- Joined
- May 11, 2014
- Messages
- 5
- Reaction score
- 0
This is my first post. I've learned a ton from this forum over the last few weeks and hopefully will have my first Phantom in the next few weeks.
First off, I am a police officer in Florida. I work in a very busy city that has a wide variety of types of people. I must admit that it annoys me when officers are referred to as "thugs" or "bullies" please remember that we all go to work everyday to help the citizens we work for. We are called on to not only fight crime but also solve people's personal problems. Often these problems are not criminal at all, but are very important to that person. So we "try" and resolve it as best we can, and sometimes we are unable to.
Every single patrol officer or deputy comes to work and sits in a briefing everyday. Everyday we hear the complaints of the citizens we work for. Then we go out and try to fix them.
Please take any legal advice you receive on the internet or from a friend or even from a lawyer with common sense and responsibility. Remember, most of the time we are only talking to you bra cause another citizen has a problem they would like to be addressed. So please help us resolve the problem if you can.
One word of advice for this community: stop using the "D" word immediately, call it a quadrocopter or an RC Quad or whatever.
Ok, now to focus on the sibject at hand... Often people will ask us (and sometimes demand us) to stop someone from doing something that is not illegal. Flying an RC aircraft is not illegal in 99% of the US... But it is not a right, and just because a law doesn't specifically reference and RC aircraft doesn't mean you can't break it with one. There are many state and local laws that restrict "video voyeurism" and many of these laws may prohibit you from viewing an area of someone's property that is not in directly in the "public view" in other words: an area where a person has reasonable expectation of privacy can be violated by someone operating a "flying camera" and it may not matter whether it was accidental or not.
How far an officer would take a complaint of this nature depends on many factors. There are very few laws restricting photography/videography of anyone in public view regardless of their age or gender. But parents simply do not care, if you are operating a "flying camera" near a school, bus stop, or park with children nearby... I can assure you at least one parent will not care that it is not illegal.
The FAA is NOT the boss of a local officer or deputy. We cannot arrest you on FAA violations. But we can apply appropriate statues and ordinances even if they would normally not apply to RC Aircraft.
We live in a world where people call 911 because someone is knocking on the front door. We live in a world where people are paranoid of what they don't understand.
Just remember you have the right to do whatever you want until it infringes on someone else's rights. And we live in a world where people think things that they don't like or agree with are illegal.
Hope I can be of help to anyone here on the forum!
First off, I am a police officer in Florida. I work in a very busy city that has a wide variety of types of people. I must admit that it annoys me when officers are referred to as "thugs" or "bullies" please remember that we all go to work everyday to help the citizens we work for. We are called on to not only fight crime but also solve people's personal problems. Often these problems are not criminal at all, but are very important to that person. So we "try" and resolve it as best we can, and sometimes we are unable to.
Every single patrol officer or deputy comes to work and sits in a briefing everyday. Everyday we hear the complaints of the citizens we work for. Then we go out and try to fix them.
Please take any legal advice you receive on the internet or from a friend or even from a lawyer with common sense and responsibility. Remember, most of the time we are only talking to you bra cause another citizen has a problem they would like to be addressed. So please help us resolve the problem if you can.
One word of advice for this community: stop using the "D" word immediately, call it a quadrocopter or an RC Quad or whatever.
Ok, now to focus on the sibject at hand... Often people will ask us (and sometimes demand us) to stop someone from doing something that is not illegal. Flying an RC aircraft is not illegal in 99% of the US... But it is not a right, and just because a law doesn't specifically reference and RC aircraft doesn't mean you can't break it with one. There are many state and local laws that restrict "video voyeurism" and many of these laws may prohibit you from viewing an area of someone's property that is not in directly in the "public view" in other words: an area where a person has reasonable expectation of privacy can be violated by someone operating a "flying camera" and it may not matter whether it was accidental or not.
How far an officer would take a complaint of this nature depends on many factors. There are very few laws restricting photography/videography of anyone in public view regardless of their age or gender. But parents simply do not care, if you are operating a "flying camera" near a school, bus stop, or park with children nearby... I can assure you at least one parent will not care that it is not illegal.
The FAA is NOT the boss of a local officer or deputy. We cannot arrest you on FAA violations. But we can apply appropriate statues and ordinances even if they would normally not apply to RC Aircraft.
We live in a world where people call 911 because someone is knocking on the front door. We live in a world where people are paranoid of what they don't understand.
Just remember you have the right to do whatever you want until it infringes on someone else's rights. And we live in a world where people think things that they don't like or agree with are illegal.
Hope I can be of help to anyone here on the forum!