Shelby County Sheriff’s Office to begin using drones out on patrol
By
MEMPHIS, Tenn. (WMC) – If you live in Shelby County, you may see more eyes in the sky very soon.
Deputies on patrol for the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office will be using drones on patrol with goals to help serve, fight crime, and protect neighborhoods.
The sheriff’s office has used drones to patrol and keep an eye on large events in the city and county for several years now, but they’ll soon begin using them in everyday scenarios, come next month.
“We don’t have to make that call and wait, sometimes up to an hour, for that drone to get there to start searching the area,” said SCSO Lieutenant Jason Valentine. “We’ve got a drone in the field that can be there within minutes when seconds matter.”
From the East Coast to the West Coast, law enforcement agencies around the country are turning to drones to help them protect and serve.
Next up… Shelby County.
Valentine is no stranger to using them.
“Earlier this year, we really realized that there’s a huge need for drones in law enforcement, actually… right there in the cars, and [with] the officers that are patrolling,” said Lieutenant Valentine.
After successfully testing a drone in the traffic division, Valentine says the sheriff’s office plans to slowly roll them out on Shelby County streets with eight trained patrol deputies.
“We’re going to kind of take a crawl, walk, run, approach to this and put these drones out, and just let these patrol officers have these as another tool in their toolbox to help with things such as missing children, missing elderly people that walk off when a Silver Alert goes out, or an Amber Alert,” said Lieutenant Valentine.
The pilots must get their FAA licenses and take a 40-hour training class, learning policies and state and federal laws needed to operate drones, paid for with grant money.
Valentine adds, though, the training doesn’t stop once the deputies leave the classroom, but continues out in the field when they go to patrol and protect Shelby County residents.
“We want the public to really trust that we’re not going to be out here invading their privacy or flying over houses just for the sake of flying over,” said Lieutenant Valentine.
“If you see a drone and you feel like it’s a sheriff’s office drone, you can either, A: call dispatch or the non-emergency number to verify, or B: trust that if it’s sheriff’s office drone, we’re actually on a mission,” he continued.
Valentine says the drones were purchased using the sheriff’s office budget and can be used during the day and at night.
He also says the training will continue monthly for deputies flying drones.
He adds if anything improper happens, the sheriff’s office could lose its license and ability to fly drones for several years.
They take using them out in public very seriously.
About Post Author
