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Kentucky Man Arrested After Shooting Down Drone
McGruber writes: Hillview, Kentucky resident William H. Merideth describes his weekend: "Sunday afternoon, the kids – my girls – were out on the back deck, and the neighbors were out in their yard. And they come in and said, 'Dad, there's a drone out here, flying over everybody's yard.'" Merideth's neighbors saw it too. "It was just hovering above our house and it stayed for a few moments and then she finally waved and it took off," said neighbor Kim VanMeter. Merideth grabbed his shotgun and waited to see if the drone crossed over his property. When it did, he took aim and shot it out of the sky.
The owners showed up shortly, and the police right after. He was arrested and charged with first degree criminal mischief and first degree wanton endangerment before being released the next day. Merideth says he will pursue legal action against the drone's owner: "He didn't just fly over. If he had been moving and just kept moving, that would have been one thing -- but when he come directly over our heads, and just hovered there, I felt like I had the right. You know, when you're in your own property, within a six-foot privacy fence, you have the expectation of privacy. We don't know if he was looking at the girls. We don't know if he was looking for something to steal. To me, it was the same as trespassing."
The owners showed up shortly, and the police right after. He was arrested and charged with first degree criminal mischief and first degree wanton endangerment before being released the next day. Merideth says he will pursue legal action against the drone's owner: "He didn't just fly over. If he had been moving and just kept moving, that would have been one thing -- but when he come directly over our heads, and just hovered there, I felt like I had the right. You know, when you're in your own property, within a six-foot privacy fence, you have the expectation of privacy. We don't know if he was looking at the girls. We don't know if he was looking for something to steal. To me, it was the same as trespassing."
Merideth's neighbors saw it too. "It was just hovering above our house and it stayed for a few moments and then she finally waved and it took off," said neighbor Kim VanMeter. VanMeter has a 16-year-old daughter who lays out at their pool. She says a drone hovering with a camera is creepy and weird. "I just think you should have privacy in your own backyard," she said.
In some states, castle doctrine applies outside of the boundaries of the home. Also, if someone leaves a recording device on your property in an area where you have an expectation of privacy, you would generally be assumed to have a right to destroy it if it were on the ground.
Absolutely. And he used exactly the right kind of weapon, and I'll assume birdshot, which, as long as he was using non-lead shot, is safe enough in that scenario. I hope he's cleared of all charges.
You could call the police and lodge a complaint like a civilized person instead grabbing your gun and shooting randomly at everything that you don't like.
Yeah, the drone pilot was probably being a douche. Does this give people free reign to go randomly shooting at things?
Or in other words do nothing? In my town the poilce won't even come out to investigate a car breakin, they surely aren't going to come out when I tell them someone is flying their toy helicopter over my yard.
Shotgun shot is harmless when falling out of the sky after distance takes the speed down. I've been rained on by shot duck hunting from guns across a lake.
Were talking 12+ guage and not buckshot people. The small stuff just gets slowed down too much to do any real damage after a few hundred yards. Might get in your eye though that would suck.
Kentucky is a "Castle Doctrine" state. Under Kentucky law, to invoke the Castle Doctrine, an intruder must be making (or have made) an attempt to unlawfully and/or forcibly enter an occupied home, business or car; the occupant(s) of the home must reasonably believe that the intruder intends to inflict serious bodily harm or death upon an occupant of the home; and/or the occupant(s) of the home must reasonably believe that the intruder intends to commit some other felony, such as arson or burglary. There are other, more specific conditions and constraints. The law (in Kentucky) also includes a "duty to retreat". So, no, you can't simply shoot trespassers, even in Kentucky.
And yes, you have a right to privacy, but you don't enforce that by taking the law into your own hands.
No they can't. The pellets are accelerated out of the gun by the power an the explosive charge. They then loose velocity due to gravity and (far more importantly) air resistance. While the loss due to gravity is reversed once the pellets reach the top of their arc, the loss due to air resistance continues until they drop below their terminal velocity (the point at which air resistance and gravity cancel each other out).
Any sufficiently elevated shot will have the pellets reaching the earth at their terminal velocity (which is a fraction of the velocity that they leave the gun barrel at).
If the pellets can penetrate a duck in the sky while loosing velocity, then they penetrate a person on the way back down gaining velocity.
Birdshot has a relatively low terminal velocity -- I've had bird shot rain down on me during duck hunting season, and it's literally feels like rain. It's probably an eye hazard, but bird shot isn't going to kill anyone when it falls from the sky. A slug or bullet on the other hand could be more deadly since it's going to have a higher terminal velocity, especially if on a more ballistic trajectory and is still spinning and not tumbling.
At a shotgun range I've been to, they have a duck tower about 150 yards behind the clubhouse. It's surrounded by a fairly thick stand of tall trees, but a couple of the stations result in shooters shot trajectory going through the "hole" in the trees and raining down on the front porch of the clubhouse.
I've been standing there and gotten "hit" -- it actually feels no different than if you through a handful of coarse sand into the air and let it fall on you, actually less since you really only feel a small number of pellets because of dispersion.
Shooters are restricted to target loads of #7.5 shot or smaller, so its very light shot. So light that on their "hard" sporting clays course it's very difficult to hit the distant crossing and away clays in any wind. The #7.5 shot has so little inertia that it just gets blown off target.
Many pheasant hunters I've known have stories about getting hit with shot from people on the other side of a field or road hunting on roads adjacent to the field they were hunting on. It's like coarse sand, and pheasant hunting uses much heavier shot than target shot.
The drone just muddles the issue because nerds are passionate about them.
If a creep kept holding up a camera on a stick to videotape my daughters over my fence, I would put some bird shot in that camera as well.
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Hillview Police detective Charles McWhirter of says you can't fire your gun in the city.
He wasn't charged for shooting a drone, he was charged to discharging a gun within city limits. Reckless endangerment doesn't have anything to do with drones it means he was being a risk to public safety.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
Nice line for a laugh, but this actually won't work.
GPS chips are cheap, and most of the drones beyond the very basic level have them. In the event of loss of signal (And it's a digital, frequency hopping signal that you *might* be able to jam, but you won't be able to take over.) most multicopters will ascend to ~100 feet, fly slowly to their launch point, then slowly land.
KRS 503.080
Protection of property
(1) The use of physical force by a defendant upon another person is justifiable when the defendant believes that such force is immediately necessary to prevent: (a) The commission of criminal trespass, robbery, burglary, or other felony involving the use of force, or under those circumstances permitted pursuant to KRS 503.055, in a dwelling, building or upon real property in his possession or in the possession of another person for whose protection he acts
KRS 503.085
Justification and criminal and civil immunity for use of permitted force –Exceptions
(1) A person who uses force as permitted in KRS 503.050, 503.055, 503.070, and 503.080 is justified in using such force and is immune from criminal prosecution and civil action for the use of such force, unless the person against whom the force was used is a peace officer, as defined in KRS 446.010, who was acting in the performance of his or her official duties and the officer identified himself or herself in accordance with any applicable law, or the person using force knew or reasonably should have known that the person was a peace officer. As used in this subsection, the term "criminal prosecution" includes arresting, detaining in custody, and charging or prosecuting the defendant.
The FAA defines it. 500 feet. 1000 over urban areas. All perfectly reasonable. If a guy is taking pictures from that height or above, too bad. You are fair game.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Many states require that a No Trespassing sign be posted for criminal trespass to occur. Kentucky does not require such a notice, but it DOES define trespassing in the first and third degress as being ulawfully *in a dwelling*. Second degree trespass is as close as he might get. I quoteth the law:
A person is guilty of criminal trespass in the second degree when he knowingly
enters or remains unlawfully in a building or upon premises as to which notice
against trespass is given by fencing or other enclosure.
(2) Criminal trespass in the second degree is a Class B misdemeanor.
Emphasis is mine. As to whether a telepresence (drone) constitutes a "person...upon the premises" will no doubt be the subject for his lawyer and the prosecution to discuss. At several hundred dollars an hour.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
This instance was illegal. I'm an RC modeler, a licensed helicopter pilot, and a drone builder. This drone was flying illegally by all existing laws.
You can't fly over people when below 1000' (and can't fly above 400'). . FAA RC statuary regulation and FAA FAR part 91. https://www.faa.gov/uas/media/...