TAMPA, Fla. — Stop pointing lasers at helicopters. If you do, you could be arrested. That's the message this week from area law enforcement.
Police made arrests in two separate cases this past weekend in the Tampa Bay area.
In the first, a Tampa Police Department helicopter was flying over the I-4 / I-275 interchange. Just after 10 p.m. on Sept. 17, investigators say the pilots were targeted by a green laser. The beam was coming from downtown.
The TPD chopper quickly moved to protect the pilots' vision.
"Officers aimed the camera to the location where they believed the laser was
coming from and within seconds, they were again targeted with the green laser," TPD said.
This happened repeatedly, police said, making it tough to fly. Police alerted Air Traffic Control, dispatchers and officers on the ground.
Officers say they determined the person with the laser pointer was sitting in Curtis Hixon Park. They identified him as 21-year-old Gerald Perez. He was arrested.
Around the same time the following night, air traffic controllers advised aircraft to be aware that somebody else was pointing a laser. The warning came after a Cessna flying over Tampa International Airport was targeted by a green beam.
The control tower told law enforcement helicopter pilots. As they responded, they were targeted by a laser, too. Investigators say it was shining from a nearby neighborhood.
They were able to pinpoint the house from which the laser was being used. Members of the Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office arrested Dhaneshwar Sahadeo, 33, who investigators say was holding the laser pointer.
Both cases are still under investigation.
