Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Dad shoots down drone hovering in his yard near his girls

If there is any justice in the world, the charges should be dropped and the drones owner should be charged via the FAA instead..

That said, for all the guys who recommend the three S's remember the owner of the drone may well have footage of exactly what happened, up to the point of the drones "serious malfunction" anyway..

From a legal perspective, I am not sure what the best way for the home owner be to deal to with the situation would be, which is a very sad thing in and of itself..

My next door neighbor was having a birthday party in his backyard, having gotten a drone as a birthday present he was playing around with it. Next thing you know, bang he flew it into the side of my house. I was inside at the time unaware of him flying the drone, the noise startled me and when I went to investigate. I was less than pleased to put it mildly when I found the drone in my yard, it had not caused any damage to my house and the neighbor was pretty embarassed. The look I gave him when I handed his drone back to him was sufficient to get my message across. Don't know where he flies his drone nowadays but it damn sure is not over my backyard.

Use a flu-flu fletched arrow. It has extra fletching, only flies about 40/50 yards and then floats softly to the ground. Designed for bird hunting with a bow. Wont lose arrow and wont come down and cause damage.

Yep. Just like attaching a camera to a pole and sticking it over your neighbor's fence. No way destroying that would be legally or morally wrong. Same here.

So if someone drives onto your property, you are legally allowed to destroy their vehicle?

If you can't protect your air space, a home invader is safe as long as he keeps jumping.

It is not about the vehicle it as all about the camera.

If someone parked a camera on a tripod on my driveway it would not last long.

Morally, I agree with you, but legally, I am not sure you can destroy other peoples stuff just for tresspass?? Plus, in this case, you have the issue of discharging a firearm within the city limits..

And besides the criminal aspect, you then have to factor in the possibility the drone owner may take out a civil suit to recover the cost of the damaged drone..

Again, I have no idea whether that is likely to succeed or not, but even if it doesn't, its likely to be an expensive exercise for the home owner once lawyers get involved.

My hunch is that “self defence” aspect might be the best way forward for the home owner, rather than trying to argue straight trespass and/or invasion of privacy..

How is that analogous to my example??

On Sunday, police arrested Merideth on two felony charges: wanton endangerment and criminal mischief. The drone's owner, who told police the device cost $1,800, had the wreckage returned to him. Merideth, however, maintains that he was within his rights. In an interview with Ars Technica, he said the matter came down to issues of privacy and good manners.

If the vehicle that comes onto my property is threatening me, yes I feel I have the right to disable it. Every time.

As to discharge in city limits, really normal people would not care about this, and I certainly don't, but there are things that go along with defense, that eliminate, or should in all states, the liability to other penal code issues.

IE if I"m legal in defending myself, others or my property in a self defense issue, then I cannot or should not be charged with the issue of discharge.

If I am charged with that, then every time an LEO fires their weapon inside the city, they should also be charged. And I'm not against LEO at all if you know me.

Here in the US a lot of us tend to take our private property rights very seriously, much more so than other countries do. I"m glad we do. Blood, sweat, tears etc... into buying and keeping it, its mine, you are not welcome unless invited.

Drones will be an issue until its all sorted out, and I hope they quickly understand that yep, don't ban drones, but they can only overfly public property or property that you own or have permission to be on, and if other happens, destruction is fine.

Firefighting, EMS and LEO have had serious issues with drones already, so much so that if they do ban em, I'm almost ok with that.... A good friend had such a close call in an Air Evac Helo a while back that he quit the service and went back to ground EMS.

What a phuggin crock...

That's why I'm glad I live where I live. First off most people around here wouldn't know the first thing about a drone, much less how to fly one or spell it.

A turret and a ballistic tip would solve the problem and they would never know where it came from.

Which why i said perhaps the homeowners best course of action might be to claim self defence..

However, I don't think the law supports the destruction of property on the grounds of simple trespass or invasion of privacy..

At this point it would seem the home owner has not claimed "self defence" and is simply arguing he has a legal right to destroy the drone essentially for trespass/invasion of privacy.

It would also seem the Police have taken the opposite view and charged him..

I don't agree with this, but the law these days is pretty fugged up in a lot of cases..

Unless they were filming you and recording the drones position via the GPS ect?

That's the ever loving point, they wouldn't know.

Would be interesting to see the effect of firing up a "noisy" unsuppressed motor (or similar) in the vicinity of one of these drones?

If it were flying low enough I would think a good high pressure garden hose would do the trick. A couple good soaks aughta make a point.

How the hell could you claim self defense?

Afraid of serious injury... from a toy drone?