REMOTE-CONTROL POLICING
City’s new robot goes where it may not be wise for officers to tread
KINGSTON » City police are now equipped with a remotecontrolled vehicle that would make most 8-year-olds envious.
The RoboTex Avatar, a small tank-like all-terrain vehicle complete with an XBox-style remote control, is among the newest technologies acquired by the department and is designed to allow officers to do their jobs in potentially volatile situations when “you don’t necessarily want to send cops inside,” said Lt. Michael Bonse, a 15-year veteran of the department’s Emergency Services Unit and administrator of the department’s Police Training Division.
The robot, first deployed on Jan. 20, didn’t cost the Kingston Police Department a penny. In April 2014, while at a conference of the New York Tactical Officers Association, Bonse won the $20,000 robot in a raffle.
After allowing his 8- and 11-year-old sons to test drive the Avatar, Bonse donated it to the Kingston Police Department.
Bonse, 40, is clearly thrilled not only with the tactical applications of the new equipment, but with the equipment itself. As a kid, he only got to play with remote-controlled cars with wires attached.
The Avatar, with the added benefit of its “life-saving capabilities,” including a two-way radio, a 360-degree camera, a headlight and even the ability to force entry by climbing stairs and ramming through interior doors, is way cooler.
On a recent visit to the department’s Garraghan Drive headquarters, Chief of Police Egidio Tinti couldn’t help but taking a turn at the controls. The company bills the Avatar as “a rugged, affordable, easy-to-use tactical robot.”
Bonse said the department was “fully prepared” to purchase a robot very much like the one he won using a portion of a $100,000 2013 grant from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. With the tactical robot in hand, the department is exploring other technology, including a pole camera that will allow officers to look into windows, and an under-door camera that will provide interior views without risking an officer’s safety. They’ve also replaced a negotiation phone kit with one that has cellular capacity, he said.
On Jan. 20, the Avatar was used to enter an Orchard Street residence and locate a 16-year-old boy who authorities later charged with threatening a 22-year-old man with what appeared to be a handgun, police said at the time.
Police did not identify the suspect because of his age. They also did not identify the victim.
After making the alleged threat, the 16-yearold returned to his portion of the residence, according to police, who said attempts to contact the suspect “by phone and voice went unanswered.”
When the suspect saw the Avatar, he surrendered without incident within two or three minutes, said training officer Andrew Zell who was on the scene at the time. Before the Avatar was deployed, Zell said, the suspect hadn’t been responding at all and police had received a report that he was armed.
“Anytime we can not put officers in danger and can have ‘eyes’ on the subject beforehand, we’re in a better spot,” he said, referring to the Avatar’s camera and its ability to relay live audio to the subject.
At that point, in a more traditional policing situation, “we may have spent six or eight hours outside” waiting for the suspect to respond or leave the building, Bonse said. With the robot, after securing the building’s exterior and obtaining an arrest warrant, the Kingston Police Emergency Services Unit used the robot to enter the residence “and were able to safely determine the location of the 16-year-old,” police said in a press release.
Tinti called the robot “a great tool for us.” He said “old school” policing would have required police to “wait it out,” but the robot provided officers with audio and video from inside the suspect’s residence and allowed them to locate the suspect and make a quick arrest.
The robot can save officer’s lives by allowing them to bring phones and even meals and beverages to suspects who refuse to leave their hiding places.
“I’d be content that we’re never in a situation where we need this ... but when time is on your side, there’s almost no reason not to use a tool to check an area,” Bonse said.