- The Washington Times - Saturday, May 31, 2014

The Los Angeles Police Department announced Friday it had added two “unmanned aerial vehicles” to it’s arsenal on Friday.

The department received the two Draganflyer X6 aircraft as gifts from the Seattle Police Department, the Los Angeles Times reported Friday.

Both drones are equipped with a camera, video recording and infrared night-vision capabilities, the newspaper reported.

LAPD officials were hesitant to refer to the gifts as drones, avoiding negative connotations the word has taken on alluding to privacy concerns.

Department spokesman Cmdr. Andrew Smith said that the aircraft would only be deployed for “narrow and prescribed uses” that will be made clear to the public. Two examples include: hostages situations or instances where a suspect has barricaded himself inside a building.

L.A. officials have had problems with drone usage before. Recently the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department received criticism for flying a small airplane equipped with high-powered cameras over Compton for several days without notifying city residents.

• Kellan Howell can be reached at khowell@washingtontimes.com.

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