As an animal lover I'll make this comment: I'm familiar with Marshall Farms and what they do is despicable. They raise primarily Beagles for product testing- they are used basically as lab rats. They never see the light of day and are exposed to all kinds of toxic chemicals until they die.
Do you know of any other animal breeders who need a large security force? Marshall Farms is infamous for trying to suppress any information about their operation.
As a retired detective with over 30 years experience I made these observations:
Clearly Marshall Farms security called the police because they saw a drone observing their property. (Perfectly legal but they didn't like it).
The police have done this for Marshall Farms before.
The state trooper only wanted to identify the occupants of the van. The occupants committed no crimes and the trooper did not have probable cause to arrest anybody. He could argue that he had reasonable suspicion that the drone flight was suspicious given the current state of terrorist activity nowadays. But it was obvious to me he knew the drone was observing Marshall Farms, not planning a terrorist act.
Given those facts, the officer can ask for ID. If the people refuse, he can legally do nothing. He can detain for a reasonable length of time to determine if a crime had been committed. (In Arizona, that time has been determined to be 20 minutes buy the Supreme Court).
If he can't determine a crime was committed he must release the people. They were stopped for suspicious activity, not a traffic violation, therefore the driver is not required to produce a drivers license.
Clearly, these people were arrested for "contempt of cop". Meaning the officer arrested them only because they didn't comply with his illegal demands.
This is the most blatant and unprofessional case of police misconduct and false arrest I have ever seen. To do this while being recorded defies any sensibility. I gave up counting how many times the trooper lied when claiming the people would be committing a crime if they did not identify themselves.
They did nothing wrong and that us why they were released without being charged with anything.
Personally, I see this as a textbook case of false arrest (civil) and violation of civil rights (a federal crime).
@Don H. - I have to disagree that they got what they deserved. These people are members of yet another organization attempting to shed light on Marshall Farms- I don't consider that "trouble making".
Even if they were just harassing Marshall Farms, that does not justify police misconduct.
Also, the Federal Air Regulations can only be enforced by federal LEO's. Local officers can assist the Fed's but they can't arrest on their own.
I don't recall any of the officers asking for his 107- maybe I missed that.
