SurveillanceFlorida restricts the use of drones by law enforcement agencies

Florida police agencies want state lawmakers to make a special exception in a bill that bans the use of UAVs by law enforcement, so that  drones could be used for crowd control.

The bill, however, won the approval of the Senate Community Affairs Committee without the exception. The Miami Herald reports that for now, UAVs can only be used in  certain emergencies, and, if approved by a judge, for surveillance of suspected terrorist.

“What we’re talking about here is Big Brother and the idea that Big Brother is watching,” Senator Geraldine Thompson (D-Orlando) told the Miami Herald.

Thompson, along with several other committee members, urged Senator Joe Negron (R-Florida), who introduced the bill, to consider dropping some of the restrictions, even though they ended up voted for the measure.

Negron however, said he would vote against his own bill if the crowd control exception was added to it. “We know something about crowds,” Negron told the Herald. “We had a crowd back in the 1700s. It was called the Boston Tea Party. Can you imagine if King George had sent a drone to hover over the Boston Tea Party to see what the American patriots were up to?”

Negron wants to restrict the use of drones in Florida in order to protect the privacy of citizens. Orange County Sheriff’s Captain Michael Fewless said, however, that there is no expectation of privacy at a public event with a large crowd, and that the sheriff’s office would support the bill if the crowd control exception was included.

“We do not want to use the drone to fly over people’s houses, seeing what they’re doing in their backyards,” Fewless told the Herald. “What we are looking for is large scale events.They have no firearms on them [the drones],” Fewless added. “We can’t blow people up. The only thing we can do is take a picture.”

Fewless also brought up the fact that it would save taxpayers money if a UAV was used instead of a helicopter for crowd control at events where thousands of people gather.

The bill does allow law enforcement to use  UAVs  in the search of an escaped fugitive, life threatening situations, and in the event of an imminent threat such as a kidnapping or a large scale fire. Only a handful of law enforcement agencies in the state have UAVs, but Negron said the technology is expanding quickly and that a measure needed to be passed now.

The bill must make it through three more committees before it can be brought to  a floor vote.