Hagerstown police find aerial drones to be effective in fighting crime

HAGERSTOWN, Md. (DC News Now) — The Hagerstown Police Department are swearing by the effectiveness of its aerial drones.

Detective Nick Varner says it was due to citizen’s complaints about dirt bike gangs that triggered the use of the surveillance technology.

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“We’ve just been blown away by how successful we’ve been able to use these drones in so many applications,” Varner said. “From high rise search warrants to dealing with the dirt bike gangs, they are really involved with everyday policing.”

Warner was a featured guest at the Hagerstown Rotary on Wednesday and showed how destructive the dirt bikers were in the community.

“They were attacking vehicles, they were assaulting people,” Varner said. “There were a lot of different crimes being committed. There were shootings involving the dirt bikers.”

The drones even captured video of burglars trying to escape from the roof of retail stores they looted.

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“Once felons find out that we have this technology to track them down, to apprehend them, then it is going to be a deterrent,” Rotary club member, Jim Griffith, said.

Detective Varner explained that the drones are reliable backups from the sky when serving search warrants or capturing drug deals.

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