Peter Akemann, the former president of Skydance Interactive who was the owner and pilot of a drone that damaged and temporarily grounded a Canadian Super Scooper during some of the most destructive days of the Los Angeles wildfires, has escaped a prison sentence.
In fact, thanks to a plea deal with the feds and an apparent software glitch, Akemann won’t serve a single day in prison for “recklessly” flying his DJI Mini 3 Pro into the wing of the Canadair CL-415 Super Scooper on January 9, Acting United States Attorney Joseph T. McNally said Friday.
Appearing in court in downtown LA this afternoon on a criminal misdemeanor and one count of unsafe operation of an unmanned aircraft, the 56-year-old Akemann soon afterwards walked out the door on a $15,000 bond. He will formally enter a guilty plea at an unspecified date.
Outside the federal courthouse, McNally said that Akemann acknowledged his “conduct posed an imminent threat to firefighting crews.”
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Despite the loss of a pivotal aircraft for five days in the battle against the Palisades Fire that devastated most of the upmarket neighborhood and the risk the so-called illegal drone posed to the two-member crew of the Quebec-based plane, the former video game exec will only have to fork out a bit more than $65,000 to the Canadian province to cover plane repairs.
According to the Department of Justice, the Culver City-based Akemann will also have to “complete 150 hours of community service in support of the 2025 Southern California wildfire relief effort” – whatever that means now that the hurricane-force winds and fires have subsided.
“As this case demonstrates, we will track down drone operators who violate the law and interfere with the critical work of our first responders,” McNally said Friday.
Maybe, but some want a bit more than merely tracking down such individuals.
“This is not justice,” one industry Palisades resident who suffered greatly during the fires told Deadline today after news of Akemann’s plea deal went public. “I’m not saying it would have, but that plane could have maybe saved homes and businesses if it hadn’t been damaged.”
The Super Scooper accident was widely covered on local and national media during the fires, with shock outside Southern California that private drones were even allowed in firefighting zones at the time.
The probe to find Akemann was led by the FBI. With Assistant U.S. Attorneys Kedar S. Bhatia and Ian V. Yanniello of the Terrorism and Export Crimes Section in the prosecuting seat, the Department of Transportation’s Office of Inspector General, the FAA, the LAFD, and CalFire also aided in the investigation, the feds said Friday.
Akemann, who worked at the David Ellison-run Skydance from 2016 until around 2022, apparently took his drone to the top of a parking lot at the Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica on January 9 as the fires raged. Prosecutors say his intent was to get some footage of the blazes, but Akemann lost sight and control of the DJI Mini 3 Pro after it had flown about 1.5 miles away. It was then that the drone collided with the Super Scooper, opening a 3- by 6-inch hole in the left wing. The damage took the vitally needed plane out of commission.
Emphasizing that their client is “deeply sorry” and “accepts responsibility for his grave error in judgment,” Akemann’s lawyers Glen T. Jonas and Vicki Podberesky said today that the loss of control was based in part on the failure of the drone’s “geofencing safeguard feature.”
On January 13, four days after the crash, the drone company DJI Viewpoints brought out an update for its products.
“With this update, DJI’s Fly and Pilot flight app operators will see prior DJI geofencing datasets replaced to display official Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) data,” according to the company. “Areas previously defined as Restricted Zones (also known as No-Fly Zones) will be displayed as Enhanced Warning Zones, aligning with the FAA’s designated areas. In these zones, in-app alerts will notify operators flying near FAA designated controlled airspace, placing control back in the hands of the drone operators, in line with regulatory principles of the operator bearing final responsibility.”
The post Ex-Skydance Executive Escapes Prison Time After Admitting To “Recklessly” Operating Drone That Crashed Into Super Scooper During L.A. Wildfires appeared first on Deadline.
