Free at Last - Quadcopter Freestyle FPV

/This is a public service announcement/

If you're gut ever says that maybe you shouldn't be flying somewhere, or if for instance it's marked but it looks tempting cause there's no one around. It isn't worth the risk. You will not always get a warning. And the possible penalties are actually pretty severe.
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For those of you that don't know a friend and I were recently arrested (by ticket not handcuffs) for flying drones at the Eastern State Hospital here in Williamsburg, VA. I haven't made this very public until now not having known the outcome of the case.

In shortest form, a friend from my monthly drone group that had flown there many times without issue recommended it. I did a virtual tour of the entire property in Google's satellite & street views so I could study the layout prior. There were no signs and the Google cars even recorded while driving down all of these streets as if public. The entire area we planned to explore was abandoned so we figured great... sweet 'bando' action and no soft targets (ie. people) to worry about.

We arrived, it was beautiful, we flew... and then we got arrested by a not so happy Eastern State Police Department that wasn't interested in anything we had to say.

Apparently there was one small (non-traditional) no trespassing sign, on a cable, blocking another entrance, 100 yards away from where we had parked (which we didn't happen to see driving in). The facility coincidentally had been having trouble with vandals and ghost hunters constantly breaking in and we just happened to roll up obliviously right into the middle of it at the wrong time.

So... after lots of stress... going to court twice and facing 1 year in jail, a $2500 fine, and a permanent criminal record for trespassing. The state's attorney and police officer FINALLY agreed in court yesterday to drop the charges at the last possible second. And then the officer leaned in and said that they wanted to get drones at the facility now themselves to better surveille it so what did I recommend lol. Absolute craziness.
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Anyway, the moral of this story is:

A) Don't fly at Eastern State Hospital!
B) Just be AWARE of what can actually happen to you if you're caught flying near any posted signs.

I hope this helps someone out somehow.