Will The Fourth Amendment Be Destryoed By Police Drones?

Although the president’s use of drones to execute the war on terror and those he assumes are associated with it has so far occurred only outside the United States, soon drones will slice through the domestic skies, as well. While the sight of drones over U.S. cities and towns is rare now, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) predicts that by 2020, 30,000 of these unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) will be patrolling American airspace.

Scores of these UAVs will be deployed by state and local law enforcement, adding to the many that will be sent airborne by the federal government.

In a report released as part of a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit, the FAA revealed that it has approved drone licenses for at least 18 organizations, including police departments in Seattle, Washington, and North Little Rock, Arkansas. A story published November 3 in The Hill reports that Houston, Texas; Miami-Dade County, Florida; and Arlington, Texas, are also ready to launch their high-tech eyes in the sky as soon as the ok is given by the federal government.

Aviel Sanchez of the Miami-Dade County Police Department is quoted in The Hill piece saying that although “his department received FAA authorization in July 2011,” it has not sent a drone airborne.

“It’s nice to have that capability. If it does … provide a service while safeguarding our property, our personnel and the citizens, then by all means, we’ll use that,” Sanchez said, as reported by The Hill.

It is the use of those enhanced capabilities that is worrisome to constitutionalists.

Below is a brief sample of some of the information contained in the FAA disclosure regarding the use of drones by local law enforcement. As readers will discover for themselves, often the police department’s description of their intended use for the drones does not match the scope of the permitted flight plans as indicated on maps included in the files.

For example, the Seattle Police Department was issued a license to fly drones within their jurisdiction, and it reported the following intent for their use of them:

The objective of our program is to create a higher standard of safety for members of our community by utilizing the Draganflyer [sic] X6 Unmanned Aerial Vehicle in support of numerous Law Enforcement related functions which could include but are not limited to:

1. 1. Crash site related to interstate transport of hazardous materials,
   2. Crash site related to railroad transport of hazardous materials,
   3. Tactical support of law enforcement operations, and
   4. Search and rescue operations

Within those four objectives are several constitutionally suspect issues. For example, no precise guidelines are mentioned regarding the scope of the searches to be conducted by drone, and there is no indication of how the “tactical support of law enforcement operations” will be conducted so as not to violate the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition on warrantless searches and seizures. That is to say, will officers of the Seattle Police Department be required to submit an affidavit “particularly describing the place to be searched and the persons or things to be seized” in advance of launching the drone?

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