A black-and-white drone about the size of a couch cushion took off with a gentle buzz at the Hawthorne Police Department earlier this month, hovering and darting back and forth several times before landing on the podium to applause.
A small audience and local TV news crews had gathered to see the demonstration of “Responder,” marketed as the first drone specifically designed to respond to 911 calls by quickly arriving at the scene, sending a live video feed and providing medical attention if necessary. supply.
The company behind the new drone, Seattle-based Brinc (a tech startup with a 24-year-old CEO), boasts that it will “revolutionize the public safety landscape.” But law enforcement agencies in Southern California and across the country already use drones for a variety of purposes, including 911 response, and skeptics warn of the risk of “mission creep” if the technology is weaponized or used for surveillance.
Some Los Angeles activists have fought to limit police drone use, but Hawthorne’s adoption of Brinc’s Responder is a sign that some local officials are continuing to embrace drones despite pushback and the price tag.
The contract with Brinc started in the low tens of thousands and could grow to millions of dollars, a company spokesman said. The exact price depends on what the drones are used for and the number of launch sites, among other factors.
Hawthorne will be the first agency to test the dedicated 911 drone, with plans to launch a small fleet by the end of this year. They will be deployed to charge “slots” across the city, ready to be dispatched to a nearby emergency, Brinc said in a press release that lists OpenAI CEO Sam Altman as one of the company’s investors.
Many of the features introduced in Responder overlap with commercial drones currently used by law enforcement. One obvious difference is aesthetic, with Brinc adding red and blue lights and a siren to his art.
The Santa Monica Police Department began using drones to respond to 911 calls in November 2021, said Sgt. Derek Leone, who oversees the department’s drone program. It sources its drones from major Chinese-owned manufacturer DJI. Brinc emphasizes that its drones are American-made.
“Brinc is definitely trying to set itself apart by building knowing the many needs of law enforcement,” Leone said. “This is an attempt to tailor the drone specifically to our mission, but we work quite competently with what we have.”
The Los Angeles Police Department first considered adding drones to its arsenal in 2014 when it received two drones from authorities in Seattle; The community rejected them due to privacy concerns.
The ACLU of Southern California voiced its own objections at the time, arguing that drones “could be used for completely covert surveillance that a helicopter could never perform, and could pose certain threats to privacy when combined with other technologies, such as facial recognition software, infrared night.” view cameras or microphones to record personal conversations.”
The LAPD passed regulations in 2019 stating that drones cannot be equipped with weapons or facial recognition software.
Police say drones are useful for monitoring hostage situations or getting a clear view of a barricaded suspect. Drones can also help search for fugitive or missing people and can also provide thermal measurements for firefighters.
At the Brinc presentation at Hawthorne, company founder and CEO Blake Resnick played a video featuring a hypothetical example of a drone in action. A convenience store owner calls 911 to report a possible robbery after seeing a man with a gun near the store. A drone arrives and its camera captures footage showing that the suspected gun is actually a lighter firearm-like weapon, preventing a false alarm.
The Chula Vista Police Department in San Diego County became the first agency to use a drone to respond to a 911 call in 2018 as part of a Federal Aviation Administration pilot program.
Authorities placed drones on the police station roof and deployed them to 911 call points when appropriate.
According to retired Chula Vista Police Chief Don Redmond, who now works as vice president of advanced public safety projects at Brinc, the department’s drones were able to arrive at emergency scenes in roughly half the time it took police officers and also record footage of crimes in progress. .
Chula Vista found that sending a drone to a 911 call allowed authorities to avoid dispatching officers 25% of the time, according to Redmond.
“Everyone across the country is struggling to find staff,” Redmond said. “Here’s an innovative way to keep police officers on priority calls.”
Police departments in Beverly Hills and Irvine also use drones to respond to 911 calls.
“The drone can reach and sometimes even answer the call much faster than a police officer could, even under the best of circumstances,” Santa Monica Police Lt. Erika Aklufi said.
Hamid Khan, an organizer with the LAPD Stop Spying Coalition, said his group fought to keep LAPD drones on the ground between 2014 and 2017, and that there is still “quite a bit of concern” about their continued use.
“They have the capacity for surveillance, data collection and continuous monitoring,” Khan said.
Although drones are only designed for certain situations, such as 911 calls, Khan worries they will become more common as time goes on and “mission creep” will eventually lead to more dangerous applications.
The majority of police drones are not armed, and Brinc says he would never allow his devices to use deadly force, but Khan pointed to North Dakota, the first state to legalize it. armed police drones In 2015.
“They claim they will never arm themselves, but we see how policies can change,” Khan said.
Some local officials shrugged at Brinc’s arrival in Hawthorne and the new controversy it sparked.
Former LAPD SWAT officer John Incontro said drones have long been a powerful tool for law enforcement.
“They get there first and they can get into orbit and see what’s going on,” said Incontro, who is now the police chief in San Marino. “It’s kind of like having the helicopter ready.”
After hearing about Responder, Incontro wondered what features set it apart from the drones his department had recently acquired and was preparing to use to investigate suspicious activity reports at large properties in the area.
“I wasn’t familiar with a company that made drones specifically to respond to 911 calls,” he said. “I don’t know why this is any more special than what I just described.”
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This story was first published in the Los Angeles Times.