Surveillance Plane Now Patrolling Lancaster, CA; Austin, TX, Kids to be Tracked With GPS Device

City To Be Watched By Permanent Eye In The Sky

Surveillance plane will record “mundane” activity

August 27, 2012

Infowars.com - The Californian city of Lancaster will be the first to experience a “new era in law enforcement surveillance” with residents set to be watched by a permanent eye in the sky which will beam constant video footage back to police headquarters including crimes in progress as well as “scenes of mundane day-to-day life.”

A Cessna plane fitted with sophisticated video surveillance technology will fly loops around the city and send footage directly back to a Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department dispatch center. Officials plan to add a second aircraft to the arsenal at a later date.

“About a few hours into its maiden flight Friday, the plane’s video feed captured its first incident: a motorcycle rider who had crashed at 20th Street East and Avenue K. Using the video, deputies in the dispatch were able to help paramedics assess the situation before they got to the scene. Later, the department got word that a group fight was brewing at Eastside High School. The plane moved into position and conducted surveillance above the campus. No fight occurred,” reports the L.A. Times.

According to a report by ABC 7, the camera can zoom in to a person walking down the street from three miles away. The system also has a 5 second response time, meaning it can swiftly pinpoint a car and track its movements indefinitely.

Despite claims that the surveillance system will only target crimes in progress, officials admit that the video footage will be stored for two years and can be reviewed in case a crime or suspect was “unwittingly” captured on camera.

Despite the fact that Mayor R. Rex Parris admits the city is cash-strapped, $1.3 million dollars a year will be invested into the project, the same amount of money it would cost to pay for five police patrol cars each with a two deputy crew.

Lancaster resident David Abber called the program a “violation of the Fourth Amendment.” The ACLU looked into the matter and came back with a lukewarm response, stating that some of their fears had been allayed but not all.

The program is unprecedented because, as the L.A. Times notes,

“Lancaster appears to be the first city where a camera will send video continuously to the ground, to be used as an integral part of daily policing.”

As we have previously highlighted, the idea of having a permanent eye in the sky, whether that be via manned aircraft or surveillance drones, remains the priority of law enforcement bodies across the country despite the significant costs involved during a time of economic hardship when some cities are struggling to afford vital services such as firefighters.

Last year, the Ogden Police Department applied to fly an unmanned surveillance blimp at a height of just 400 feet over high crime areas of the city to watch for “suspicious activity.”

The use of surveillance drones and blimps to carry out sweeping surveillance of the public with total disregard for privacy rights is expected to accelerate in the coming years. The FAA has forecast that 30,000 surveillance drones will be in U.S. skies by the end of the decade.

Last month, Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano told a House Committee on Homeland Security that the federal agency was working on deploying drones for purposes of “public safety.”

As we reported earlier this year, the DHS is already using another type of airborne drone surveillance, also utilized to track insurgents in Afghanistan and Iraq, for the purposes of “emergency and non-emergency incidents” within the United States.

Prisoner Training: Austin Kids To Be Tracked With GPS Device

Parental responsibilities eviscerated as state takes over

August 27, 2012

Infowars.com - Children in nine Austin high schools are to be given GPS tracking devices and assigned “mentors” in a program designed to prevent truancy yet one that also illustrates how kids are being treated like prison inmates.

AISD: GPS tracking to boost attendance

“With parent permission, up to 1,700 students across eight high schools will be equipped with a GPS device that looks a lot like a cell phone. They will also be teamed up with a mentor who they have to check-in with using the device several times a day,” reports KXAN.

The program is being overseen by Dallas-based AIM Truancy Solutions. The company boasts that the system has boosted attendance figures at other high schools by around 12 per cent.

Nine Austin schools are currently part of the program as well as other schools in San Antonio, Dallas and La Joya.

The idea of tracking kids with GPS devices and forcing them to check in with a “mentor” is not far removed from prisoners being made to wear GPS ankle bracelets and being assigned parole officers.

Austin is by no means the only city to use GPS technology to keep tabs on schoolchildren. Similar programs are in place across the country, including in Anaheim where kids are seventh- and eighth-graders with four unexcused absences or more in a school year are forced to carry GPS devices.

Palos Heights School District in Illinois is also using a similar system, attaching GPS locators to children’s backpacks in order to “locate kids in seconds.”

The program underscores how school has come to represent prisoner training for many children, with their every action being under constant surveillance, indoctrinating them to accept a similar environment in the outside world.

The justification that students need to be tracked and surveilled by school authorities outside of the classroom for their own safety and performance is one that has been abused repeatedly.

In 2010, the Lower Merion School District in Pennsylvania used school-issued laptops to spy on kids in their own home. The controversy ignited after student Blake Robbins was disciplined for “improper behavior in his home”. It turned out that school officials had installed software on the laptops that used the computer’s webcam to send images back to the school server every 15 seconds.

Schools across the country have also installed surveillance cameras in bathrooms to spy on children.

The story also serves as a stark reminder of how the role and responsibility of parents to discipline their own children is being eviscerated, with the state stepping in to fill the void.

Forget GPS trackers and cameras in laptops – how long before America follows the British example of the government installing surveillance cameras inside the private homes of citizens to ensure that children go to bed on time, attend school and eat proper meals?

Under the guise of “Family Intervention Projects,” social services goons and private security guards in the UK are given the authority to make regular “home checks” to ensure parents are raising their children correctly. Surveillance cameras are also installed inside homes so government spies can keep an eye on whether parents are mistreating kids and whether the kids are fulfilling their obligations under a pre-signed contract.