Public can "view" police drone videos in California.
- Thread starter The Droning Company
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This isn't about hacking drones or drone video. It's simply about police departments releasing their drone video under some conditions, as is done with body camera video.
From the article:
"a California State Appeals Court has ruled that some police videos must be released to journalists and the public at large."
The two concerns mentioned were 1) that drones were being launched from the hospital roof and 2) that drones might somehow capture confidential information between staff and patients at the hospital. One seems like "So what?" and the other is imaginary, unless the drones have capabilities far, far beyond what is normal.
It sounds like the Chula Vista PD is very open about their drone usage, to the point of defining launch sites and sharing flight information. This seems like a slow night news filler story with little substance.
Chip
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I agree.
Yes and no. Chula PD is open in that it discloses the regular patrol routes of its drones. However, the appellate court concluded its being overly secretive and violating the CA Public Records Act by refusing to produce any drone videos recorded during so-called "emergency response" flights. Chula's reasoning was that every emergency response was by definition an "investigation" making all such drone videos exempt from public disclosure.
Every state has its own public records act which specifies what records are and are not exempt from disclosure. An exemption for an ongoing police investigation is common. The rationale is that releasing a police report regarding an active and ongoing investigation may compromise the investigation. My hunch is that its uncommon, however, for a police department to claim that every single report relating to an emergency response is by definition forever exempt from public disclosure.
So in the case here, the appellate court said that Chula is not being sufficiently transparent and is violating CA Public Records Act. Since Chula PD is one of the few PDs in the country permitted by the FAA to fly BVLOS, some may find disturbing its efforts to cloak all these flights in secrecy.
I would say that depends on your level of interest in Chula PDs BVLOS flights and using state public records act to obtain government drone videos. You know what they say, one man's trash is another man's treasure.
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Yes, I agree with the court's decision on access to police drone flight information. It seems to me that it should be treated similarly to officer body cam information.
But that particular news story didn't deal with that, just worries about hospital roof drone takeoffs and drones potentially collecting confidential information from staff and patients.
Mike M
Member
Hack? What's up with y'alls stories? At least this one had some information, even if the title is wrong.
Of course the police department didn't agree with the appeals court and tried to take this to the CA State Supreme Court who wouldn't hear it. Huge win for the people.
dronedj.com
Chula Vista police lose court bid to overturn drone video access
California's Supreme Court denies the Chula Vista Police Department effort to overturn court rulings making its drone videos accessible
dronedj.com
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