Lockport, N.Y. (WBEN) - In the early morning hours on Sunday, Niagara County Sheriff's deputies responded to the call of a vehicle striking a house on Ridge Road in the Town of Lockport.
Upon arrival at the residence after 4:30 a.m. ET on Sunday, deputies discovered an SUV had left the roadway, struck the home, rolled over and crashed into a utility pole. However, the operator of the vehicle fled the scene on foot.
Mobile personnel and the Niagara County Sheriff's Office's Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Team were utilized in a search for the driver with the assistance of a police drone on-hand. The driver, later identified as 26-year-old Timothy Outten of Gasport, was located a short distance away and detained by police.
The homeowner was inside of the residence at the time of the incident, but escaped uninjured. The Town of Lockport Building Inspector was also called to evaluate the structural integrity of the residence.
Outten was transported by ambulance to Erie County Medical Center for evaluation, and was later arrested for Driving While Intoxicated, Leaving the Scene of an Accident. He was also issued multiple Universal Traffic Tickets for the accident, and given a future court date in the Town of Lockport.
A number of law enforcement entities, both locally and statewide, have began increasing the use of police drones to assist in department matters. Whether it'd be to search for a suspect like in Sunday's instance, a missing person, or to aid an investigation, officials like Niagara County Sheriff Michael Filicetti say drones have become a resourceful tool for his department.
"Years ago, we never had this kind of technology. We've had our helicopter for many, many years, but putting a helicopter up takes some time. You get your pilots, get your tech flight officer, get the helicopter ready, get it up in the air. In this incident, the drone was right there with the supervisor, you need to have an observer with them, and you can put that drone up in minutes," said Filicetti in an interview with WBEN. "To have that ability to put it up in minutes, it really saves you a lot of time, and sometimes time is of the essence when you have a suspect that's fled on foot, or if somebody's wandering or missing. It really cuts down your go time, so to speak, and you can get your equipment up in the air. It's very, very beneficial."
Filicetti says the use of these drones depends on how many operators the department has out on the road at a given time. He noted they were lucky on Sunday night, as one of the department's road supervisors, who's qualified to use the drone, was able to deploy the drone after the vehicle struck the house.
"We've used them a variety of times out on the road, and again, depending on the supervision that's working or the deputies that are working, they're actually out on the road with them," Filicetti said. "They take the drones out, and we've had them out for missing people, we've had success after the end of a vehicle pursuit, actually finding a suspect using the drone. And then they're subject to call."
Filicetti adds the Niagara County Sheriff's Office has a whole team of operators, so if it's a serious incident, the call will come in for a two-man team to deploy the drone.
And with the decision to deploy the drones being supervisory discretion, Filicetti says if a supervisor is already working, they know when they can use the drones, and when they would be most helpful.
"If there's nobody working, typically they would look to speak to the chief deputy, he would authorize in these kinds of circumstances where we have people that either are missing or fled on foot. Those kinds of scenarios, where we think having that extra set of eyes up in the sky would be very, very helpful," Filicetti noted.
Similar to many helicopters on the force, a police drone is equipped with streaming video and FLIR technology (thermal technology) that can be helpful at night detecting heat signatures and things of that nature.
"When you're flying a drone or an unmanned aerial vehicle, you have to keep them in line of sight, so your area is somewhat limited. Whereas a helicopter, if we get our helicopter up, same technologies on board, but it can have a much larger search area. So if you're not confined to a smaller area and you have to have some range, definitely we would call in aviation on that," Filicetti said.
In addition to police drones being helpful for ongoing police matters, that footage has become an increasingly helpful tool when it comes to investigations done by prosecutors. Former Erie County District Attorney John Flynn says this instance in Niagara County is the first he's heard of a drone being used in a drunk driving situation.
"In Erie County, we were using drones - the Erie County Sheriff's Department was and the Buffalo Police Department too, to a certain extent - in stolen vehicle cases. Technology was being used in the rash, quite frankly, of stolen vehicle cases that we've had over the past year here. To find out now that we're going, again, one step further and using it for drunk driving is welcome news to me, and it should be welcome news to the residents of Western New York," Flynn said with WBEN on the matter. "Now we are using technology in a smart way to keep our roadways safe. So I am all for the use of technology - drones, more helicopters, whatever it may be - to crack down on drunk driving and the safety of our roadways. That's a unique thing that I hadn't heard before, but I'm glad to hear it."
And Filicetti says the drones are only used for certain types of incidents, and the department would never overstep its boundaries when utilizing them at the scene of an incident.
"There's always that concern that we're putting it up and flying it over people's yards, or trying to look in windows and things like that. That is not the intended purpose of these drones," he said. "There's certain things we can and cannot do with those, and we abide by that."