Posted on 01/04/2005 4:27:48 PM PST by Las Vegas Dave
NEWARK, N.J. - Federal authorities Tuesday used the Patriot Act to charge a man with pointing a laser beam at an airplane overhead and temporarily blinding the pilot and co-pilot.
The FBI (news - web sites) acknowledged the incident had no connection to terrorism but called David Banach's actions "foolhardy and negligent."
Banach, 38, of Parsippany admitted to federal agents that he pointed the light beam at a jet and a helicopter over his home near Teterboro Airport last week, authorities said. Initially, he claimed his daughter aimed the device at the helicopter, they said.
He is the first person arrested after a recent rash of reports around the nation of laser beams hitting airplanes.
Banach was charged only in connection with the jet. He was accused of interfering with the operator of a mass transportation vehicle and making false statements to the FBI, and was released on $100,000 bail. He could get up to 25 years in prison and fines of up to $500,000.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
Aiming a laser with sufficient power density at the pilot's position should be harshly punished, I agree.
Pointing an annoying laser, though, that probably is under the fed guidelines for commercial laser shows, though? I don't think so.
Laser beams spread out after a distance. They are pretty parallell out to a certain distance, then spread rapidly. When I run the equatin for a 532nm green laser with a 1mm aperture, I get a beam spread of 12 to 15 feet at 2 miles. 5 mW spread over that big a circle is .5 microwatts/cm2, and at one mile is about twice that, 1 uW.
If he's in a Laser Free Zone the limit is 50 nW/cm2, this is about two miles from an airport and a very low laser power.
The next zone out is the Critical Zone, running out 10 miles, and the laser beam limit is 5 uW/cm2- vey difficult to get with a 5 mW pointer.
Beyond that, is the Sensitive Flight Zone, and the beam limit there is a whopping 100 uW/cm2.
This is from
http://www.faa.gov/atpubs/AIR/chapter_29.htm
the FAA regs on outdoor laser operations. If a laser hits a plane below these levels and out of the designated zones, it's not a crime per se.
Using the Patriot Act for this case is not good and not a good harbinger of things to come. Remember when the Clinton justice department used RICO laws to silence abortion protest?
Gee, who could have seen that one coming....?
Define terrorism.
This is the kind of information that we need to know and I appreciate that you provide your expertise in the matter.
Our govt should take heed before it willy nilly uses Patriot - needed legislation if used properly - for crimes that are not terror related.
Yes, I do remember well, RICO used for pro life protestors...horrible.
Yeah, odd and alarming. Over zealous application of the wrong law could see this guy getting set free. recall a story last week - no link or specifics, so could be wrong - about attempts to charge a gangster under the terms of the P.A. A bad guy, no doubt [if found guilty], but nothing to do with terrorism.
This kind of mission creep could easily extend to going after anti-abortionists.
Such an absurd definition would be funny, if it weren't true.
The money laundering laws included in the Patriot act are not, and were not intended, to be used only against terrorists.
If you had some knowledge of the Patriot act, I hope you could comment more intelligently.
True. The Clinton administration first tried to get them and were blocked by Repubs. So they went back on the Justice Departments shelf. And when America was kicked in the ____, and was in no mood for reasoned debate, an opportunistic government decided that would be the right time to get their wish list enacted.
How very slimy.
Yep. According to the Patriot Act, "domestic terrorism" can mean anything that involves "acts dangerous to human life that are a violation of the criminal laws of the United States or of any State." Under this definition, any crime anywhere committed by anyone can be considered an act of domestic terrorism.
And to think that some brave "patriots" here are just fine with that.
They'll change their minds just as soon as someone they don't like is in office and not one moment sooner.
The entire design of American government escapes them. The idea isn't give government unlimited powers and hope the 'right' people get elected. The idea is to limit powers to begin with because eventually someone bad *is* going to abuse their powers.
Exactly.
The MSM couldn't possibly wrong about the charges and what laws were applied by whom with the reporting on this incident. - sarcasm
And don't believe what the MSM is telling you either...
I'm not fine with it.
Ah, the Big Lie is brought out for the sheep LOL!
Maybe you'll catch a few newbies who don't know and don't care what the law actually says.
Well, since I quoted what the law actually says in Section 802 (amending 18 U.S.C. s 2331), I'm not sure what your point is.
"(5) The term "domestic terrorism" means activities that-
"(A) involve acts dangerous to human life that are a violation of the criminal laws of the United States of of any state;
"(B) appear to be intended-
"(i) to intimindate or coerce a civilian population;
"(ii) to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion
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