Switched has a new home! Huffpost Tech.

Click here to visit the new home of Switched!

Hot on HuffPost Tech:

See More Stories
AOL Tech

Google Earth Used to Solve Case of Illegally Dumped Boat

by Caleb Johnson on March 31, 2010 at 03:36 PM

A Florida police officer recently used Google Earth to track down the person who had illegally dumped an old boat into an undeveloped subdivision about 15 miles from Pensacola. According to the Pensacola News Journal, after discovering the 18-foot boat, Deputy Gregory Barnes scoured fuzzy satellite images of nearby neighborhoods on Google Earth. Barnes noticed a large boat sitting in the driveway of a home belonging to Dwight Everett Foster, so the deputy went out and questioned the man, who eventually confessed to the crime. Foster was arrested on a felony charge for littering and can face five years in prison or a $5,000 fine. Disposing the boat at a landfill, though, would've cost just $18. (In fact, Foster's son did properly dispose of it after he learned his dad was being questioned by cops.)

Of course, this isn't the first time law enforcement authorities have used this application to bag crooks. However, this case shows that police might have stumbled upon a valuable crime-fighting tool. By using Google's archived satellite images, officers can work a case without ever leaving their desks. [From: Pensacola News Journal, via: Huffington Post]

Tags: boat, crime, DumbCriminal, florida, google, GoogleEarth, litter, police, satellite, top, Web

Comments

1

HuffPost AOL Social News Most Popular