Not exactly.
Part of it is that most of them are now nanoscale, too small to actually see...
Posted on 12/10/2011 7:34:07 PM PST by Jet Jaguar
Unmanned aircraft from an Air Force base in North Dakota help local police with surveillance, raising questions that trouble privacy advocates.
Armed with a search warrant, Nelson County Sheriff Kelly Janke went looking for six missing cows on the Brossart family farm in the early evening of June 23. Three men brandishing rifles chased him off, he said.
Janke knew the gunmen could be anywhere on the 3,000-acre spread in eastern North Dakota. Fearful of an armed standoff, he called in reinforcements from the state Highway Patrol, a regional SWAT team, a bomb squad, ambulances and deputy sheriffs from three other counties.
He also called in a Predator B drone.
As the unmanned aircraft circled 2 miles overhead the next morning, sophisticated sensors under the nose helped pinpoint the three suspects and showed they were unarmed. Police rushed in and made the first known arrests of U.S. citizens with help from a Predator, the spy drone that has helped revolutionize modern warfare.
But that was just the start. Local police say they have used two unarmed Predators based at Grand Forks Air Force Base to fly at least two dozen surveillance flights since June. The FBI and Drug Enforcement Administration have used Predators for other domestic investigations, officials said.
"We don't use [drones] on every call out," said Bill Macki, head of the police SWAT team in Grand Forks. "If we have something in town like an apartment complex, we don't call them."
The drones belong to U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which operates eight Predators on the country's northern and southwestern borders to search for illegal immigrants and smugglers. The previously unreported use of its drones to assist local, state and federal law enforcement has occurred without any public acknowledgment or debate.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
What a shocker.
” ,,, raising questions that trouble privacy advocates...” John Wayne would be surprised to learn that cattle rustlers have privacy rights that trump private property rights.
The DOD used a drone when looking for the Beltway Snipers.
Do you think the government believes in posse comitatus?
Don’t worry about it, live in the knowledge that our last moments will be immortalised on Youtube. (sorry).
Not unless it can see through two layers of black electrical tape.
And if they activated the microphone, they have been listening to “Radio Classics”
Not exactly.
Part of it is that most of them are now nanoscale, too small to actually see...
Yep. Ever been stopped at a "sobriety checkpoint", "seat-belt check point," "child booster seat checkpoint," or "agricultural inspection checkpoint." In some counties there are inspectors that roam neighborhoods to check trash cans to see if the garbage has been properly sorted into recycling bins. If you try to carry several thousand dollars cash through an airport you'll be pulled aside and forced to answer all kinds of questions. But these are all things that are for the safety and health of us all. You have nothing to worry about if you haven't done anything wrong.
Why do you think it’s any different when you are in your home?
I have no problem with this. No different than helicopters, only quieter.
Because in your home you have a reasonable expectation of privacy. It would take even a bad lawyer two seconds to get that kind of film thrown out in court.
Just imagine if this had happened under Bush.
That applies only to standing armies, e.g. the military.
The fact that you cannot discern the difference between the military and your local police department is part of an ongoing transformation.
Welcome to the Police state...
So be conscientious when you hear: Get Down! Get down! On your face! Now! Now! Now! Taser! Taser! Taser!
Report: Died of natural causes.
Get it? Go to sleep now.
Yeah, my antennae went up when the local news reported Homeland Security raided a couple of stores that were selling knock-off purses and CD's. You couldn't be more right!
There’s nothing we can do about except bitch. And when they arm them with hellfire, we’ll bitch some more, to no avail.
Sooner or later, we will either tire of bitching, or we will submit.
always camera. = always on camera.
Interesting, but...
My wife sat on a jury for a Federal trial where UAV (not necessarily Predator) video was used as evidence to convict a pair of Mexican nationals in a people-smuggling case.
So the article may technically be true - first use of Predator against citizens - but misleading. Non-military use has been on-going for at least the last 5 years...
Since they belong to Customs and Border Protection, why the hell weren’t they being used to patrol the border, stop smuggling and illegal immigation instead of looking for 3 guys who “brandished” on private property - whatever the hell that might be - in freakin North Dakota.
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