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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.
And generally the police will look at the sky, see no object, and say, "If it happens again, call us," and will never do anything.
Except that you can't ask a drone questions.
I expect this to be a legal mess for a long time. This will probably come down to property rights.
The area above the property is private, but the extent of that ownership is not entirely defined. Cases like this will probably define it.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
The fact that the owner(s) showed up before the police did is proof that they knew where the drone was and what it was doing, and that they were in control of it: in other words, an admission of criminal trespassing.
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
We are accustomed to living in a 2D world (unless you live in a tall apartment in NY... and even then) but drones add a third dimension that we are not used to. I think the FAA has been far too lax in allowing drones to operate in unrestricted space and in not applying radio controlled airplane regulations to drones. Already we have drones crashing into buildings, falling on people, endangering commercial and emergency response airplanes etc, etc)
A good starting point would be to recognize the airspace above private property as part of the property, up to the level allowed to commercial aircraft. That would mean that drones could only fly above designated land surfaces.
"He took a duck in the face at 250 knots." -- William Gibson, Pattern Recognition
you _do_ know that outside of physics class we take air resistance into account, right?
So below are all the rules for flying an RC plane. Why don't we simply apply the rules to drones? As a matter of fact, you have to explain to me why the don't automatically apply anyway?
Fly below 400 feet and remain clear of surrounding obstacles
Keep the aircraft within visual line of sight at all times
Remain well clear of and do not interfere with manned aircraft operations
Don't fly within 5 miles of an airport unless you contact the airport and control tower before flying
Don't fly near people or stadiums
Don't fly an aircraft that weighs more than 55 lbs
Don't be careless or reckless with your unmanned aircraft â" you could be fined for endangering people or other aircraft
Come the revolution, the Bourgeois, Capitalistic, "A PARKING STICKER HOLDERS", will be first against the wall!
His drone just got shot down, and his first thought was to go knock on the shotgun-toting property owner's door?! Brilliant.