A recently passed law in North Dakota allows police to fire less-lethal weapons from Unmanned Aerial Vehicles -- commonly referred to as drones.
The original intent of House Bill 1328 was to require police to obtain a search warrant from a judge in order to use UAVs to search for criminal evidence, according to The Daily Beast.
Representative Rick Becker told the news outlet that his bill would have banned all weapons on the aircraft, but an amendment urged by Bruce Burkett of the North Dakota Peace Officer's Association limited the ban on weapons to only those that are lethal. The change allows police to equip UAVs with weapons such as rubber bullets, pepper spray, tear gas, sound cannons and Tasers.
"This is one I’m not in full agreement with. I wish it was any weapon," Becker said at a hearing. "In my opinion there should be a nice, red line: Drones should not be weaponized. Period."
Grand Forks County Sheriff Bob Rost said his department's two drones -- on loan from a manufacturer -- are only equipped with cameras and doesn't think deputies should require a warrant for surveillance.
"It was a bad bill to start with," he told The Daily Beast. "We just thought the whole thing was ridiculous."
