Judge to probe use of Taser to obtain DNA

Ryan S. Smith refused a judge’s order last fall to give a DNA sample, insisting to police that he didn’t care what court papers said.

“You are gonna have to Taser me if you want my DNA,” an officer reported Smith saying.

So police did just that, jolting Smith with electricity before swabbing the inside of his mouth.

Now the judge in the case wants to know why.

“This isn’t pretty,” Niagara County Court Judge Sara Sheldon Sperazza told lawyers involved in the case during a recent court appearance. “I’m fearful of how he’s been treated.”

Sperazza ordered several Niagara Falls police officers and an assistant district attorney to appear in her court Monday and provide sworn testimony to explain how Smith came to be shocked by a Taser on Sept. 29, 2008.

According to police records obtained by The Buffalo News, officers involved had been told by superiors to “use any means necessary” to collect the sample.

Criminal and civil attorneys say that Smith had a constitutional right to refuse the DNA request.

The judge could have ordered Smith jailed until he gave the sample, the lawyers said, but police and prosecutors had no legal authority to force him to provide one.

“If someone refuses to give their DNA, then they can be held in contempt and be held in jail until they comply,” said Patrick Balkin of Lockport, Smith’s defense lawyer.

Balkin said he never heard of anyone in the nation collecting a DNA sample using a Taser.

“It’s the worse thing I’ve ever seen,” he said. “You don’t even see people in a Third World country treated like this.”

After the DNA sample was obtained and tested, a grand jury last December handed up a 24-count indictment against Smith, 21, of Niagara Falls, in relation to a shooting and a gas station robbery. The indictment includes multiple counts of robbery, burglary, kidnapping, assault and criminal use of a firearm, as well as single counts of resisting arrest and menacing.

The last two charges accuse Smith of pointing a gun at a Niagara Falls police officer who responded to the robbery at a Sunoco gas station in the city on Dec. 24, 2006.

Smith also is accused in the July 27, 2006, shooting of Joseph Harris in the victim’s Niagara Falls home.

Smith’s DNA profile was on file in a state criminal justice databank because he had been jailed for two incidents that took place in 2005.

Sperazza granted him youthful- offender status in those cases.

Smith had responded to an order by Sperazza to provide a new DNA sample last August, before the latest cases landed him in Niagara County Court, but that sample was lost. After that, the court order for another new sample was obtained.

On Sept. 29, Niagara Falls Detectives Jim Galie and Frank Coney located Smith on Niagara Street and told him they needed to swab the inside his mouth for DNA, but Smith “was being uncooperative,” according to a report filed by Officer George W. McDonell.

McDonell responded to the call with Capt. David LeGault and Warrant Officer Bill Gee.

On the way to Police Headquarters, Smith said, “Man, this is messed up. I already gave them my DNA. I’m not giving it up again,” McDonell reported.

Once at headquarters, Smith told Officer Ryan G. Warme, “You are gonna have to Taser me if you want my DNA. I don’t care what the [court] paper says,” according to the police incident report.

Then Smith was taken to the Crime Scene Unit, where Officer Jason Sykes was to take the swab. When Smith again refused, Galie, Coney, Sykes, Warme and McDonell tried to reason with him, McDonell said.

“I ain’t giving up my DNA again, I already gave it up once,” Smith reportedly said. “I’ll sit in jail, I ain’t giving it up again. You’re going to have to taze me.”

Galie then contacted Detective Lt. William Thomson and Assistant District Attorney Doreen M. Hoffmann, McDonell reported.

“It was relayed the officers could use any means necessary to secure the sample,” he wrote.

At that point, McDonell used a Taser to apply a “drive stun” to Smith’s left shoulder. After that, he wrote, Smith complied with the order to provide his DNA.

According to his lawyer, Smith was handcuffed and on the floor when he was Tasered, and was rendered unconscious for a short time. He barely recalls the DNA being taken.

“You get pretty disoriented when you get hit by 50,000 volts,” Balkin said.

After the sample was taken, Smith was charged with second- degree contempt for failure to obey a court mandate.

On the report obtained by The News, the section where officers are asked if the suspect was read his Miranda rights has a check in the box marked “No.”

In any case in which a Taser is used, Niagara Falls officers are required to file a “use of force” form.

On Monday, Balkin plans to call all of the officers involved to testify except Warme, who has been jailed and suspended from his job since FBI agents charged him in October with wire fraud, conspiracy to distribute crack cocaine and other charges.

Balkin said he also plans to call Hoffmann to the witness stand.

“I’d like to give [Hoffmann] some credit in this case. I sure can’t picture any district attorney thinking that they would use a Taser,” Balkin said.

Hoffmann told The News that she will offer a very different version of what happened that day than Smith did.

nfischer@buffnews.com and sscanlon@buffnews.com

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Police Tasers: excessive force or necessary tool?

A crop of legal cases across the US raise concerns over the use of electric stun guns in routine police stops.

It's time to ask our elected officials this question!

Washington – From isolated cases across the country, a debate is emerging over the use of electric stun guns as a “pain compliance” device by law enforcement.

At issue isn’t whether police can use the weapon, known as a Taser, to protect themselves from dangerous suspects or to prevent a criminal from escaping. That is its designed purpose. Instead, the question is to what extent police may use a stun gun against someone who is not actively resisting arrest but who is passively refusing to obey a police command.

To some officers, such refusal is a form of resisting arrest and constitutes grounds to shoot 50,000 volts of electricity into that person’s body in five-second bursts. When a person is tased, the central nervous system is overridden and the person experiences a seizure accompanied by intense pain.

Such tactics would be unconstitutional in a police interrogation room.

By contrast, during an arrest or roadside traffic stop, there are no clear standards for when police use of a stun gun for “pain compliance” might violate Fourth Amendment protections.

Officials at UCLA recently agreed to pay a student $220,000 to drop a lawsuit against the university in connection with a November 2006 incident in which the student was repeatedly tased after refusing a police order to leave the school library.

Last week, the US Supreme Court declined to take up the case of a handcuffed Florida motorist who was tased three times because he disobeyed a deputy sheriff’s command to stand up and walk to a patrol car.

Given the proliferation of police stun guns, the issue is expected come up with increasing frequency across the country, according to civil libertarians.

A controversial alternative to guns

Developed in the 1990s, stun guns have helped reduce injuries to both police officers and suspects by offering officers a safer alternative to a firearm or a night stick.

Today there are more than 375,000 stun guns being used at 13,400 law enforcement and military organizations in 44 countries, according to Taser International, the manufacturer of the leading brand of stun gun.

But stun guns have come under increasing scrutiny. According to Amnesty International, more than 300 individuals have died after stun gun encounters in the US in the past nine years. And even their nonlethal use has been controversial.

Los Angeles police tried to use a stun gun against Rodney King before his arrest degenerated into the now infamous police beating.

In September 2007, campus police at the University of Florida used a stun gun to neutralize a disruptive student at a John Kerry speech. The student’s plea, “Don’t tase me, bro,” became a popular tee shirt slogan.

In the case of the Florida driver, the Supreme Court justices offered no explanation for their decision not to hear his case. The move lets stand a federal appeals court decision that found the deputy’s actions reasonable and justified.

“I hope [law enforcement officials] don’t see this as open season to tase anyone who doesn’t do exactly what they are told,” says Tallahassee lawyer John Jolly, who successfully represented the deputy in the Florida case.

“In the end it is all going to come down to a question of reasonableness under the circumstances,” Mr. Jolly says. “If a reasonable person would think that use of force is going to accomplish a lawful objective and make it less likely that somebody gets hurt, they can do it.”

The tasing of Jesse Buckley

The Florida case involves a motorist named Jesse Buckley who was pulled over for speeding on a remote Florida highway in March 2004.

Mr. Buckley was issued a traffic ticket, but became distraught and refused to sign it. Washington County Deputy Sheriff Jonathan Rackard placed Buckley under arrest, cuffing his hands behind his back. As instructed, the motorist exited his car and headed toward the patrol car.

Before he reached the cruiser, Buckley collapsed to the ground. The encounter was captured on the video camera mounted on the dashboard of Mr. Rackard’s cruiser. The video has been posted on the Internet.

The deputy tried to lift Buckley, but he went limp and started sobbing. Buckley was warned that if he didn’t get up he would be shocked with a Taser.

“I don’t care anymore,” Buckley said. “Tase me.”

The deputy tased him three times before backup arrived, and the two officers walked Buckley to the patrol car.

Photos of Buckley’s body later revealed 16 burn marks.

Buckley filed a lawsuit against the deputy for excessive use of force by a police officer. A federal judge refused to throw out the lawsuit, but a divided panel of the 11th US Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta sided with the deputy. The suit was dismissed.

“The government has an interest in arrests being completed efficiently and without waste of limited resources,” wrote Chief Judge J.L. Edmondson in the 2-to-1 decision. “Even though [the motorist] was handcuffed, he still refused repeatedly to comply with the most minimal of police instructions – that is, to stand up and to walk to the patrol car.”

In a dissent, District Judge Beverly Martin said that “no reasonable officer could have believed that the force used by [the deputy] was necessary in response to the situation at hand.”

Judge Martin added: “The question in this case is whether a taser gun may be used repeatedly against a peaceful individual as a pain-compliance device – that is, as an electric prod – to force him to comply with an order to move.”

Courts loath to second-guess police

The appeals court decision creates a dangerous legal precedent permitting the use of tasers to force compliance with police orders, says Miami lawyer Michael Masinter, who represented Buckley.

“It isn’t hard to envision police officers dealing with anti-abortion protesters or civil rights protesters – pick your political issue,” he says. “There is nothing in this decision that forbids police officers from using tasers to break that up.”

Jolly views the case differently. He says police officers face an array of dangers during roadside stops and that it is wrong to second-guess split second judgments after the fact.

“This guy could turn from sobbing basket-case into a raging wild man at the snap of a finger. That officer is in a surprisingly difficult situation,” Jolly says.

Mr. Masinter disagrees. “Mr. Buckley was no threat to anybody,” he says. “There was no active resistance here and therefore no authority to use this kind of force.”

Jolly says the courts – including the Supreme Court – are generally reluctant to second-guess a police officer acting alone in a potentially dangerous situation. “In baseball, all ties go to the runner,” he says. “In federal civil rights litigation against individual officers, all doubts go to the officer. Close calls are his.”

Related Stories

Britain abuzz over a new plan to arm bobbies with Tasers 12/11/2008

Are stun guns too deadly? Louisiana case adds to debate. 08/12/2008

Police stun guns pack volts – and debate 07/15/2004

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Police in U.S. Could Soon Have “Pain Ray” Guns

Imagine a world where police have the ability to fire pain ray guns at protesters that instantly cause them excruciating pain as soon as they are activated.

NewScientist is reporting that the U.S. Department of Justice is developing two portable "non-lethal" weapons that inflict severe pain from a distance using either microwave technology or laser beams.

Imagine a world where police have the ability to torture from a distance anyone they want at the touch of a button.

Does that sound like something out of a science fiction novel?

It’s not.

It is in the final stages of development and could soon be a reality on the streets of America.

NewScientist is reporting that the U.S. Department of Justice is developing two portable “non-lethal” weapons that inflict severe pain from a distance using either microwave technology or laser beams.

According to that report, the intention of the U.S. Department of Justice is to put these pain ray weapons into the hands of police on the streets of America.

Some observers are very upset about this development, as they claim that giving police the ability to instantly torture anyone they want from a distance is a very dangerous thing to do.

Others are applauding the development of these new “non-lethal” weapons as a step away from the use of “lethal” weapons by police.

All of this comes a couple of months after a report that the U.S. Army will be deploying mobile pain ray trucks (called the Active Denial System) that have the capability to instantly fry the flesh of whole crowds of protesters using microwave technology.

Imagine that.

A whole crowd of rioters actually being cooked like they are in a microwave oven.

Frightening stuff.

Instead of finding more ways to torture and kill one another, perhaps we all should be looking for more ways to love each other.

Just a thought.

Source

Take Your Child To Work Day: 43 Children Stun-Gunned At Jail

From the Miami Herald

A total of 43 children were directly and indirectly shocked by electric stun guns during simultaneous ”Take Your Sons and Daughters to Work Day” events gone wrong at three state prisons, according to new information provided Friday by the Florida Department of Corrections.

Also, a group of kids was exposed to tear gas during a demonstration at another lockup.

Three prison guards have been fired, two have resigned and 16 more employees — from corrections officers to a warden — will be disciplined due to the incidents that unfolded April 23, said DOC Secretary Walt McNeil. An investigation is ongoing.

None of the children in any of the incidents required medical attention or was notably harmed, McNeil said. He said the children, who ranged in age from 5 to 17, were all children of prison officials.

In nearly every case, the guards had permission from parents or grandparents to administer the ”electronic immobilization devices,” McNeil said.

”I can’t imagine what these officers were thinking to administer this device to children, nor can I imagine why any parent would allow them to do so,” McNeil said. “This must not happen again.”

McNeil called the episode ”embarrassing” for the nation’s fourth-largest prison system. It has been rocked by far more serious scandal.

A McNeil predecessor, Jimmy Crosby, is incarcerated in a federal prison for taking bribes. Other guards were busted in a steroid ring, rampant pilfering, misusing inmate labor, and beer-soaked brawls stemming from a cutthroat culture of interprison softball games, in which a semi-pro baseball player was given a no-show job to help one institution win on the diamond.

Source

Note: Full article was deleted by the Miami Herald.

Related:

Corrections sergeant shocks kids with stun gun during prison visit

It was “Take Our Daughters and Sons to Work Day” at the Franklin Correctional Institution, and Sgt. Walter Schmidt wanted to give the kids an idea of what their parents do.

So he took out a handheld stun device and zapped them with 50,000 volts of electricity.

The children, whose ages are not available, reportedly yelped in pain, fell to the ground and grabbed red burn marks on their arms. One was taken to a nearby hospital.

DOC spokeswoman Jo Ellyn Rackleff said in an e-mail, “We believe that a number of children may have received a shock.”

Schmidt, the arsenal sergeant at the Panhandle prison, said he asked parents for permission to shock the kids.

“When they said ’sure,’ I went ahead and did it,” he said by phone Friday.

Three days after the April 24 incident, Warden Duffie Harrison wrote Schmidt that his “retention would be detrimental to the best interests of the state” because he had “engaged in inappropriate conduct while demonstrating weapons … to several kids during a special event at the institution.”

“You tased at least two kids to demonstrate the EID, which is in direct violation of procedure and placed the department at risk of litigation,” Harrison wrote.

Schmidt was terminated after 14 years with the Department of Corrections.

“It wasn’t intended to be malicious, but educational,” Schmidt said. “The big shock came when I got fired.”

DOC Secretary Walt McNeil expressed concern for the children, whose names were not released, and ordered a full investigation into the matter.

Schmidt said he could not give more details about what happened because of the investigation.

Electronic Immobilization Devices such as the one Schmidt demonstrated are typically used to subdue unruly or uncooperative inmates.

Unlike the Taser, which is fired at a distance and delivers its shock via dart-tipped wires, the EID Schmidt used must be in direct contact with the person to shock them. The 50,000 volts emitted by the device are 450 times as strong as the current in a household electrical outlet.

EIDs work by temporarily disrupting the person’s neural and muscular systems. Deaths have been attributed to the devices, though other factors such as drug use and other health problems are often said to play a role.

Source

Wireless Tasers extend the long arm of the law

XREP projectile

TASER stun guns are going wireless, doubling their range.

The Taser XREP is an electrically charged dart that can be fired from up to 20 metres away with a 12-gauge shotgun. Upon impact, its barbed electrodes penetrate a victim’s skin, discharging a 20-second burst of electricity to “distract, disorient and entice the subject to grab the projectile”, says Taser. But grabbing the dart routes the shock through the hand, making it difficult to let go and spreading the pain further.

While the XREP delivers a lower voltage for a longer time, a spokeswoman for Taser says its effect is similar to existing versions.

Commercial production of the XREP is due to start later this month, with US police departments and the US military expected to be using the weapons by the end of 2009.

Source

Related:

NEW Taser XREP!
Law Enforcement Only

Introducing the TASER XREP – the eXtended Range Electronic Projectile. XREP is a self-contained, wireless projectile that fires from a standard 12-gauge shotgun. It delivers the same Neuro-Muscular Incapacitation (NMI) bio-effect as our handheld TASER X26, but can be delivered to a distance of up to 100 feet, combining blunt impact with field proven TASER NMI.

The core technology that made the XREP possible is the XREP engine. A stunning engineering achievement, the XREP Engine provides the same bio-effect as our field proven X26, but from an electronics package that weighs only 2.4 grams and consumes less than one tenth of a cubic inch. In order to achieve a wireless projectile, the battery is fully integrated into the chassis and autonomously provides the power to drive the XREP engine for its full 20-second cycle.

The XREP comes pre-packaged in shell that is compatible with existing 12 gauge launchers. The transparent shell ensures officers properly identify the XREP prior to loading it in the shotgun.

As the TASER XREP is deployed, a rip cord attached between the shell and the projectile activates the projectile. Once activated, the TASER XREP is “live” as it comes out of the barrel. The XREP autonomously generates incapacitating Neuro Muscular Incapacitation for 20 continuous seconds — enough time to close the distance and take the offender into custody without risking injury to officers.

Not only does the XREP incorporate a revolutionary electronic payload, the XREP also incorporates a radical new spin stabilization technology to maximize accuracy. As the XREP leaves the barrel, 3 torsion spring fins deploy, causing the projectile to spin, even when launched from a smooth bore, providing superior accuracy and flight stabilization. The TASER XREP launch velocity is approximately 300 feet per second.

The nose assembly of the XREP contains 4 forward facing barbed electrodes and the collapsible electrode cowling. On impact, the forward facing barbed electrodes attach to the body of the target.

The energy from the impact breaks a series of fracture pins that release the main chassis of the XREP which remains connected to the nose by a Kevlar reinforced fiber. As the chassis falls away, 6 cholla electrodes automatically deploy. Named after the famous desert cactus, the cholla electrodes penetrate clothing to deliver the TASER XREP’s powerful NMI over a greater body mass.

Another innovative and unique feature of the XREP nose is the reflex engagement electrode. A normal reaction to the pain of a projectile impact is for the subject to grab at the impact site. If the subject tries to grab or disconnect the XREP projectile, the reflex engagement electrodes complete a circuit allowing TASER NMI to discharge from the Nose Electrodes, through the subject’s body, out to the hand that grabbed the XREP. This creates a significant spread that allows the XREP pulses to affect a large body mass, causing overpowering Neuro Muscular Incapacitation.

To maximize incapacitation, the XREP engine incorporates a microprocessor controlled optimal electrode selection technology. Twenty times per second, the XREP Engine checks for the best electrode connection to maximize the contact spread and achieve greatest incapacitation. If the Cholla or Reflex Engagement electrodes make contact, the XREP engine automatically delivers NMI impulses from the nose electrodes to the selected electrode. In fact, if the subject even grabs the tether, a live hand-trap wire makes a connection and the NMI effect is delivered through the hand, preventing the subject from letting go. If none of the preferred electrodes are in contact, the XREP delivers its impulse across the front electrodes, creating a painful stimulus to distract, disorient, and entice the subject to grab for the XREP making a hand connection, or to move in reaction to the pain which can help the cholla electrodes on the main chassis to engage.

The XREP will be released into a pilot field test phase in the fall of 2007. The pilot stage is expected to last 6-12 months before full production release.

TASER XREP: The most technologically advanced projectile ever fired from a 12 gauge shotgun.

Video’s:
XREP Promotional Video
XREP Informational Video

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Additional article:

Tasers: the next generation

Trooper, Paramedic Fight Caught on Tape

A trooper scolds the driving paramedic for not yielding to their vehicle.

PADEN, Oklahoma — An Oklahoma Highway Patrol trooper and a paramedic were caught on tape scuffling Sunday while a patient was being taken to the hospital.

The fight happened on Highway 62, near Paden, after a OHP and first responders argued over a close call on the road.

OHP alleges that one of the paramedics on the video assaulted the trooper, but the assault was not caught on tape.

“We’re like trying to tell the guy, ‘Dude, my mom is in the back,’ and my step-dad was like, ‘My wife is in the back. Can we do this at the hospital?’” said Kenyada Davis.

Kenyada Davis’ mother was the woman in the back of the ambulance being treated for heat exhaustion.

He was able to shoot the altercation with his cell phone’s camera.

Davis said it all started because the ambulance failed to yield to OHP troopers, who were en route to a call along highway 62 in Paden.

Davis said the driver of the ambulance was trying to avoid hitting a car that slowed down and wasn’t aware of troopers nearby until it was too late.

“He slowed down, and as the car was getting over, that’s when he passed us,” Davis said. “I didn’t hear him.”

The paramedic argues they were trying to avoid hitting a car and wasn't aware of the troopers' oncoming vehicles.

But after OHP troopers finished their official business, they pulled the Creek Nation ambulance over. One of the troopers chided Paul for failing to yield.

Once the ambulance was pulled over, Davis pulled out his phone and shot video of the scene.

Watch the full video of the altercation between the trooper and first responders.

According to the OHP, the paramedics assaulted the trooper just before the fight broke out.

“It didn’t look like it was being handled very well, at least form the tape I saw from the troopers’ standpoint,” said NEWS 9 Legal Analyst Irven Box.

The entire scene, including the alleged assault was captured on dash cam video and has not been released.

The Okfuskee County District Attorney’s office is reviewing all of the footage and could file criminal charges against the paramedic by the end of the week.

An OHP Trooper tries to restrain the paramedic. OHP claims the paramedics assaulted the troopers, but it was not caught on tape.

Source

Zealous Cop Caught on Video Detaining News Reporter

These are the country’s post 9/11 law enforcement psychos that we are either going to allow to control us, or, rebel against their uncalled for and unwanted abuse of the American people.  And this nut is just one of dozens I’ve seen over the last several years.   Whitewraithe~

El Paso, TX 7 News reports “An 7 crew covering a crash on I-10 on Monday unwillingly became part of the news. Motorists stuck in traffic witnessed veteran journalist Darren Hunt and photojournalist Ric Dupont being handcuffed and detained.”

POLICE STATE TACTICS: Tasering Pregnant Women and the Elderly

In George Lucas’ film THX 1138 (1970), the police in a futuristic state make citizens compliant by shocking them with “pain prods.” After seeing the movie, I remember thinking that if the police were ever allowed to use implements such as these, we would rapidly move into a police state. This has now happened with tasers.

Tasers are electro-shock weapons that are currently used by more than 11,000 law enforcement agencies in the United States. Designed to cause instant incapacitation by delivering a 50,000-volt shock, tasers are hand-held electronic stun guns that fire two barbed darts. The darts, which usually remain attached to the gun by wires, deliver a high voltage shock and can penetrate up to two inches of clothing or skin. The darts can strike the subject from a distance of up to 35 feet, or the taser can be applied directly to the skin. Although a taser shot is capable of jamming the central nervous system for up to 30 seconds, it can disable the subject for even longer. And because tasers can be aimed anywhere on the body, they can immobilize someone more easily than pepper spray, which must be sprayed in the face.

Taser manufacturers and police agencies insist that tasers are a safer alternative to many conventional weapons typically used to restrain dangerous individuals. This may be true in situations where tasers are used as an alternative to other impact weapons that can cause serious injury, such as batons or lethal force. However, research shows that in many police departments, officers routinely use tasers primarily as a substitute for low-level force weapons such as pepper spray or chemical spray. Tasers have become a prevalent force tool, often used against individuals who pose no serious danger to themselves, the officers or others.

Amnesty International reports that in instances where tasers are used, 80% of the time they are used on unarmed suspects. In 36% of the cases, they are used for verbal non-compliance, but only 3% of the time for cases involving “deadly assault.”

Since 2001, over 300 cases indicate that tasers exacerbate health issues and accelerate death. In November 2003, a mentally disabled man was tasered by Georgia police a total of six times for violating a home detention order. Hours later, he died in jail.

Incredibly, police officers have tasered pregnant women, even when they are fully aware of their pregnancies. In 2001, Cindy Grippi was tasered in the back for entering her house against the instructions of police officers, despite the fact that she was not engaging in any truly disruptive or criminal behavior. As a result, Grippi fell onto her stomach and recounts that she “felt a sharp pain in her abdomen as the taser struck her.” Hours later, doctors diagnosed Grippi with “fetal demise,” and she delivered a stillborn child. Tianesha Robinson was tasered by police officers in 2006 for resisting arrest during a traffic stop. Days later, she suffered a miscarriage.

In Colorado, a man was repeatedly tasered in the genitals for “resisting” after being handcuffed and placed in the back of a police car. In 2003, an imprisoned African-American woman was asked to remove all her jewelry. When she asked for a mirror to help remove her eyebrow ring, she was pepper sprayed and tasered. The tasering caused her to “fall to the ground and lose control of her bladder. While on the ground, a male officer forcibly removed her eyebrow ring with pliers. She was left in her urine for several hours without being given anything to clean herself with.” In August 2007, a man was tasered while holding an infant–causing him to drop the child on its head.

Police using tasers are supposedly trained to press the trigger lightly to guarantee that the shock lasts no longer than five seconds. However, there are numerous cases in which police officers have continued to press down on their triggers in hopes of elongating the shot and maximizing pain. In other cases, police officers have continued to shock individuals repeatedly, despite the fact that the first shock achieved their goal of thoroughly immobilizing the target. In 2003, an elderly blind woman, who was also extremely hard of hearing, was struck by a taser three times for failing to respond to police officers. As a result of the taser shocks to her back and the pepper spray to her face, the woman’s prosthetic right eye was ultimately dislodged from its socket.

The use of tasers by police raises a number of concerns for the protection of human rights. Portable and easy to use, with the capacity to inflict severe pain at the push of a button without leaving substantial marks, tasers are obviously open to abuse by officers. Their use often violates standards set out under the United Nations Code of Conduct for Law Enforcement Officials, which requires that force be used as a last resort and that only the minimum amount necessary be used.

Taser International, the company that manufactures and sells the stun guns, has sold them primarily to law enforcement agencies. The company has sold several hundred thousand to such agencies nationwide. However, since 1994, slightly less powerful tasers have been sold to the general public.

This development is truly alarming. Silent and instantly crippling, the taser is an ideal weapon for criminals to assist them in robbery, rape, abduction, etc. An attacker can now carry his own personal victim-paralyzing device, powerful enough to instantly incapacitate the victim and give the attacker complete control.

Tasers are also ripe for sadistic use. For example, in January 2008, a man in Albany, N.Y., was sentenced to 46 months in prison and 24 months of probation for using a 30,000-volt stun gun on his 18-month-old son during a game of peek-a-boo. He claimed that he “wanted his child to be tough…to be the toughest cage fighter ever.” It is impossible to remain untroubled by these words, as well as the image of a father purposefully torturing his defenseless child. The Social Services caseworker who investigated the situation said, “The look in the child’s eyes will not easily be forgotten.”

Clearly, the use of tasers should be suspended immediately–or at least until a comprehensive medical study can be conducted proving they are safe to the general public when used by police officers. And the police must by law be severely restricted in their use. Otherwise, we are opening the door for rampant abuse and police state tactics.

Source

Austin Great-Grandmother Tasered at Traffic Stop

Fox 7
June 1, 2009

A 72-year-old woman is pulled over for speeding, then tasered and sent to jail. Kathryn Winkfein says she drives to Austin about twice a month to do her shopping. But on a Monday afternoon, a Travis County Constable deputy pulled her over, on her way back to Granite Schoals.

“Due to being a construction zone, and workers being present,” Pct. 3 Constable Richard McCain said, “it was 45, she was doing 60.”

Winkfein admits she was speeding in the dangerous strip of Highway 71 and Bee Creek.

“He explained to her,” Constable McCain said, “sign the ticket stub, it’s not an admission of guilt. It’s a promise to appear in court. She didn’t want to. She said take me to jail.”

That’s when the officer says Winkfein exited her vehicle and didn’t cooperate.

Read entire article

URL to article: http://www.infowars.com/austin-grandmother-tasered-at-traffic-stop/

Blind Woman with Cancer Faces Assault Charges of Police Officer after being Tasered!

Police use taser on blind woman with cancer

Posted: var wn_last_ed_date = getLEDate(“Jul 17, 2008 4:46 PM EST”); document.write(wn_last_ed_date);July 17, 2008 03:46 PM

DAYTON, Ohio (WDTN) – Family members are angry and speaking out after Dayton police used a stun gun on a woman who is blind and suffering from cancer. Police said they were looking for a suspect when they knocked on Denise Harris’s door Thursday morning. But according to both police and witnesses, things quickly got out of hand and Harris was tased.

“She was able to force herself down on to the floor and not be cooperative, grabbing on to the detective. A taser was dry stunned onto her arm to control her hand movement, then she was cuffed,” said Sgt. Charles Anderson.

Her family said she was yelling at officers because she was scared.

“She was terrified. She was extremely terrified,” said Harris’s niece, Dionna. “She was scared because the person identified themselves as a police officer. But she’s been robbed before by someone using the same technique.”

They said police used unnecessary force when officers came to the Fernwood Avenue apartment looking for Harris’s son, who is wanted. Officers said Harris attacked a detective.

“She’s blind and they pulled her off her Futon, handcuffed her and tased her because he said she swung at him. She can’t see,” said Harris’s sister Elvita Harris. “I’m very frustrated and upset. Dayton police need to implement a sensitivity program.”

Neighbors said they told officers she was blind and sick.

“It was heartbreaking,” Brenda Miles said. “I was almost in tears because I know the lady and I look out for her because she’s blind.”

Harris was taken to Good Samaritan for treatment.

The officers actions will be investigated, but Sgt. Anderson said Harris should have told them she was scared.

“She does not have to open her door. It was a voluntary thing for her to open her door,” he said.

Harris is now facing charges for assault on a police officer and resisting arrest.

Reported by Mandi Sheridan, WDTN / Edited by David Robinson

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