14-Year-Old Tasered By Police in Allentown, Pennsylvania (Video)
Via the Guardian:
CCTV footage shows a police officer pushing a 14-year-old girl against a parked car and firing a taser at her groin. Shortly before the taser was fired the teenager is seen raising her hands in surrender. She received hospital treatment after the incident in Allentown, Pennsylvania.
California Man Tasered to Death After Running Stop Sign
Police issue X26 TASER. Photo: Junglecat (CC)
Phil Willon writes in the LA Times:
A 43-year-old man died after San Bernardino County sheriff’s deputies used a Taser gun to subdue him after a traffic stop, authorities said Wednesday.
A deputy attempted to stop Allen Kephart, a disc jockey and teacher’s assistant from Crest Park, after he allegedly ran a stop sign about 3:15 p.m. Tuesday on California 189 in Blue Jay, said Cindy Bachman, a Sheriff’s Department spokeswoman.
Kephart pulled into a Valero gas station parking lot about a quarter of a mile away, got out of the car and “became combative and uncooperative” with the deputy, Bachman said. Additional deputies arrived to assist, she said.
“The deputy attempted to place him under arrest, at which time he was Tased,” Bachman said. “He became unconscious, and medical aid was immediately provided, CPR.” Kephart was taken to a local hospital, where he was declared dead.
Kephart’s father,…
Police Officer Threatens To Taser Man’s Genitals
Toronto police officer gets aggressive with his Taser against a handcuffed suspect (did he watch The Hangover the night before?):
Oklahoma Police Taze Bedridden 86-Year-Old Grandmother For “Aggressive Posture In Her Bed”
The cops-abusing-their-tasers story to top them all? Maybe not — I am still expecting a “baby-tazing” incident shortly. From the Courthouse News Service:
Police tasered an 86-year-old disabled grandma in her bed and stepped on her oxygen hose until she couldn’t breathe, after her grandson called 911 seeking medical assistance, the woman and her grandson claim in Oklahoma City Federal Court. Though the grandson said, “Don’t Taze my granny!” an El Reno police officer told another cop to “Taser her!” and wrote in his police report that he did so because the old woman “took a more aggressive posture in her bed,” according to the complaint.
Lonnie Tinsley claims that he called 911 after he went to check on his grandmother, whom he found in her bed, “connected to a portable oxygen concentrator with a long hose…to ask for an emergency medical technician to come to her apartment to evaluate her.”
In response,…
Do Tasers Hurt?
Seems like a stupid question right? But remember the old saying, ‘there are no stupid questions, only stupid answers…’ From Discovery News:
Since the advent of our nation’s pastime, there has been a longstanding tradition of the fan who thinks it will be just HILARIOUS to jump onto a baseball diamond and get his or her 15 minutes of fame before getting tackled by security guards.
On Monday, 17-year-old Steve Consalvi decided to do just that during a Philadelphia Phillies game.
Except this time, the overzealous fan who told his dad he was looking for a “once in a lifetime experience” got a little more than he bargained for: he got Tasered. It’s the first time a Taser has been used to stop a spectator who’s running on the field.
The kid’s OK, and now the Phillies and Philadelphia police are investigating whether the officer’s use of the Taser was appropriate…
California’s Bay-Area Transit Police Stripped Of Tasers
Photo: D.C.Atty (CC)
Have we finally reached the point at which police over-use and abuse of tasers will start resulting in the danged devices being taken away? The Bay Area’s BART police are losing their tasers after a police sergeant attempted to tase a 13-year-old boy on a bicycle whom he was pursuing by car. Oh, and there was last year’s fatal shooting of an unarmed, restrained man on a subway platform after a BART police officer confused his handgun with his taser. California’s KTVU reports:
OAKLAND, Calif. — Following an incident involving a BART police sergeant inappropriately discharging his Taser, transit agency officials have ordered all its officers to hand in the controversial weapons Thursday until further training could be undertaken, KTVU has learned.
The final straw, apparently, came after an April 1st incident when BART police sergeant who was responding to a call about an alleged assault at the Richmond BART station.
Multiple sources…
Whose Idea Was This? Testing Tasers On Meth-Head Sheep
You definitely can’t make this stuff up. Come on PETA, forget about the rich bitches in fur coats, get these sheep into rehab and away from the psycho scientists who dreamed up this “experiment,” reported at POPSCI:
Cocaine is a hell of a drug, but getting shocked with a Taser while riding high on methamphetamines probably beats any white-knuckled cocaine experience hands down. And that’s exactly what happened to some lucky sheep in a new study that tested the effects of Tasers on meth-addled targets, funded in part by Taser International.
There’s at least some scientific reasoning behind all the apparent madness. Growing abuse of methamphetamines has led to arrest-related deaths in situations where law enforcement officers used their Tasers on drug-intoxicated suspects. The latest study was designed to test whether electronic control devices (e.g. Tasers) can lead to dangerous cardiac responses in meth-intoxicated humans, with sheep standing in for people.
The less-lethal…
‘Don’t Daze Me, Bro!’ Meet A Non-Lethal Weapon from Homeland Security
So as the court system starts to regulate more and more the use of tasers by police, I have a feeling these “non-lethal” options will come into more widespread use. Here’s a video from some folks who made of a version of the Dazzler. The clip from the Homeland Security conference is pretty astounding:
Our first open source Homeland Security non-lethal weapon project — The “THE BEDAZZLER: A Do-it-yourself Handheld LED-Incapacitator”. After attending a conference where the $1 million “sea-sick flashlight” (named “THE DAZZLER”) was demonstrated by the US Dept. of Homeland Security, we decided to create our own version. For under $250, you can build your own dazzler…
Yes this project does indeed cause: Nausea, dizziness, headache, flashblindness, eye pain and (occasional?) vomiting! So don’t use it on your friends or pets…
Court to Cops: Stop Tasing People into Compliance
David Hambling writes on WIRED’s Danger Room:
The use of Tasers has become increasingly controversial over the last year, following high-profile cases such as the Tasering of a 10-year-old girl who had refused to take a shower and video of a 72-year-old great-grandmother who was Tasered following a driving offense.
Now a federal appeals court in San Francisco has set down new rules for when police officers are allowed to use Tasers. In particular, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that Tasers can’t be used simply to force a non-violent person to bend to an officer’s will. The court’s reason was that Taser’s X26 stun gun inflicts more pain than other “non-lethal” options:
The physiological effects, the high levels of pain, and foreseeable risk of physical injury lead us to conclude that the X26 and similar devices are a greater intrusion than other non-lethal methods of force we have confronted.
The ruling followed a…
