ROBOCOP OF THE WEEKK: GUN SNATCHER
by Hazed
A standoff with a gun-wielding fugitive was ended by a stealthy robot, which crept up on the miscreant and stole his weapon.
Ray B Bunge, a 52-year-old from California, was on the run, having been charged with attempted murder, criminal threats, assault with a deadly weapon, robbery and felony vandalism.
Police chased him on foot, but he hid himself in a small dugout dirt berm surrounded by wire. A police helicopter was brought in and it filmed Bunge, so police could see he was holding a gun. Since they didn’t want to storm his dugout and risk getting shot, they used the helicopter’s and squad cars’ public address systems to try to talk him out, but that didn’t work – he showed no signs of budging.
So they deployed a robot. While the police continued to try to persuade him to give himself up, the SWAT team sent one of its robots to sneak up behind him. “The robot quietly approached the suspect’s position. Through the robot’s camera the suspect could be viewed lying on his stomach looking towards the SWAT vehicles,” the police report states.
“His gun was observed next to his feet and the robot quickly picked up the weapon without him noticing. The weapon was immediately delivered to SWAT personnel.”
Having handed over the gun, the robot returned to the dugout and began to demolish the wire. When Bunge reached for his firearm, he realised it was gone – snatched by the Robocop – so at that point he surrendered.
Score one for the robots.
Source: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/09/20/swat_robot_disarms_shooter/
