ST. LOUIS (KMOX) - It looks like a plan to put surveillance planes in the skies over St. Louis to fight crime has been grounded by a federal court ruling.
A federal appeals court in Baltimore calls the aerial surveillance flights unconstitutional, saying police data captured by the already grounded program cannot be used against anyone. The court says it amounts to a warrantless search, in violation of the 4th Amendment.
That is likely the end of St. Louis' flirtation with the same program. Last year, aldermen were debating an 18-month trial run for the spy planes here. Sponsoring Alderman Tom Oldenberg said he might try to get it going again when the session ended. But now that plan appears unlikely to take off.
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Ohio company, Persistent Surveillance Systems, uses planes to track the movement of suspects and vehicles moments after a crime is committed. They're equipped with cameras that zoom in from the city-wide image and move backward and forward in time to identify the movements of potential suspects and witnesses, telling officers within hours just where to look for people who traveled to and from the scene.
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