IT'S STARTED!

POLICE HAVE STARTED USING AIRFORCE PREDATOR DRONES TO ARREST AMERICAN CITIZENS
As the unmanned aircraft circled 2 miles overhead, sophisticated sensors under the nose helped pinpoint the three suspects and showed they were unarmed. Police rushed in and made the first known arrests of U.S. citizens with help from a Predator, the spy drone that has helped revolutionize modern warfare. But that was just the start. Local police say they have used two unarmed Predators based at Grand Forks Air Force Base to fly at least two dozen surveillance flights since June. The FBI and Drug Enforcement Administration have used Predators for other domestic investigations, officials said.  The previously unreported use of its drones to assist local, state and federal law enforcement has occurred without any public acknowledgment or debate. Rep. Jane Harman (D-Venice), who sat on the House homeland security intelligence subcommittee at the time and served as its chairwoman from 2007 until early this year, said no one ever discussed using Predators to help local police serve warrants or do other basic work. Using Predators for routine law enforcement without public debate or clear legal authority is a mistake, Harman said. "There is no question that this could become something that people will regret," said Harman, who resigned from the House in February and now heads the Woodrow Wilson  International Center for Scholars, a Washington think tank. In 2008 and 2010, Harman helped beat back efforts by Homeland Security officials to use imagery from military satellites to help domestic terrorism investigations. Congress blocked the proposal on grounds it would violate the Posse Comitatus Act, which bars the military from taking a police role on U.S. soil.
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