Since the first drones were used in Afghanistan several years ago, I’ve been told that they would never be used in the United States. I told everyone who said this, they were wrong. First, they were used on the US-Mexican border. Then, they were tested in Houston. Now, they’re coming to the Miami-Dade police department in another case of what we see in war zones end up being used against citizens.

Miami-Dade is blazing new territory for civilian law enforcement agencies. Cops in Houston have tested UAVs, and a sheriff’s office in Colorado has a drone to look for stranded hikers. But no one has deployed a drone in a large metro area.

What’s not clear is how cops will sort out the raft of thorny privacy questions hovering around plans for using this powerful, new eye in the sky.

“At this point, it doesn’t really matter if you’re against this technology, because it’s coming,” says P. W. Singer, author of Wired for War and an expert on drones. “The precedent that is set in Miami could be huge.”

What is clear, is that the police really do not care about the privacy issues. They see the drones as a means to do their job and they don’t care whose rights are trampled on in the process.

MDPD is keeping the details of its deal with Honeywell quiet. The department didn’t respond to Riptide’s Freedom of Information Act request about the contract, but sources confirm the drone purchased is Honeywell’s T-Hawk.

“All the legal and political and ethical… complications and questions we have to figure out are enormous,” Singer says. “What seemed like science fiction just a few years ago is becoming reality.”

Of course they do not want to respond. They don’t want to speak to the media or the public and they certainly do not want to be held accountable for their actions. The public outcry will just be a complication to them.

We’ve seen their use in the United Kingdom and Venezuela’s airships, why are we accepting these invasions of privacy as something normal in our lives? Given the fact that drones can see through walls, how safe are American citizens going to feel once these become widespread? We need to force local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies to be accountable. We cannot let drones become commonplace in our lives and accept invasions of privacy as normal. I, for one, enjoy the privacy I have at home and do not wish to have drones surveilling my every move.