Indianapolis Metro PD caught bootlegging on 2m

IPD busted by a local TV station after local hams reported them using 2m HAM radios for "personal and police" communications on 2m simplex. They were heard using "the 7 dirty" words and are apparently unlicensed. The radios shown in the report were installed by the Metro IPD motor pool appear to be Kenwood TM-271A's. I guess all the QRM on their 800 system from Nextel is so bad they have to QSY to 2m to communicate. The report claims IPD has been bootlegging "for years" on ham frequencies.

FCC where are you? Since Riley left this seems to be an ever increasing problem.

http://www.theindychannel.com/video/18779383/index.html

 

Sorry, that comment is entirely out of line !

If you have a complaint about the practice of auctioning spectrum, your complaint should be sent to the appropriate authorities.

They are:

your US senator
your US house of representatives member
the chairman of the FCC
the members of the FCC board

not an enforcement official.

 

Police Bootlegging on Amateur Spectrum

Hope they get fined. There have been people who used radios for illegal use from the private citizen group who got caught practicing what the police did and was punished. Likewise should be shown toward officers of the law, they are not above the law they are suppose to enforce. There seems in society atleast two separate environments but should only be one but that's a sad commentary on society itself.

 

If we were caught using IPD's frequencies we would be hung on the spot, I say they do the same to them as well, but I'd say there is more people to blame for this problem becides the two police officers, the radio techs that install the radios and there supervisors should have made sure and double checked that they were authorized or not so I say they should go after the techs too

 

The Point of Infraction

I wish I had a written transcript of just what happened. I may well have been that the radios were installed for use when and if the local police comms went down and the local em-comm groups were doing their ride-alongs for communication. However, as with most "open" equipment, it was an opportunity and invitation for misuse. The same can be said for every Amateur Radio Installation in a local government facility. Unless Amateurs are present at all times, it becomes an oppotunity and invitation to wrong doing. Remember that the radios in the police cars were not illegal; the illegality didn't begin until unlicensed operation and operation for police business began.

Remember if it is deemed illegal for an Amateur rig to be installed in a vehicle that is used by a person not licensed for Amatuer radio, we might not be able to let our wives, children, or friends borrow our vehicles.

KF7CG

 

Boo on the reporter for making inaccurate (at best) statements:

Speaking of the 2M radios: "hundreds of police officers illegally posess" - Nonsense. There is nothing illgal about posessing a 2M radio.

"The problem is an audience outside the police department is also listening in" - More nonsense. The problem is that the officers are breaking Federal laws.

I love that the FCC has told the department to take care of it internally. Love those double standards.

 

I'm willing to bet, if the other local PD's in the area are checked (Speedway, Beech Grove, Lawrence, Carmel, Fishers, Nora) they will find more 2m rigs being used in cop cars as back channel comms between road officers.

 

The police are NOT above the law. They must follow it as everyone else does. The FCC must bust their nuts just as they would have done to us if we used their frequencies. Then again, if the FCC fines them. There goes the taxes of Inianapolis!

Andy KF4JQD

 

I wouldn't say it's out of line, Ms. Smith's background is one of the original author's of the Scam Plan. Do your research and see who you are dealing with, if you think her interest in keeping the amateur radio service around the way Riley did, you are sadly misinformed.This is the same person who sent a form letter response to myself and other amateurs who reported Ebay sellers peddling modified 2m ham rigs for use on PS/commercial frequencies.

Her response was "we don't have the time or resources..."

Well what are we paying her for then? Is her job not amateur radio enforcement? too busy? if she cannot manage "all the many reports of ebay auctions" tell me how is she supposed to manage a radio service of over 600,000 licensees? and I didn't even add GMRS to that count either.

To author another fine piece of legislation like the so-called "concensus plan"? yeah she and her friends over at the TA and Sprint have done a fine job with rebanding on 800 haven't they?

and yes, some of us wrote our elected officials about the Scam Plan, the words fell on deaf ears. They don't represent us, they represent Sprint Nextel, Verizon, at&t, T-Mobile, google, etc.

now it's 5 years later and the QRM on 800 continues...Sprint is trying to offload the iDEN system anyway so what was the point? Meanwhile the lawyers get richer and we all pay the piper.

The FCC response to what these Metro IPD officers is doing unacceptable and atypical.

 

Sad State of Affairs

1. The implied sarcasm towards Laura Smith won't do much for what you deem inappropriate behavior by the FCC. Contact YOUR governmental representative and get like-minded people to do the same. It is a representative form of government. Your proxy does your bidding.

-.. --- --. --- ...- --- - . ..--.

2. The enforcement of decency on the airwaves is mostly a self-policing (sorry for the pun) entity. There are volunteers that do this under authority of the FCC (if I understood the questions right when I took my tests). If you feel the need to become a driving force in this endeavor where you reside, volunteer.

3. It is unfortunate that a local television station had to become involved in order for something to be done about this breech of decorum and blatant disregard of federal regulation. See item # 2.

'I was told I was gullable, and I belived them!'

 

Hunters on Marine Band...
Public Safety on Ham...
Hams that can make a sailor blush on Ham...
Sound like CB to me...
Unregulated, uncontroled.

 

Remember it is NOT illegal to posess radio equipment modified for illegal uses, but it IS illegal to USE said equipment.

Maybe it is against flea-bays policy to auction those radios, but it is NOT illegal to modify them.

I can also understand the concept of not having the resources to chase
every instance of someone selling a modified radio.
Now, if those radio were USED that is a different story.
But to try and stem the flow of modified equipment is
an impossible task.

Also, someone using a modified amateur radio on commercial frequencies would NOT fall under the jurisdiction of the Amateur Enforcement division.
It would be a matter for the FCC F.O.B.,
but it would be necessary for a complaint to be filed by an agency that had been "harmed" by the illegal radios, with all the supporting documentation.

As to Laura Smiths actions before she was named to the amateur enforcement division, I could care less.
I don't know her, and I wish her well in her new task at hand.

Sounds like you have an ax to grind with Nextel, Verizon, et al.


And, yes Indy PD should get a HEFTY fine, not unlike the Philadelphia
Fire Dept received several years ago.

 

Most law enforcement officers are oblivious to band plans and amateur radio. To support this statement I would ask those who have been pulled over to recall how the officer responded to the discovery of amateur radio equipment. Most officers would rather place hams under arrest and seize the equipment under the scanner law. Mainly because they do not understand the FCC exemption for hams. I would not be surprised if Indy has a ham wannabe as their radio tech who promised those officers a way of communicating outside of the failed cellular phone networks and then sold them the equipment. As far as the inappropriate speech, well cops or notorius for being foul mouthed when they talk to each other no differently than workers at a construction site or in a local bar. I write this with certainty because I have been an officer in the state of Indiana for 18 years. I think that the Indy radio tech should bare the responsibility for this one.

 

I emailed the reporter who did the story to try to find out whether his scanner buff told him what frequencies.

There's a chance the term "ham radio" has been used to refer, generically, to chit-chat on the radio.

 

If the tech didn't transmit w/o a license, then why should he/she "bare" [sic] the responsibility?