New Las Vegas Sheriff Plans to Use 400 Drones for First Response

McMahill said the department has identified 11 “chronic hotspots” that account for about three-fourths of the crimes reported in the Las Vegas valley.

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October 24, 2022

In a speech Thursday at The Orleans, Clark County Sheriff-elect Kevin McMahill—who as sheriff will command the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police—told a crowd of about 200 that the police department plans to deploy hundreds of drones to shootings, but he did not provide a date for the program to begin.

“For the first time in our agency history, we’re going to be able to keep more officers safe, reduce officer-involved shootings and find more suspects than we ever have, quite frankly,” he said at a breakfast hosted by the Commercial Real Estate Development Association, also known as the National Association for Industrial and Office Parks of Southern Nevada.

McMahill said the department has identified 11 “chronic hotspots” that account for about three-fourths of the crimes reported in the Las Vegas valley, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reports.

“We’re taking 400 drones that are pre-positioned out in these neighborhoods, on top of businesses,” McMahill said. “When the gunshot detection technology goes off, it’ll triangulate, it’ll give the GPS coordinates to the local drone. The drone will be overhead within 30 seconds.”

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