In 2002, a man given the name Song Jiang by the Chinese police escaped from a prison camp.  Song had been convicted of the trafficking of women and children.  This month, 17 years later, Song who is now 63 years old has been recaptured by authorities with the aid of a drone.  Once again proving how invaluable of a tool drones are for police forces, regardless of the backlash some civilians have voiced over police using drones.

The primary complaint that is brought up concerning the use of police drones is that of privacy issues and what exactly are the boundaries for law enforcement officers.  People are worried that with a “Big Brother” like drone in the hands of police officers, their every move can be watched and used against them.  There have also been concerns about police officers using drones to over-policing certain areas, resulting in further tensions for some.  And finally, there is the worry of the safety hazards that drones flying over people can pose.  Luckily the FAA and individual state law makers have made regulations for law enforcement drones.

As of now, Congress has yet to pass nation wide regulations for law enforcement drones, but that hasn’t stopped agencies from creating safe drone programs for police and other law enforcers.  Allie Bohm, an advocacy and policy strategist with the American Civil Liberties Union, stated “In a perfect world, I’m sure many drone operators and law enforcement agencies would like to have national rules, because it makes it easier — you’ve got one rule wherever you are. It also means that the rules apply to federal law enforcement.  That said, we also sort of live in this reality where Congress is not moving on drone legislation right now and … my understanding is that we’re not really expecting it to move, so into that void steps the states.  I think it’s necessary that it’s going state by state, and I think the state legislation is incredibly important…you can put in place reasonable privacy protections for domestic surveillance drone use and still do effective law enforcement.”

And that is exactly what has been happening.  Police departments, fire departments, and emergency response teams all over the country have been safely and effectively using drones to better their performance.  These drones are being used to monitor large crowds in public spaces, collect evidence, provide traffic assistance, pursue fugitives, monitor prisons, assess fires, locate lost persons, and so much more.  That is exactly how the Chinese police in Yongshan were finally able to re-apprehend  Song Jiang.

Earlier this month police had received clues as to Song’s whereabouts.  These clues led the police to begin searching in the remote mountains of Yunnan province in south-west China, near Song’s former hometown.  After exhaustive manual searches of the caves in the area, police turned to a drone for one last chance to finding the missing prisoner.  With the drone’s airborne vantage point the police were able to spot a blue tarp over an outcrop and ground litter that turned out to be the tiny cave Song had been living in for almost two decades.  Song Jiang had become an inmate in his own isolated prison for so long that he had partially lost the knowledge to communicate with other humans.

Song has been returned to an official Chinese prison.  Without the footage provided by the drone he could very well have remained hidden in his cave for the rest of his life.  Drones are helping police officers complete tasks that would otherwise be too difficult or dangerous to do by traditional methods.  They are saving time, money, and lives.