I chair the tech and garden committees at the PTA at my kids' elementary school in Brooklyn, a small, Title 1 (the majority of the families are poor) school with limited resources. A couple months ago the PTA gave money for expensive self-watering planter boxes, flowers, hoses, and other gardening implements to improve the austere, institutional exterior, which resembles a prison. As we discovered this morning, some of the flowers, boxes, and hoses were stolen over Memorial Day weekend.
Since planter boxes must be outside, and the thief must be in the neighborhood to know the boxes are there, it occurred to me that they must be visible from the air and perhaps a camera drone with decent range could be used to recover the stolen property and put a stop to thefts that will surely continue if we merely replace what was lost.
Ideally I imagine flying it from the flat roof of my 4-story apartment building to search in a .5 mile to 1 mile radius, with roughly 30 minutes of flying time and a "go home" feature if it loses contact with the controller or runs too low on battery.
Are there drone aficionados in the SN community who can speak to the feasibility of such a project and/or can recommend models to buy?
[Editor's Comment: Original Submission]
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The company may also be putting itself up for sale: According to CNBC, the company has hired JP Morgan Chase to seek a potential sale. "If there are opportunities for us to unite with a bigger parent company to scale GoPro even bigger, that is something that we would look at," GoPro CEO Nick Woodman told CNBC earlier Monday.
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Also at The Mercury News and Ars Technica.
Related: Ask Soylent: Best Long Range, Camera Drone for under $1K?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by buswolley on Wednesday May 27 2015, @03:15PM
Have a lawyer?
subicular junctures
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 27 2015, @03:18PM
Suuuuuurrrrrre it is.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 27 2015, @03:24PM
http://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=7638&cid=188533 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 27 2015, @06:45PM
To be fair, adults are just big kids.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Tramii on Wednesday May 27 2015, @03:19PM
I don't know if using a drone to search people's homes for stolen property is really a great idea. Would you like it if someone entered your house while you were gone and looked through all your things?
It really sucks that some low-life decided to steal from the local school, but I think your proposed solution is pretty terrible. You are going to piss off plenty of people by spying on them. The chances of actually finding the gardening stuff via drone is pretty low. I doubt the criminal is just next door and has everything sitting out in their yard in plain view. Far more likely they stole it to sell it. Perhaps some kids just trashed it.
You would be better off taking the drone money and having normal security cameras installed at the school. That way if anyone tries to steal the other boxes, you will be able to identify them. Also, it will allow you to protect other things in and around the school.
(Score: 4, Informative) by aclarke on Wednesday May 27 2015, @03:26PM
I agree with this. I understand and empathize with you in your situation, Phoenix666, but buying a drone doesn't seem like the right response.
That being said, to answer the original question, a friend of mine has a DJI Phantom 2 Vision [dji.com]and I've been very impressed with it. I don't know if it's the "best" out there, but after flying it a few times and using the footage I think it's a great piece of kit. That particular one is under $1000 as the Phantom 3 is out. If anyone is looking to buy a drone/camera combo, DJI makes some solid products.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Wednesday May 27 2015, @03:35PM
About as intrusive as looking at your neighborhood on google maps. He isn't talking about hovering outside anyone's windows, he's talking about scanning the area from altitude. Getting into semi-autonomous drones would be a lot of fun. I agree that it isn't as practical as security cameras but it sounds like Phoenix666 was going to spend his own money, not the schools.
I'd guess the property was stolen but i doubt it was by someone less than a mile away (unless this is really urban). It was probably stolen by a parent who does pickup/dropoff by car.
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(Score: 3, Insightful) by Tramii on Wednesday May 27 2015, @07:02PM
About as intrusive as looking at your neighborhood on google maps.
There are two different views I am familiar with on Google Maps. Overhead and street view. The street view maps are what anyone would see walking/driving down your street. If the OP wants to drive his car around the surrounding neighborhoods looking for the planters, that is fine. The overhead view is a one time snapshot probably taken years ago. No one really cares about people looking at that because while you might be able to peer into their backyard, the information is totally outdated. The chances of catching them sunbathing nude is pretty low.
He isn't talking about hovering outside anyone's windows, he's talking about scanning the area from altitude.
OK, so what happens when he's scanning from altitude and sees some planting boxes in someone's backyard or on someone's balcony? You don't think he's going to go in for a closer look? Or maybe he'll just report to the cops every house that has similar looking planting boxes? Perhaps he should just go himself and knock on all the front doors and demand to inspect their planters.
For this plan to work, yes he will have to essentially hover around people's windows. Now maybe the drone will have a good zoom camera and won't need to fly close to the house to peer in, but it's the same thing. He's planning on peeking into everyone's house and violate their privacy.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Wednesday May 27 2015, @07:30PM
So for you it is okay to "spy" as long as the data is very old? Would it be acceptable if his drone recorded the neighborhood and then he waited a few years to look at the video? Also, in my experience google maps are no more than 3 years old. That number is only going to get smaller too!
Phoenix666 is here, there is no need to make assumptions about what he would do. But we can certainly debate about what you or i would do. If i saw what looked like the planters then i would turn the image over to the school and let them decide. I'd probably see who is living at that address and see if it was school faculty, as that could affect who i gave the image to.
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(Score: 4, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday May 27 2015, @09:15PM
It's very interesting to see the responses to this idea and the visceral reaction it has provoked. What I'm talking about is a slightly different take on the age-old, time-honored practice of me walking past your house and seeing my stolen property sitting in your yard, calling the cops, and having you arrested. The only difference is I'm talking about an RC craft that can do it from 60 ft in the air. But the emotional reaction to it has been, it seems, much stronger than the general reaction, even here on SN, to having the NSA in every most intimate part of your home and person, on your computer, on your smartphone, reading every thought and intimacy you share with those closest to you, stealing your medical data, profiling you, flagging you, and truly, totally invading your privacy.
Why is that?
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by KGIII on Wednesday May 27 2015, @11:22PM
It is likely because you walking by their house does not mean you are able to look in their back yard or over their fence. In the back yard or beyond a fence I, personally, have an expectation of privacy from government bodies and from nosy neighbors. That would be why I would be out back or behind a fence. Of course I live in a very wooded area about a half mile from the road so this is figurative in my case.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Thursday May 28 2015, @02:53AM
In that context, yes, for someone to see into your backyard they'd already have to be trespassing on your land. Here, I can look out my kitchen window right now and see into every neighbor's back yard on the block (our blocks are like donuts, with the back yards in the holes, surrounded by 2, 3, and 4 story brownstones and apartment buildings. In an area with this kind of density the only expectation of privacy you can reasonably have is to be inside with your drapes drawn. If the thing you want people to not see is by definition a thing which must be visible (plants that need light to grow), then there's a chance someone can see it.
But this is a long-standing precept of law in the United States, at least. When I was a kid in the 80's the government flew choppers over our valley for weeks to catch people growing marijuana out in the open. They didn't need search warrants because the plants were visible from the air. It's also the same precept that protects the paparazzi who sit in boats offshore celebrities' beach homes with tele-photo lenses and snap pics of stars sunbathing in the nude. They also hire choppers to get pictures from the air, which are like drones that carry people to operate the cameras. Like those guys or not, what they do is perfectly legal. When I lived in Chicago my car was stolen, and when I reported it the first thing the cops asked me was if I had gone around the neighborhood to see if I could see it. Why would they suggest such a thing if it were impossible for me to report that I had seen my car because it was sitting on someone else's property?
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 1) by KGIII on Thursday May 28 2015, @05:26PM
That is why it is figurative. If I were a star and had people shooting pictures of me I would still be unhappy about it. This does not mean that it is illegal, it means that it is something that would perturb me. Just because it is legal does not mean I have to be happy about it. Just because it is illegal does not mean I have to be happy about it. Legality does not mean it is ethical either. You are free to go about spying on your neighbors, and while their response may be illegal, do not be surprised if your children are shunned or if someone takes offense and does the same to you - also do not be surprised if someone slashes your tires. The tire slashing would be illegal, immoral, and not entirely surprising. In my neighborhood (not nearly as dense as your area) I would not be surprised to have the RC shot down, doing so would be illegal but it would not surprise me to see it happen.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday May 27 2015, @09:07PM
The planter troughs are unusual, and visibly distinctive from the brands that Lowes and Home Depot, the two home supply stores in the area, carry. They also have the water meter that protrudes from the top [edgesuite.net] of the box so you can see how much water is in the reservoir and if it needs re-filling. They're also planted with 4 blue pansies (the school colors are yellow and blue) that haven't been in Lowes or Home Depot for 6 weeks (and the gardening committee wishes they had, in order to replace the original single plants that presumably the same thief had dug out of the troughs and stolen from the school 3 weeks ago). So, if we see a planter like ours, with the water meter, planted with 4 blue pansies with red mulch, hanging on somebody's fire escape or back patio, I think it merits a knock on the door from the cops. Especially since we're talking about a schmuck who's stealing from a school where poor kids go. Does it constitute an open-and-shut case? No, but then we're more interested in deterring repeat theft than in necessarily getting the planter trough itself back, and a visit from the police might do that.
No, it doesn't. Let's say that the stolen item was an electric blue Ducati. It gets stolen from you, and you walk down the alleys in your neighborhood and see it sitting on someone else's back patio. Does the thief get a get-out-of-jail-free card because it's sitting on his property? Can he invalidate your claim of theft because you saw it sitting on his property? Of course not. You call the police, tell them you saw it sitting on your neighbor's patio, and they serve the guy with a search warrant and arrest him if they find the bike. Let's take it a step further and say that you can see the bike sitting inside his house through his sliding glass doors. Can you still report its location to the police in response to your original complaint? Of course you can.
There are no alleyways in this part of Brooklyn, or we certainly could walk down them. On my block, I can go to the roof of my building, which is slightly taller than most, and see down into all the neighbors' back yards. Can I be arrested or sued for doing that? No, of course not. And if I do that and see that the guy on the corner has what looks like the stolen property, can I report it to the police? Of course I can.
Using a drone is the same thing, looking at the exterior of a house at something that is plainly viewable, except that it's using propellers to gain that elevation in the x-axis instead of huffing up 4 flights of stairs.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday May 27 2015, @08:36PM
It's a densely populated part of Brooklyn, and you wouldn't know the school had the planters to steal unless you walked by them on the way to the store or the subway; driving past the school on the street, which is an arterial road with a higher than average speed limit and volume of traffic, makes it pretty unlikely a driver would discern the quality of the planters from 30 ft away at 35mph and then say to himself, "I'm gonna steal that!" The zoning of the school itself, which is pretty small and less desireable than every other school in the neighborhood (because it's a Title 1, meaning "poor" school), ranges 3 blocks radius at most from the school. Even people who are zoned for the school try their darnedest to get their kids into other schools in the neighborhood because of that bum rap, which is why we on the PTA have been trying to improve the outward appearance of the school and make it seem more desireable. It is 95% certain that the thief lives in the immediate vicinity and passes the school frequently.
It does not make sense to buy a drone for a one-time use, of course, even if it were successful in helping the school recover the stolen property and deter repeat theft. So I had thought that it could also become the seed for a drone-flying club as a fun way to get the kids into computers and technology and give them early experience in what, for better or worse, is a burgeoning industry. It would also help us get some good press for the school and change our reputation.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday May 27 2015, @08:22PM
They're self-watering planter troughs that are quite uncommon around here. Lowes and Home Depot don't carry them, and even most professional nurseries don't carry them--you have to order them through specialty gardening sites online. They're also designed to be outside, not inside; so it stands to reason the thief has put them outside, most likely in his backyard where it won't be visible from the street.
The idea is not to enter anyone's home, but to get a perspective from, say, 60 feet in the air.
It's an option, too, but likely to be an ineffective one. All the thief has to do is wear a hoody at night, and his face will be hidden in shadow. So all we'd have is footage of an unknown person stealing from the school. Even if the thief did not wear a hoody and the security cameras got a full, clear shot of his face illuminated by the streetlights, it would do us no practical good because it's not the same thing as, "Joe Smith, 445 5th Avenue, Brooklyn, NY." And no cops anywhere will canvass a neighborhood for petit larceny.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by middlemen on Wednesday May 27 2015, @03:28PM
Find some cheap tiny low-powered GPS/RF trackers and implant them in your boxes, that might be cheaper than the drone... maybe even get them solar powered since your boxes are kept outside...
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday May 27 2015, @09:19PM
That occurred to me, but it seemed battery life would be a significant limiting factor, and solar panels sticking out of a planter box to power them would be, it seems, a dead giveaway to the GPS/RFID tracker. On the other hand, if there were something whose battery could last a week or two with the tracker chirping once every 15 minutes, that could work. I could bury it in the mulch and no one would be the wiser. Do you know of brands/models/specs that might fill the bill?
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 3, Informative) by middlemen on Thursday May 28 2015, @12:47AM
Sorry I don't know something that has a good battery life but you should pose this question on reddit in the appropriate subreddit for RFID and GPS and other tracking devices. There you will find folks who specialize in these things and give you suggestions that are good for your problem. Maybe just avoid the mulch story and just say you need to track inventory that is being transported and see how they respond.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Thursday May 28 2015, @02:59AM
Thanks for the suggestion, I'll do that. I'll be interested to see what they say; I've experimented with location awareness in mobile apps and the GPS can be quite inaccurate, bouncing around as much as 100 yards. That's a big difference in a place with this kind of population density, meaning the GPS could bounce between the Catholic Church on the corner and the DayCare center up the block, when the true location is the dodgy house in between.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 4, Funny) by Ken_g6 on Wednesday May 27 2015, @03:34PM
A surveillance drone is way too complicated. How about a surveillance gnome? [digitalspy.com]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 27 2015, @03:42PM
Not only are you likely to not find the stolen goods that way, you are also likely to falsely accuse anyone who happens to have planter boxes himself which happen to look like those of your school (I assume there's nothing uniquely identifying the planter boxes from your school). And even if you should happen to find the stolen planter boxes, unless you can prove that the planter boxes you've found are those that were stolen, you're out of luck anyway. So you're risking trouble and/or neighbourhood conflict without any reasonable chance of getting back the stolen goods anyway.
As of the fear that new items will get stolen again, I'd say you should invest in surveillance cameras instead of a drone. It has a deterrent effect, and if the stuff is stolen again anyway, you at least can be sure that the real thief is on the images. For extra effect, add a set of fake cams to the real ones. The potential thief will not know which are the real ones and which are fake.
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Wednesday May 27 2015, @04:06PM
And for good reason. Search warrants exist for a damn reason. People don't like busybodies assuming they did something wrong and poking around.
That said, I'd still like the fundamental question answered. What is a good, cheap camera drone?
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday May 27 2015, @04:37PM
http://www.tomsguide.com/us/best-drones,review-2412.html [tomsguide.com]
http://www.quora.com/As-of-2015-what-are-the-best-consumer-drones [quora.com]
I think the consensus is the DJI Phantom 2 Vision, which is about $700. There's also the Parrot Bebop [techcrunch.com] which starts at $500 but rises to $900 with the "skycontroller". And the flight time is 12 minutes rather than 25 min. for DJI.
Someone should suggest something in between $200-400.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday May 27 2015, @09:37PM
I did look at the Bebop, so I'm glad you put the actual flying time at 12 minutes rather than what the sales sheet said. Do you have a sense for how far out the Bebop could practically go in that time?
I'm a complete noob when it comes to drones, which is why I submitted this project to SN. I have seen YouTube clips and have read some forums, but that doesn't really tell you if you could use one of these devices on a project like this. Will it tend to crash if the wind speed gets over 20mph? Will the video be unusable due to poor resolution and shaky-cam? Will the thing shatter if it comes down slightly too hard on a flat roof?
I have checked NYC's Drone User Group, but nothing there shed any light on the project apart from a no-fly map of the city that shows my part of Brooklyn to be in the clear.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday May 27 2015, @10:45PM
I am no drone expert, so plan accordingly.
I figure 20 mph is not going to harm the drone, but it might depend [dronebly.com] on the model. The DJI should tolerate up to 33 mph [dji.com] and maybe more. You've probably seen videos of drones flying into clouds at 2,000 ft., around fireworks, above Niagara Falls, etc. They don't seem to be impaired by wind or shakycam.
I don't know the extent of how these drones can be made to operate a flight path [dji.com], but I imagine you want to take a Google Map of your neighborhood and divide it into sections that it can film before returning to you. Recharge and repeat. Your calculations may differ, but I think if it's no more than 5 miles away from you before it needs to head straight back to you on 50% charge, then you don't have a problem. Also think about the camera angle. Will it point straight down or at a slight angle?
Height could be tricky. The further up you are, the harder it will be to spot planters, but the closer to the ground you are, the more chance of an unexpected collision. Maybe the flight planning will allow you to avoid taller buildings but keep close.
If you end up with a few hours of footage, you can watch through it in faster than real time or skip around. Also keep the footage to use in the documentary you make if you end up finding the stolen planters.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Thursday May 28 2015, @02:38AM
Thanks, those are good considerations. I know next to nothing about RC craft, likewise drones, nor have I previously had any desire to learn more, but in this case, for this particular application, it seemed like a solution that is available and that might work (whereas surveillance cameras do not seem to be particularly good at preventing crimes or securing convictions). The suggestion another Soylentil made of GPS/RFID trackers seemed interesting, too, if the battery life could last long enough to be viable. For us, it's not about flying drones per se, but about getting the thefts to stop so we can make our school a better place for our kids. The police will lift no finger to investigate for something so small (to them), so if we can hand it to them on a silver platter to enforce, perhaps they might.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Wednesday May 27 2015, @04:56PM
Are you suggesting that the police are going to prioritize flowerpot theft high enough to do anything other than chuckle?
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(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Wednesday May 27 2015, @04:59PM
Broken Windows [wikipedia.org] is a very common policing philosophy. Especially in places with low crime. Some people view it as socially harmful, excessively targeting of poor people, and not a fundamentally correct model of crime, but it's still a really common approach.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday May 27 2015, @09:44PM
If it were my personal planter troughs, no. But it's the school's (or, rather, the school PTA's). The school is a Title 1 school, which means most of its families are poor. That makes it great fodder for the news media. The school is also half a block downhill from our City Councilman's house, and he is personally invested in it. We have strong connections with our local State Assemblymen and State Senators, half of whom used to be teachers in city schools. Lastly, many of our PTA members have just gotten elected to district- and city-wide Department of Education bodies. So the potential for us to turn it into a black eye for the local precinct is there if they should choose to blow us off.
Even so, the police will do absolutely nothing about it unless they have an actionable tip. That's the idea here. Even if they find the stolen property and cannot prosecute because the evidence isn't solid enough, the deterrent to repeat theft would be enough to satisfy us; we can replace this stuff this time, but we can't do it forever.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday May 27 2015, @10:50PM
If you make it into the local news (for success, not arrest), post the ultimate "I told you so" submission.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday May 27 2015, @09:30PM
You don't need a search warrant if you can see your stolen property sitting on someone's property. If a guy two blocks down steals your car, and you see it sitting in his driveway, do you not get to call the cops because it's sitting on his property? No, of course not. The proposition is absurd. If somebody steals your kid's electric green BMX bike that he races with, and you see an electric green BMX bike sitting in the back yard of a house .5 miles away, do you not get to call the cops because, "Oh well, I suppose it's possible that somebody else in this neighborhood has that exact same BMX bike in electric green?" No, of course not.
I find it interesting that people here who would not see any issue with those examples, do take issue when the seeing is done from altitude. What if I did the seeing by climbing a tree on the street to gain the altitude? If the stolen property were visible that way, it's still fair game. What if I climb to the top of my friend's high-rise residential building and look down into the backyards with a telescope? That's still fair game, too.
If I fly overhead in a chopper and look down, that's still OK. But if I use a camera drone, suddenly it's not? It doesn't make logical sense, but it's very interesting that so many here are reacting as though it's totally, totally different.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday May 27 2015, @04:28PM
If you don't grab a Phantom 2 Vision, there's also Parrot [parrot.com]. I don't anticipate success in finding these planters in a potentially 2-3 mi2 area, and they could have been moved much further away. Surveillance cams might be a better idea. If you can afford the $700 drone, you could also lend it out to students for (supervised) projects.
You might run into trouble [vice.com] flying a drone around in NYC. This [meetup.com] might be useful.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by tftp on Wednesday May 27 2015, @04:58PM
A couple months ago the PTA gave money for expensive self-watering planter boxes, flowers, hoses, and other gardening implements to improve the austere, institutional exterior, which resembles a prison. As we discovered this morning, some of the flowers, boxes, and hoses were stolen over Memorial Day weekend.
People are suggesting that you invest into cameras. IMO, they won't be effective. Thieves will get a truck, come at night in hoodies, and your cameras will record only shadows. You will not be able to return your property; chances are that your evidence won't even be able to support an indictment, let alone the conviction. Thieves these days are brazen, often armed, and the police is afraid to touch them.
Was it some gardening aficionado who stole the boxes? Not likely. People don't fall in love with gardening upon first glance at your setup. Gardening fans know what it is, where to get it, and what *they* need for *their* gardens. Yours is most likely not even suitable to them.
It's far more likely that the boxes were stolen by common thieves who just take anything that is not nailed down. Then they sell these through their network of sellers of stolen property. Perhaps you can find those on eBay, or through Craigslist.
What can you effectively do to prevent the recurrence of the theft? First, don't have those boxes outside. That's the best, IMHO. Even if the boxes cannot be stolen they can be vandalized. Second, if you must have those boxes outside, nail them down. Actually, weld them to the rebar of the concrete. Nothing less will do. This is the fact of life in a large city. It's not your paranoia speaking - the lowlife *is* after you. Technology will not help to solve this social problem, unless it is merely a warning alarm that wakes up a platoon of armed guards and a kennel of fierce dogs.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 27 2015, @08:55PM
> First, don't have those boxes outside.
Hello? Did you read the post?
They are planter boxes. They have plants in them. There only purpose is to be outside.
(Score: 1) by tftp on Thursday May 28 2015, @12:29AM
They are planter boxes. They have plants in them. There only purpose is to be outside.
Plants (and boxes) can be also installed in enclosed courtyards, and indoors, and on balconies, and on the roof, and in many other safe locations. Given the variable weather in NYC, it may be even better to put them inside and plant perennials [sunset.com].
I understand the intent to liven up the exterior of the building... but in the end it all gets down to what you can protect. Obviously, expensive (hydroponic) boxes are attracting attention of thieves. The cheapest boxes cost about $140 new. Solar boxes are more than $200 each [modernsproutplanter.com]. Would you leave $200 in cash just sitting outside, near an empty school, at night? Would you expect to find the money there in the morning?
And from the POV of the thief - what is the chance that the police will start aggressively searching for thieves who got away with several boxes of plants? The expectation is that the police will ignore this crime, even if it is reported. The boxes have no serial numbers, no unique ID, no way to prove that they are exactly the boxes that got stolen. The loss is small; nobody was injured or killed - it's a petty crime. Short of catching the thief in the act, the police can't prove anything. The submitter hopes that the police will act if he only tells them where the stolen property is. Will such a word from "a civilian" be a sufficient probable cause [thelawdictionary.org] for a search warrant if 100,000 of these boxes were made and sold in the state? The judge will simply ask Phoenix666: "How do you know that those are YOUR boxes?" - and that will be the end of it. Perhaps it's for better, because the wrongly accused gardener may file his own lawsuit against the submitter, and the school, and the city... A citizen cannot walk around, peek into people's backyards, and sic the police onto those who he thinks have his property.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by anubi on Thursday May 28 2015, @06:11AM
And I seriously do not think you will find your flowers in the planter.
Its probably in some warehouse filled with marihuana plants by now.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday May 27 2015, @09:50PM
Having them outside is the point, because the exterior of the building looks like juvenile hall. None of our kids should have to go to school in a building that looks like a prison. The planter troughs were screwed on and zip-tied on with industrial grade straps. Putting them in cages nullifies the goal of not having the school not look like a prison, and using chains or cables would not stand up to somebody with bolt cutters. That, too, would take seconds to defeat.
It is true that if nobody had nice things, then there would be no reason to steal. We could all resign ourselves to living in homes and learning in schools and working in offices made of dull, gray cinder block, and own no cars that are parked on the street, and consign ourselves to living ugly, hostile lives because there are a few assholes in the world who steal. Or, maybe, we could take steps to catch thieves and punish them? Just sayin'...
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 1) by tftp on Wednesday May 27 2015, @11:01PM
Or, maybe, we could take steps to catch thieves and punish them?
Yes, that would be nice. But is it only your opinion, or perhaps it is supported by your local police (who seldom finds thieves,) and your Mayor [nypost.com] (who hates the police, and the feeling is mutual [huffingtonpost.com],) and the judges who operate revolving doors, and your Congressmen, and your President [cnsnews.com]?
Crime could be significantly reduced if only those people did their job. But as you can read in the news, that's not what they do. If you are all alone in fighting crime without sufficient authority and legal means to do so, you cannot win. All you can do is to keep spending money on passive defenses in attempt to minimize the damage. That does not reduce the number of thieves; it only creates more targets for them.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday May 27 2015, @11:22PM
If you are all alone in fighting crime without sufficient authority and legal means to do so, you cannot win.
I'm not certain that's what this is, nor that it is legally distinct from walking past somebody's yard and seeing your stolen property in it. Cops won't lift a finger to investigate the theft of a planter trough from a poor school. They probably wouldn't investigate the theft of a rich man's Rolls Royce either, for that matter, if it meant they had to expend effort to do so. But if a school came to them, having done the legwork, with pictures of the property and an address where it is, would they still refuse to do anything? Maybe. But there's a chance.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 28 2015, @02:25AM
So let me ask some questions to hopefully clarify the issue.
If you weren't looking for a criminal, could you legally fly a drone around your neighborhood? With a camera.
--I think the answer is yes.
If that's true, then yes, flying around with an rc plane/drone with a camera attached in order to look for stolen goods is entirely fine.
(Score: 1) by tftp on Friday May 29 2015, @12:32AM
If you weren't looking for a criminal, could you legally fly a drone around your neighborhood? With a camera. --I think the answer is yes. If that's true, then yes, flying around with an rc plane/drone with a camera attached in order to look for stolen goods is entirely fine.
Law is not math. Intent matters a great deal in law. Imagine that the RC drone hits a wire, falls, and cuts up a child with its spinning blades. The operator will have to explain to the judge what it is that he was doing. The judge will learn that the operator was acting as a PI without a license [ca.gov]:
Private Investigator / Qualified Manager
Requirements for Licensure
A private investigator is an individual who amongst other duties (1) investigates crimes, (2) investigates the identity, business, occupation, character, etc., of a person, (3) investigates the location of lost or stolen property, (4) investigates the cause of fires, losses, accidents, damage or injury, or (5) secures evidence for use in court.
A careless teenager will get a slap on the wrist. An adult who was trying to perform a commercial service without being properly certified and caused injury or death while doing it... it's likely time in prison.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 28 2015, @11:58PM
Police aren't afraid. They don't care. You've got insurance (right?) and they have traffic ticket quotas to meet. Gotta get the city it's revenue and look busy.
(Score: 1) by lairdb on Wednesday May 27 2015, @05:49PM
I agree with most of the commenters that this is not a good solution for the OP -- but let's please also answer the question. One of the great values of sites like this is the "oh, I have a very similar problem" value, and if no-one answers the specific question, that value is lost.
(For example, I have a friend who is a cattle rancher, and his mission profile would be nearly identical -- if there were actual answers, this thread would be helpful to him.)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 27 2015, @06:24PM
It does sound similar. Your friend wants to fly drones too rather than do the actual work at hand ;)
(Score: 3, Funny) by c0lo on Wednesday May 27 2015, @08:25PM
There are some answers and you can adapt them too. Like:
* weld your cattle to the rebar in the concrete; or
* Find some cheap tiny low-powered GPS/RF trackers and implant them in your cattle... maybe even get them solar powered.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 27 2015, @08:39PM
> his mission profile
Where's the beef?
(Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 27 2015, @05:49PM
Write all over the stuff in permanent marker / spray paint / engrave. And, tie down what you can with anchors.
If you make them unattractive to be stolen, you will prevent most theft. If it is an idiot drunk, then your efforts will likely not be successful no matter what you do.
But, drones?! Wow.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 27 2015, @05:56PM
Unless you clarify if you are paying for that drone yourself, one might assume that you used this event to convince someone with a budget to buy a drone so you could play.
How about using that money to purchase non expensive, non self watering planter boxes. Manual labor to water the plants perhaps? Or even a committee to organize students to take turn watering the plants? That could even translate into teaching the students a thing or two; how things grow, the rewarding aspects of honest work...
Perhaps you could even use some of the time you were planning on flying that drone to water the plants yourself.
Technology is not always the right approach.
(Score: 2) by isostatic on Wednesday May 27 2015, @11:03PM
So you're saying he could use the drone to water the plants?
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 27 2015, @06:41PM
Have you thought about a Predator [wikipedia.org]? I guarantee you that a single shot will ensure that the offender would never steal flower pots again.
Or exist.(Score: 3, Insightful) by caseih on Wednesday May 27 2015, @10:19PM
I sympathize with your need to catch a thief, but the fact that you are asking this question here tells me you have no experience in RC flight whatsoever. What you are asking for is not only legally questionable, it's irresponsible given your lack of experience. UAVs are fine for research or even pleasure, but you need to learn how to fly first (full manual control), and always fly line of site. After you've mastered that aspect of flight, then, with the help of a spotter, maybe I'd be comfortable with you flying over my head with your remote camera drone. Although drones are often correctly referred to as R/C toys, they are potentially dangerous and should be handled with care. Never fly over people or buildings, never fly beyond line of sight, and never fly above 400 feet, particularly near urban areas. Let's keep R/C safe and interesting to everyone and not do stupid things. If anything is going to kill the hobby with regulation and red tape, it's drone users (can't really call them pilots since most don't really know how to fly) flying dangerously, which is what you're proposing (over people, buildings, beyond line of sight).
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday May 28 2015, @12:18AM
What is stopping him from doing these things? Isn't a DJI Phantom 2 Vision capable of flying over Brooklyn neighborhoods with the camera trained at the ground? Can it be made to fly a planned path and return to the user before it can run out of battery charge?
If you don't want inexperienced pilots to ruin the hobby, why would you insist on manual control? Automated flight would be safer as long as the path has no obstacles. Future consumer quadcopters will be able to avoid collisions autonomously while continuing along a flight path.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0, Troll) by Coligny on Thursday May 28 2015, @03:53AM
great there was one sensitive post carefully explaining why a vigilante redneck who heard of them drones on fox news should not go ahead with a dreadfull plan and you need to patronize it down with bullcrap rationalisation.
No, bubba shall no operate his first RC to become a one moonshiner justice masheen. End of story. The question is as stupid as "where can I bought them helicopter to search from up high for my stolen meth ?"
Yes you can stackup crappy justifications or excuses to validate him until the sewer tank is full. That's still dreadfully retarded.
RC UAV still requires more than a bit of practice and real interest before being used.
It's the legion of flatliner brainded Toy's RUs Obamadrone wanabees that put bad name to the hobby and allow stupidly restructive legislation to be pushed forward.
If I wanted to be moderated by mor0nic groupthinking retards I would still be on Digg and Reddshit.
(Score: 2) by istartedi on Wednesday May 27 2015, @10:54PM
That's the wrong tech choice. You probably only need a few angles on the building. You also need continuous coverage, which isn't practical with flying. Get yourself a couple fixed, wireless cameras. Get a dozen dummy cameras. Post signs. Good luck.
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by Michelle on Thursday May 28 2015, @04:06AM
If you (or someone like you) even tries to do this over my fenced private property and I catch you, you better prepare yourself for a world of trouble because I *WILL* find you and show up with cops and a string of lawyers at your door. If you're concerned about something getting stolen off your property, then put up cameras that are aimed AT YOUR PROPERTY, not at some elses'. This is NOT the same as "driving by and seeing your property in someone else's yard" if you're spying/peeping on private areas of private property that are not in plain view from the public street.
Others may take a much more aggressive approach (more power to them) if they catch you. Mind your business.
"Right now is the only moment you'll ever have; so why be miserable?"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 28 2015, @04:22AM
Let's guess, you will use your drone to follow his drone back to his secret mountain lair...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 29 2015, @12:02AM
It's especially funny because they think they own the sky.