Jackson, the capital of Mississippi, is now being patrolled by a surveillance helicopter complete with high-tech wizardry such as a zoom camera, insanely high-powered searchlight and an infrared camera, according to Jackson Free Press's Adam Lynch. But the real story isn't in Jackson's pretension to being a big city and wanting to use infrared cameras to illegally see into the homes of its citizens, its that the helicopter is mostly funded by private donations.
While spending $500,000 a year in operating costs on a crime-fighting helicopter might seem overkill for a city with fewer than 200,000 citizens, the city is actually paying very little -- most of the money is coming from private donors, including former Netscape CEO Jim Barksdale.
Even better, McCreery has volunteered that the helicopter will using its infrared camera to peer into houses, something that's been ruled unconstitutional for police officers.
Now the city has signed on to provide $25,000 in startup costs and ongoing operating expense contributions. This strikes me as a supremely odd arrangement. There's now a snooping helicopter that can zoom over and peer into Jacksonian's houses, but its not clear who runs or owns the company.
Disturbing...
