Tasers a form of torture, says UN

Originally posted by The Vagabond
On the low end, you've got grabbing someone's wrist, turning them around, and cuffing them because they won't comply with lawful instruction.

I'm all for using a taser on somebody if they're swinging a knife around. But it's when a taser is used instead of this that we have a problem.

>
I'm also fully in support of putting a bullet in the guy that steals your wallet.

[edit on 25-11-2007 by apc]

Would somebody like to explain to me how a device that cooks you alive is significantly different from a TASER? The situation is similar. It's a potentially lethal force being dialed down so as to just be very very painful instead. Let's not forget that this technology was developed my a military contractor for battlefield use.


And whether or not we call the UN the UN or something different is hardly the issue. It's going to be the same nations- it's not like we can change the name to "The Fantastic One Hundred and Ninety Two" and replace the "bad countries" with nations that a cross between Dudley Doright and Aquaman.

So if the problem is "the people in charge" we're screwed, because the UN is run by the representatives of the nations on this planet (which are all pretty ugly, I admit).

The question there is a matter of creating provisions within the UN which provide objective criteria that any nation can act on, not subject to the equivocations of self-serving committees which pick and choose which wrongs they will condemn.

Exactly APC. I explained why TASERs lend themself to such inappropriate use in This post.

In part it is a question of flawed perception, and thus a question of training. It's not that TASERs are inherently bad.

Then what's your suggestions Vagabond? How are we gonna deal with tasers and the deaths they cause? I just see the taser being used inappropriatly, when other actions could of been used. Like I showed, look what's next on the list. ( radio-frequency). Where does it stop? Pretty soon police will just vaporize us.

As you say, you see TASERs being used inappropriately.

The goal then, obviously enough, is to stop them from being used inappropiately. Some say the answer is not to have them used at all. I say the answer is that they be used appropriately.

How do you get police to use the TASER appropriately? I've been careful not to act as if I had the magic answer to a problem that has plagued society from the very beginning, but one obvious starting point is to give better training and back that up with accountability that treats a police officer who misuses his TASER no differently than a police officer who misuses his firearm.

One idea that has not been practical in the past but whose time has now come is the personal police recorder.
We've got kids running around in this country with a videorecorder, audio recorder, GPS, and 160 gigs of memory, and 8+ hours of battery life for it all in their hip pocket at a pricetag of under 500 bucks and a total weight of less than 2 pounds.

There is no reason that a cop can't have a device the size of an IPod secured to his shirt that will record everything he sees and hears and report on his positon, which will give them both a tactical advantage in dangerous situations, outstanding evidence in court, and a much-needed check on their conduct (as well as defense against false allegations).

That is a damn good idea! To smooth the overall system, reduce costs even further, and minimize any additional belt load, they could use an off the shelf pen-camera (like this one) and tie the A/V feed into the existing dashcam recorder. Just one extra pen in their shirt pocket.

reply to post by The Vagabond

OK, now you've got my respect, Vagabond. Best idea I have heard come down the pike in a while.

I see a couple concerns about the pen-cam, such as what is preventing the police from either turning it off or pointing it in the wrong direction, but I think this could be overcome. The real hurdle is convincing the beaurocrats to do it without making a huge mess.

Great, and I do mean GREAT! idea though!

TheRedneck

Lerthal Weapon vis a vis Excessive use of Force:

It is very alarming for me to have learrnt of the recent manslaughter cases in Canada (Three or Four incidents one after another in just a span of a month or Two), whereby unarmed peoples lives were taken away by the keepers of peace, justice, law and order. The very lives of the people that they are supposed to protect, were taken away, in an instant just by a zap, from that "harmless little gadget".

Where was the due process? Where was the fair trial? Where was the conviction (if applicable, and the sentence).

And Canda is supposed to Champion Human Rights?

Tasers make for very convenient summary executions.

And then we ridicule countries where people are executed without a trial, hearing or due process.

What am I supposed to think? How should I feel? What should happen to my level of confidence in the system of law and order and justice?

Were those successive incidents merely glitches, aberrations, or are they the order of the day, and a signal of what we are to expect in the future?

In the news, see:

VANCOUVER, British Columbia - A Canadian man died Saturday, four days after police used a Taser stun-gun on him because he reportedly was acting erratically in a store, police said. He was the third person to die in recent weeks in Canada after being shocked by the hand-held weapon.
news.yahoo.com...

DARTMOUTH, Nova Scotia - Canada is taking a closer look at the police use of stun guns after two recent deaths, including one in which a man died about 30 hours after being shocked. ... More than a dozen people have died in Canada after being hit with Tasers in the last four years. However, the manufacturer of Taser guns says they have never been conclusively linked to any deaths in Canada.
news.yahoo.com...

Christ what ever happened to the good ole days of blasting someone in the grill with a billy club? that seemed to work just fine

When I worked as a dispatcher, our local PD got Tazers and it seemed to me that the level of conversation dropped during stops and bookings. Before, if someone was brought in and mouthing off, there were locked up for a couple of hours and left to cool down. But when a tazer was used, they were repeatedly shot until they complied. I watched one officer in booking shock a drunk 3 or 4 times after he sat him down and the guy kept trying to stand up. In the past, the drunk would have been locked up or the officer would have stood in the secure area of the booking room. But since the drunk had been tazed while making the arrest, and left "hooked up" until paramedics could respond to remove the barbs, it was easier to just keep pulling the trigger. I left the department shortly after that because it seemed to me that the new Captain was slowly building his own private army of officers. Thankfully, after the mass exodus of employees who felt the way I did complained, the City wised up an terminated the contract with this guy.

Tazers can be good tools, but when first introduced to a department, I believe that the officers "look" for an excuse to use them. It's true that officers have to be tazed before they're allowed to use them, but these officers aren't shot. the ends of the wires are taped to a portion of there body and they're given the option of a 2 or 5 second taze. The one inch barb isn't shot into them so it really not the same thing in my opinion.

The only exception to that was the one new officer who happened to be standing to close to the Chief of PD when he picked up a gun and pulled the trigger. The new office was shot in the leg and took the whole ride as other officers were shouting at the chief to turn it off.

The officers are taught to shoot at the chest to ensure that both barbs will strike the suspect. But like any gun, it has to be aimed and a poor shot could result in someone being shot in the face or groin areas. The range is about 20 feet and the training I watched where officers shot at a paper target was about 10 feet and the barbs spread pattern was anywhere from 2 to 7 inches. So accuracy isn't consistant in my opinion.

I'd suggest that if anyone thinks a cop is out of line, don't argue with him on the spot, you're only going to lose or get abused even more. Let him be a jerk, then file a complaint with the city, the department, the newspapers, and anyone else who can sound an alarm. I applaude that kid who had his car wired up for video. I feel such cameras should be part of the officers uniform and the video/audio be transmitted to a watchdog agency where the Police Department can't access it. If that was the case, a lot of officers attitudes would change or they'd be looking for other jobs.

I think what has also happened is law enforcement has started to use the weapon in a different way than it was intended to be used also.

It was suppose to only be used as a last resort before using a firearm, but now I think some law enforcement officers are using the taser as a way to punish a civilian. Instead of being an alternative to using deadly force in extremely dangerous situations, the way it was supposed to be used, more and more it is being used as a tool of punishment for either just getting the officer mad, not listening to his EVERY command, or other minor infractions of the law.

Also, I don't seem to remember the police on the TV show "COPS" using the taser much.
I wonder why.

[edit on 26/11/07 by Keyhole]