Taser safety issues

There has been some controversy over the use of electroshock weapons including tasers as they are more used over time.

Recognised risks of electroshock weapon use

Taser International has admitted in a training bulletin that repeated blasts of a taser can "impair breathing and respiration". Also, on Taser's website it is stated that, for a subject in a state known as "excited delirium" (a controversial term in itself), repeated or prolonged stuns with the Taser can contribute to "significant and potentially fatal health risks". In such a state, physical restraint by the police coupled with the exertion by the subject are also considered likely to result in death or more injuries. Electroshock devices are known to burn skin with its electric arc and can damage delicate electrical equipment such as pacemakers.

It is assumed that tasers as well as all other high voltage stun devices can cause cardiac arrhythmia in susceptible subjects, possibly leading to heart attack or death in minutes by ventricular fibrillation (which leads to cardiac arrest and if not treated immediately to sudden death). People susceptible to this outcome are sometimes healthy and unaware of their susceptibility.

Critics argue that although the medical conditions or illegal drug-taking among some of the casualties may have been the proximate cause of death, the electric blast of the taser can significantly heighten such risk for subjects in an at-risk category. This suggests that tasers and other electroshock weapons would be dangerous to use on people with certain medical conditions and yet, since police officers will typically not know about a person's medical history or possible drug use, this entails a risk of death with virtually any suspect.

Advantages and disdvantages of electroshock weapon use

Supporters say that electroshock guns are a safer alternative to devices such as firearms. Taser uses the term "non-lethal" as defined by the United States Department of Defense - which does not mean the weapon cannot cause death, but that it is not intended to be fatal. Non-lethal weapons are defined as "weapons that are explicitly designed and primarily employed so as to incapacitate personnel or material, while minimizing fatalities, permanent injury to personnel, and undesired damage to property and the environment."

Supporters say that electroshock weapons and tasers are more effective than any other means including pepper-spray (an eye irritant/breathing irritant), batons (and other conventional ways of inflicting pain), hand-to-hand combat (i.e. wrestling a subject to the ground), or even hand guns, at bringing a subject down to the ground with a minimum physical exertion, and with a minimum of potential for injury. Electroshock weapons have a direct link to reduced injury from use of physical force, and are attributed to saving human lives by use as an alternative to the use of firearms to subdue violent or out-of-control subjects.

Critics, however, charge that police officers who are risk-averse will also resort to tasers in situations where previously they would have used more conventional, less "extreme" techniques, such as trying to reason with a cornered suspect.

Deaths and injury caused by electroshock weapons

Between June 2001 and June 2007, there were at least 245 cases of deaths of subjects soon after having been shocked using Tasers. Of these cases:

• In 7 cases, medical examiners said Tasers were a cause or a contributing factor or could not be ruled out as a cause of death.
• In 16 cases coroners and other officials stated that a taser was a secondary or contributory factor of death.
• In dozens of cases, coroners cited excited delirium as cause of death. Excited delirium has been questioned as a medical diagnosis.
• Several deaths occurred as a result of injuries sustained in struggles. In a few of these cases head injury due to falling after being shocked contributed to later death. Some police departments, like that of Clearwater, Florida, have tried to eradicate such incidents by prohibiting taser use when the suspect is in danger of falling.

In 2005, a medical examiner ruled for the first time that a Taser was the primary factor in a death.

These incidents form a very small percentage of many tens of thousands of operational uses of tasers.

Several incidents have received large publicity:

• July 2005, UK. Police tasered a man in hypoglycemic shock, believing that he was a potential security threat.
• October 2006, USA. A 17 year old boy died after being repeatedly tasered by police.
• November 2006, USA. UCLA Taser incident
• September 2007, USA. University of Florida Taser incident
• October 2007, Canada. Robert Dziekański Taser incident
• November 2007, Canada. Howard Hyde incident.

Legal issues and court cases

According to TASER International, tasers are intended “to incapacitate dangerous, combative, or high-risk subjects who pose a risk to law enforcement officers, innocent citizens, or themselves”.

Tasers are illegal or subject to legal restrictions on their availability and use in many jurisdictions. In the USA, there are no federal laws guiding law enforcement agencies’ use of electroshock weapons, and each agency must formulate its own policy concerning appropriate usage.

Reports of the devices being used for torture or as interrogation tools have led the United States to place restrictions on export of the devices.

Various lawsuits against the manufacturers and users of electroshock weapons are pending, but many court judgements have dismissed lawsuits by finding evidence of preexisting conditions, ranging from excited delirium (caused by a subject's interaction with high levels of drug-use) which may be a factor before cardiac arrest, and preexisting osteoporosis which would make bone fracture more likely when the device is used on the subject.

Police officers in at least five US states have filed lawsuits against Taser International claiming they suffered serious injuries after being shocked with the device during training classes.

The UN Committee Against Torture (CAT), an agency charged with overseeing the application of the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, arrived at the conclusion on Friday, November 23, 2007, that the use of the electric pulse Taser gun constitutes a "form of torture" and "can even provoke death."

Fire risk

Tasers come with express instructions not to use them where flammable liquids or fumes may be present, such as filling stations or by police raiding methamphetamine labs, as tasers, like other electric devices, have been found to ignite flammable materials.

An evaluative study carried out by the British Home Office investigated the potential for tasers to ignite CS gas. Seven trials were conducted, in which CS gas canisters containing methyl isobutyl ketone (a solvent used in all CS sprays utilized by the United Kingdom police) were sprayed over mannequins wearing street clothing. The tasers were then fired at the mannequins. In two of the seven trials, "the flames produced were severe and engulfed the top half of the mannequin, including the head". This poses a particular problem for law enforcement, as normal police doctrine needs use of CS before the use of a taser.

In another case, a man's shirt caught on fire after one of the taser's spikes hit a cigarette lighter in his pocket. He suffered minor burns, but was also treated for two self-inflicted knife wounds, the original reason why the taser was used.

Use in schools and on children

Police officers that patrol schools, including grade schools, in several U.S. states (including Kansas, Minnesota, Kentucky, and Florida), currently carry tasers. In 2004, the parents of a 6-year old boy in Miami sued the police department for tasering their child. The police said the boy was threatening to injure his own leg with a shard of glass, and claimed that using the taser was the only option to stop the boy from injuring himself. Although TASER International cannot determine police departments’ policies, it states that the taser is safe for use on anyone weighing 60 pounds or more.

Supporters of taser use in schools argue that merely switching on the device, and threatening to use it, can be effective in frightening violent or uncooperative students into desisting from inappropriate behavior, if verbal reprimands have not succeeded. Critics counter that tasers may interact with preexisting medical complications such as medications, and may even contribute to someone's death as a result. Thus, critics say, they should either be prohibited altogether in schools, or classified as possibly lethal weapons and as a consequence, should be regulated very tightly. Critics also argue that using a taser on a minor, and especially a young child, is effectively cruel and abusive punishment, and therefore it should be banned on the same grounds that other, older forms of physical punishment such as canings have been banned from use in many schools.

Political suppression

Electroshock weapons have been used at political protests such as those by the anti-globalization movement. Members of this movement have argued that the technology, and other "less-lethal" weapons, are likely to become tools for suppressing legitimate protest.

Torture

The United Nations Committee against Torture considers the use of Tasers to be a form of torture, due to the acute pain they cause, and warns against the possibility of death in certain cases. The use of stun belts has been condemned by Amnesty International as torture, not only for the physical pain the devices cause, but also for their heightened abuse potential, due to their perceived "harmlessness" in terms of causing initial injuries like (e.g.) ordinary police batons do. Amnesty International has reported several alleged cases of excessive electroshock gun use, that possibly amount to torture, including the death of an individual after being struck 12 times with a Taser in Orange County, Florida. They have also raised extensive concerns about the use of other electro-shock devices by American police and in American prisons, as they can be (and according to Amnesty International, sometimes are) used to inflict cruel pain on individuals. For example, Eric Hammock of Texas died after receiving at least 20 taser shocks by police. Maurice Cunningham of South Carolina was subjected to continuous shock fo 2 minutes 49 seconds, which a medical examiner said caused cardiac arrhythmia and his subsequent death. He was 29 years old and had no alcohol or drugs in his system.

Tasers may also not leave the telltale markings that a conventional beating might. The American Civil Liberties Union has also raised concerns about their use. There have been several well publicized instances in which stun belts were accidentally activated by careless court personnel and criminal defendants were shocked for no justifiable reason.

Electric shocks have been used as an instrument of torture in many countries around the world, because they can be applied over a prolonged period of time without severely injuring or killing.

See Also

• UCLA Taser incident
• University of Florida Taser incident
• Robert Dziekański Taser incident

External Links

• UF Taser Incident: Viewer Discretion Advised