National Capital Region Chapter
Events
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Leadership
Lt. Mark Kaylor
LEDA NCR Chapter President
Lt. Kaylor is currently assigned as a Patrol Shift Commander. He has been with the Sheriff's Office since 1997. Lt. Kaylor serves as a Hostage Negotiator, a Search Manager, an instructor at the academy, and a CIT instructor.
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In 2017, the agency started its UAS function and Lt. Kaylor was one of the initial pilots. He has since moved on to be the UAS Coordinator. Lt. Kaylor has collaborated with the surrounding counties to provide joint training opportunities as well as mutual aid. Lt. Kaylor sits on the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments UAS and HNT groups. Lt. Kaylor is also a part of the Maryland Law Enforcement UAS working group.
Megan Descalzi
LEDA NCR Chapter Vice President
Megan Descalzi is a Crime Laboratory Technician at the Baltimore Police Department (BPD), where she documents and processes crime scenes of varying degrees. Since starting at BPD in 2019, she has been working on implementing drones into the Crime Scene Unit to assist in documenting crime scenes through aerial photography and 2D mapping/3D modeling.
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Megan is also a part-time drone pilot with George Mason University Police Department, which has allowed her to expand her skillset and knowledge with various types of drone platforms and drone missions. She earned her FAA Part 107 Remote Pilot Certification in 2022, and has since received a proctor certification and proficiency evaluation through the Airborne Public Safety Association (APSA) for the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) sUAS test methods.
Lt. Mohammed Tabibi
LEDA NCR Chapter Treasurer
Lieutenant Mohammed Tabibi is the Assistant Commander of Tactical Operations Section, which houses the UAS Unit. Lieutenant Tabibi has served with the department since September 2003 and on the Arlington Public Safety UAS Team since 2023.
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Lieutenant Tabibi has coordinated and managed many large-scale events involving UAS deployments.
Michael Lighthiser
LEDA NCR Chapter Board Member| LEDA Instructor | LEDA Steering Committee
Deputy Chief Michael Lighthiser commands the Special Operations, Research and Training Division of the George Mason University Police Department, which houses the UAS Unit. Deputy Chief Lighthiser has served with the department since January 2008 and is a graduate of the Northwestern School of Police Staff and Command.
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Deputy Chief Lighthiser is the chair of the Northern Virginia Emergency Response System (NVERS) UAS working group, sits on the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments UAS group, and helped found the statewide UAS working group in Virginia, supported by Governor Youngkin's administration. Deputy Chief Lighthiser is on the Law Enforcement Drone Association Steering Committee and the DRONERESPONDERS Advisory Board.
James Lantz
LEDA NCR Chapter Board Member
Corporal James Lantz has been involved in public safety since 2001. He became a Maryland State Trooper in 2008 and has been a member of the full time crash team since 2017. Cpl Lantz serves as the MSP Lead UAS Pilot, and he is a member of the Radiological Response Team and the Incident Management Team. Cpl Lantz developed multiple training programs regarding UAS operations and data processing for the MSP and allied agencies, and he manages the Maryland Public Safety UAS Working Group. After graduating from the FBI's National Counter Unmanned Aircraft Systems Training Center, he also started serving as a Task Force Officer for the FBI Counter Unmanned Systems Unit as a CUAS system operator.
Cpl Lantz has collaborated with the National Institute of Standards and Technology on standardized test methods, has instructed UAS operations and Test Methods throughout the United States and Internationally, and is also a member of the Pix4D Public Safety Working group and is a Pix4D instructor.