Seen in the Daily Telegraph:
“The use of these weapons causes acute pain, constituting a form of torture,” the UN’s Committee against Torture said.[...]
Three men, all in their early 20s, were reported to have died in the United States this week, days after a Polish man died at Vancouver airport after being Tasered by Canadian police.[...]
The company that makes the weapons has said that similar deaths have been shown by “medical science and forensic analysis” to be “attributable to other factors and not the low-energy electrical discharge of the Taser”.
The article is strangely (or not) lacking in details on analogous statistics when other techniques were used to subdue an individual resisting being taken into custody…or the stats on how often innocent bystanders or law enforcement officials are injured when subdual doesn’t occur.
There is no doubt in my mind that some law enforcement folks may have been overzealous in their use of Tasers… a downside that presumably can be minimized with training and appropriate filtering of potential law enforcement officers. However, that’s a phenomenon that presumably exists with other tactics at the police’s disposal.
Also, there is no doubt in my mind that Tasering is not a pleasant experience, except perhaps for certain masochists under the right circumstances. A coworker of mine, at a law enforcement liability claims conference, volunteered to be the guinea pig upon whom a Taser was demonstrated. He deemed the gadget “quite….effective”.
However, stopping a bad guy who doesn’t want to be stopped is likely to be painful and risky to the bad guy. Attempting to do so with the least risk of harm to the bad guy, the cop, or bystanders is going to be challenging…and from what I’ve read, at least until we get phasers that can be set to “stun”, Tasers seem like a decent choice, in some circumstances, among the available alternatives.
Let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater; instead perhaps energy should be invested in ensuring that the bathwater is right for the baby.
1 response so far ↓
1 PittCaleb // 26 Nov 2007 at 9:22 am
We’ve been watching all the reports of recent deaths and seen the stats on the number of people who have died by Taser’s (I think about 1 per week in the US alone). So on one hand, it’s bad, but on the other, if the Taser is being used in lieu of a gun, I think the bad guy would rather be injured and risk death by Taser than a bullet to the head, yes?
The problem lies when the Taser is used in highly unnecessary situations - i.e. the YouTube video where the young man is tasered after refusing to sign a speeding ticket. That’s a cop being lazy and Tasering when not necessary.
PittCaleb