket, though Rodriguez said he can probably count on one hand the number of times he’s let a speeder off with just a warning.

Occasionally, a driver will cry to try to get out of a ticket, he said, and some females have been known to try other methods.

"You have a few that try to show a little skin," Rodriguez said, "but when you come back with a ticket, they’re usually buttoned up tighter than Fort Knox."

On a typical weekend day, Rodriguez will write 16 to 20 tickets, though he has written as many as 37 tickets in one day, he said.

"I enjoy it," Rodriguez said. "I don’t like to come out here writing something that’s going to cost $200 ... that part I hate. But at the same time, I don’t want to go knocking on somebody’s door to tell them their loved one isn’t coming home because of the way they were driving.

"I like to think that overall we do make an impact."

Aggressive driving is not unique to Southwest Florida, Dodson said. It’s a behavior that needs to be targeted before it escalates and someone gets hurt, he said, and the unmarked cars are good at that.

"It helps us to capture these people and stop them before they hurt somebody or themselves," Dodson said.

Rodriguez has the Marauder parked on the shoulder of Alligator Alley after ticketing the driver of an SUV traveling at 87 mph in the westbound lane. Unsuspecting cars and trucks fly by the Marauder pushing 90 mph.

The SUV driver told Rodriguez he didn’t realize how fast he was going because he was talking on his cell phone.

"We have a lot of people who are out here on the Alley and they are in Shangri-La for all intensive purposes," he said.

Though the unmarked cars have their benefits, there are drawbacks as well, authorities said. Marked cars have more of a deterrent effect because they are, in a way, mobile law enforcement billboards.

There’s also the problem of being targeted by other law enforcement officers who aren’t aware of the unmarked car, Rodriguez said.

"I had a sheriff’s deputy trying to stop me," Rodriguez said. "I was pace-clocking a car."

Not all drivers are comfortable being pulled over by an unmarked car, but that doesn’t mean they can just ignore the flashing lights behind them, officials said.

"Don’t accelerate," Gonzalez said. "Pull over to a well-lit area, allow the deputy to make contact with you. Ninety-nine percent of the time the deputy that drives those Mustangs is in full uniform. If they’re not, you can ask them for their ID and have them identify themselves.

"We encourage the citizens to do that."