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Police Not Issuing Charges For Handgun-Firing Drone -- Feds Undecided
Mr.Intel sends a followup to last week's news of an 18-year-old man getting a lot of attention for posting a video of a handgun being fired from a drone. Despite calls to arrest the man, police say they can't find any reason to charge him. "It appears to be a case of technology surpassing current legislation," they said. Todd Lawrie, the chief of police where it happened, said, "We are attempting to determine if any laws have been violated at this point. It would seem to the average person, there should be something prohibiting a person from attaching a weapon to a drone. At this point, we can't find anything that's been violated. The legislature in Connecticut (recently) addressed a number of questions with drones, mostly around how law enforcement was going to use drones. It is a gray area, and it's caught the legislature flatfooted." The FAA and other federal agencies are still investigating and trying to figure out if any criminal statutes were violated.
It bothers me when I hear of regulatory organizations "investigating" to determine if a law has been broken. If the agency directly responsible for the enforcement of a law cannot immediately decide if an action is illegal how can anyone reasonably expect a regular citizen to know if they are breaking the law?
Out of modpoints but really liked a post? 1BDkF6TtmmeZ3yqXbz9yhdYVqRYnwFoXDj
Welp, now those firefighting helicopters are in REAL trouble
We are attempting to determine if any laws have been violated at this point.
As an american citizen I'm appalled by this statement. This is the land of japanese internment camps and the red scare. We once legally declared a person was 3/5ths a man based on their skin color. Heck, we have a secret prison in another country just to indefinitely punish people for anything we want at all, just because we declared they were an 'enemy combatant.' On a state by state basis we have a dazzling array of local regulations that prohibit everything from dancing to wandering the street with an icecream cone in your pocket. Clearly these officers arent trying hard enough.
Just remember: if you cant find anything to charge them with and they havent broken any laws, chances are good you can just kill them for disagreeing with you and still not be indicted for anything.
Good people go to bed earlier.
He hasn't committed a crime.
If he shoots people or trespasses there's existing law. Flying a hobby project on private land with a gun or a container of fireworks may be ill-advised -- but you don't need to make another law because you feel threatened by the brave/stupid things people choose to do with their life and property.
and just make something up to arrest him for? Cops are good at that. Disorderly conduct is vague enough to stick.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
That's not too hard, actually, from an engineering perspective. It adds expense and complexity, certainly, but it's just a design parameter. Alter the mount to react with uniform stiffness centered around and aligned with the barrel and bolt reaction mass center and you'll reduce your problem to a simple 2DOF force couple system.
I would guess that state of the art drone weapon systems are every bit as accurate as the most accomplished human snipers.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
Solenoid driven trigger pulls (such as used here) do, in fact, require an NFA tax stamp as an automatic weapon. It's a regulation designed around the scenario you describe (push button once, solenoid opens and closes repeatedly).
Almost certainly, that's what the Feds are investigating now, determining the exact details on how the gun was fired (that it did in fact use a solenoid-trigger-pull, etc.).
In other words, it may not be an FAA violation, but it's almost certainly a (probably-accidental) ATF violation.
When did we switch from, "who did this [obvious] crime?" to "let's figure out what crimes X committed?" The feds know what this guy did. Either it's a crime, or it's not. If it requires a massive amount of digging (by subject matter experts) to try to find some law to charge the guy with, it's not justice. I suspect any one of us could be found guilty of multiple felonies if a team of lawyers were tasked with charging us with something. Having said that, this guy's an idiot for having his name associated with a video containing two hot button issues combined together.
It seems odd to me that merely installing a solenoid on the trigger would cause it to be classified as "automatic" when in reality, it then falls upon the software (or the way it's wired) to determine if it's semi-auto or auto. It doesn't look like the software is written to work in a fully-automatic mode. I understand that they might charge him anyway, but I would also think he'd have a reasonable legal defense.
"I have never let my schooling interfere with my education." - Mark Twain
>>>We are attempting to determine if any laws have been violated at this point
What happens to first determining if there was any criminal intent or adverse consequences?
... and this is why you should never talk to police. They might just determine that you have been violating something while talking with you.
"It appears to be a case of technology surpassing current legislation."
They're intentionally not finding a reason to arrest him and they tell you why right there. They want new laws. This is an underhanded attempt at manipulating the public and I very much suspect it will work if the comments on this story are any indication.
If I mod you up, it doesn't necessarily mean I agree with what you've said, sorry.
The gun is legal but his use of the solenoid to depress the trigger may not have been. It may have transformed the "legal handgun" to simply being one component of an NFA automatic-weapon.
So what you are saying... is that when I build my own weaponized drone, I should arm it with a flamethrower instead of a hand gun?
Good to know...
The regulation is clear on this point (so I'm told, anyway, I haven't read it myself), because the *device* at that point has nothing mechanically preventing multiple bullets from firing per "manual action" (the button push in this case), it becomes a NFA weapon.
Essentially, you've got a "manual" operation, a "trigger" operation, and a firing of a round. In a conventional firearm use the manual operation and the trigger operation are the same. Mechanically at that point (in the normal firearm), the firearm prevents multiple rounds from being fired per manual action (by requiring a trigger release, and re-pulling it).
When you're using a solenoid for the trigger-pull, you lose the "connection" between the manual operation and the firing of rounds that is necessary to remain NFA-compliant.
More importantly, unless discharge laws were violated, why should this be illegal?
It's not concealed, nobody was hurt.
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
That's not cognitive dissonance. On one hand you have a teenager building a flying gun in his backyard in Connecticut. One the other hand you have the U.S. military taking out the bad guys half way across the world. Having two differing opinions on these two situations is not contradictory. Are the situations much more complicated and nuanced than how I described? Sure. But for most people, that's what it boils down to, so their reactions make sense.
Three days from now?? Thats tomorrow!! ~Peter Griffin
Never look for rhyme or reason in ATF dictates. You won't find any.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
Only the 2nd should be illegal. There is an increasing trend (decades I mean, if not longer) to criminalize what "might" occur, rather than just criminalizing actual harm. Here's a summary of what I "think" should be the laws: Shooting somebody - illegal Just carrying a gun, openly or not - not illegal. Recklessly shooting into the woods - maybe The last one's the hard part, but it slips so easily into "pre-crime" that it gets weird, and makes people afraid to do anything that "might" end up being a crime, though nobody was hurt. Thus this issue: Putting a gun on a drone - legal Shooting somebody with a gun on a drone - DEFINITELY ILLEGAL All IMO.
Possession, or purchase? In MO, for example, you can own and even carry a handgun at 18, but you can't legally purchase one from a dealer unless 21 or older.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
He is 18 so? How does he have a hand gun?
I had a .22 calibur rifle in the 5th grade (granted it was a single shot). Some parents teach their children weapon safety at an early age. Don't get me wrong, I'm not arguing what the kid did was at all safe and responsible, but fail to see the issue of an 18 year old with a weapon, especially since they can be in the military at that age.
So threatening you with a gun is ok? As long as I don't actually shoot you? Now substitute a drone.
No officer I wasn't shooting anyone, or even threatening them, I was just flying around my armed killer robot.
If we made "recklessly shooting into the woods" illegal, hunting enthusiasts and the NRA would be up in arms.
Besides which, there's no evidence such a thing happened with the drone - all we can tell from the video is that the drone was firing a pistol in the woods. It could perfectly well have been firing into the side of dirt hill that was off-camera. Maybe even someone's safely designed target shooting range.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
Threatening to hurt someone is illegal, threatening to hurt them with any kind of weapon is a bigger charge regardless of the weapon.
Simply having a weapon in someone's presence isn't illegal even if they feel threatened. It isn't your fault is someone is overly sensitized to guns or simply timid.
In the case of a threat it makes sense for the charge to escalate because the level of threat is escalated by a weapon. For everything else where there is a more substantial charge because a gun was involved it's ridiculous. If I actually hurt you it's how bad I hurt you that counts which automatically accounts for a gun. If I robbed you what difference does it make what I use? You suffered the same injury.
Because he is not in full control of the firearm.
Neither is a person who places a firearm in a gun rest and fires it with a string on the trigger for testing purposes.
Arrest warrants all around for the cast and crew of MythBusters, then?
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
So threatening you with a gun is ok? As long as I don't actually shoot you? Now substitute a drone.
No officer I wasn't shooting anyone, or even threatening them, I was just flying around my armed killer robot.
Threatening you with a gun is assault (i.e. threatening you with physical harm) and you can get arrested for it. You can also get sued if you have done an intentional act that is a legal and but-for cause of putting someone in apprehension of imminent bodily harm.
If you assault someone with your killer robot, it's still assault. If you do something stupid but intentional with the robot and it makes people afraid it will hurt them, they can still sue.
We don't actually need new laws to go after people who do something bad with a robot.
1. To prove a concept
2. To get a military contract
3. Profit
Looks like more than 1 to me.
I refuse to sign
You are more likely to get struck by lightning than shot by a gun.
NOAA gives an average of 33 lightning deaths and 297 injuries per year in the US for the years 2004-2013.
GunPolicy.org gives a minimum of 11,068 gun homicides and 64,389 non-fatal gun injuries in any one year over the same time span.
Statistically, a random person in the US is much more likely to be killed or injured by gunfire than struck by lightning.