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Post by nitetimeritetime on Apr 24, 2009 9:24:20 GMT -5
Hundreds (maybe thousands by now) of people have been killed by tasers. These are not non-lethal weapons. They should only be used as a substitute for a gun. If the situation doesn't call for the use of a gun, then it doesn't call for the use of a taser. Why? Because tasers kill hundreds of people every year.
Whatever this guy was doing, the only question that really matters is this: Did this guy deserve to be shot?
I did think that the continued use of the tazer was a bit excessive, but he was still resisting. With a crowd like that around, you don't want the situation like that to go on longer than necessary. The take-down was also quite awkward, but then again the guy was NAKED. I don't blame them for not wanting to struggle with the guy on the ground.
Whatever this guy was doing, the only question that really matters is this: Did this guy deserve to be shot?
yes
I gotta agree Clato - he did - because the situation was escalating and needed to be handled - but I still do not think that the officer that kneed the guy in the stomach should have done that. And I do think that the continued use of the taser was excessive. BUT - as you pointed out - with as many times as they hit him - it had to have been set very low.
I don't think they did anything wrong. Especially after clato observing the tazer was not set on a high level (in his opinion) . I also don't buy the "come on what is so wrong with a naked guy at a music festival" bit either. They had instructions on what is acceptable on the festival grounds. He had more than enough opportunity to put his robe back on. Did he really think they would just leave him alone if he didn't follow instructions? Then he resisted, I just don't see how anyone can feel bad for this guy?
Post by nitetimeritetime on Apr 24, 2009 9:59:42 GMT -5
I can't watch the video, so I don't know what happened in it. I just wanted to make sure this debate was put into the proper perspective. If he deserved to be shot, then the taser was a good alternative.
edit: At any setting, tasers can kill people with heart conditions. The cops didn't have his medical history on hand, so at any setting they were potentially killing him. Debating the use of tasers should always be a debate about the use of a lethal weapon. Not about what setting it was on. We don't argue about the "settings" of guns. We don't say -- oh, he only got shot with a .22 and not a .38 so what's he complaining about?
Post by bluntobject on Apr 24, 2009 10:04:40 GMT -5
Mace is bad news. In college once an idiot on my floor was playing with the mace his girlfriend carried, and ended up discharging it into the air. It didn't hit anyone or anything, however the ENTIRE FLOOR was basically uninhabitable for about half an hour. That stuff carries extremely quickly and is very unpleasant even in tiny doses.
Edit: On the video itself, it's MOST LIKELY NSFW, but like...you can't even see what makes it NSFW...I'm really rather confused as to how that's even anatomically possible....
I understand what your saying nitetimeritetime. But, it is your opinion that a tazer is a lethal weapon. I don't think that is the prevailing medical/law enforcement opinion. Equating a tazer to a gun does not make sense to me.
Post by nitetimeritetime on Apr 24, 2009 10:27:24 GMT -5
This is my opinion: if we continue to let authorities frame this debate in terms that say tasers are non-lethal, then we will see more and more people killed by tasers.
Post by viciouscircle on Apr 24, 2009 10:29:11 GMT -5
itetime, I can't agree with your logic that any discussion about the use of tasers MUST be about the use of deadly force. All force is potentially deadly - a strike can kill someone who has a heart condition too, and it would have taken a MAJOR beating to bring that guy down. Such a beating would have at least as much of a chance to cause unintended death or serious injury as a taser, probably more. Given the choice between beating the living shit out of the guy or tasering him, and those are the only choices left after he repeatedly resisted arrest, how can you say that the tasering was a worse choice than beating him into submission would have been?
I think it's also worth noting that the guy wasn't just naked - he was sweaty and fat naked, which means he was slippery. Add to the slippery factor his level of intoxication - if he doesn't choose to cooperate, there is probably no way they can wrestle him into it. His choices limited the choices available to the cops.
It really doesn't matter if there are naked wastoids running around Roo - Coachella is not Roo and they have different rules and regs - at Coachella you can't even drink beer outside the beer tents. It is also not private in the sense that public nudity laws are nullified once you walk onto the Polo Grounds. I've been to Coachella and not seen one single cop past the entry point the entire weekend , so if there were three of them there with this guy, you can bet they were called there to solve an issue caused by the guy. They could have walked right up and arrested him on the spot. They gave him more chances than he deserved or than they are required by law to give. The sympathy for that idiot is completely misplaced. Think about it - cops arrive on a scene and try to give the instigator an inch (metaphorically speaking, not referencing his alleged penis), but he takes a mile. What's a potential result of that? Next time they don't bother giving the inch. Basically his inability to act responsibly makes everyone else's future dealings with police officers less likely to be cordial. And the people in the crowd share some culpability here - most of them were egging the guy on and worsening the situation. They were looking for the situation to escalate and they got it. I don't feel sorry for most of them at all. The only people ruining the Coachella experience were these standard issue nimrods who don't know the difference between license and liberty.
I attended Coachella five years ago, and this video doesn't surprise me.
Indio came across to me as a place where you can smell the class disparity between rich Caucasians and lower-class Hispanics. The festival is held at a polo field for crying out loud.
I'm not surprised security agents would go overboard... The year I went, we were not only searched going into the concert grounds, but also on our way back out. That's the only time in fifteen years of concert-going that I've encountered any kind of security search exiting the performance area.
As for this particular situation... The cops were justified in acting against this guy, but I think the tazing went a little too far.
I think pepper spray or mace would be the way to go. I've been subjected to second-hand pepper spray in my life; though I haven't been tazed, I'm sure spray is a preferable approach.
Also, that was an excellent video to have playing in the background when those Jehovah's Witnesses stopped at my door.
Post by viciouscircle on Apr 24, 2009 10:47:04 GMT -5
I don't know, I've had second-hand pepper spray, and it SUCKED. Not just for a few minutes, but for hours. It probably depends on the state of one's lungs, how much of it you inhale, etc. For me I would rather get zapped and be done with it than have my throat feel like someone was running a hot poker over it for hours. But that's just me.
I do think if they used mace that any person in that crowd could then file a lawsuit claiming injuries from the mace. Even if it really wasn't bad, they'd probably still be risking a ton of fallout, legally speaking.
I just wanted to make sure this debate was put into the proper perspective. If he deserved to be shot, then the taser was a good alternative.
Just because you think that a taser should ONLY be used as a substitute for a gun doesn't mean that that's the rule.
What if a guy was beating another guy up mercilessly and one or two cops are around and can't get the man under control. He's fighting back and super strong or high on druggs or whatever scenario you want to make up. What if the guy was on his way to beating that other man to death.........surely you don't shoot an unarmed man......but I'd argue that tasering him a bit so that you can gain control of the situation is warranted.
Granted....maybe the cops should have tried a little longer and harder to physically detain him.....but they gave him many chances, he was antagonizing them by putting his hands on them and making them look foolish, so the cops had to do what they thought was right.
I don't think they did anything wrong. Especially after clato observing the tazer was not set on a high level (in his opinion) . I also don't buy the "come on what is so wrong with a naked guy at a music festival" bit either. They had instructions on what is acceptable on the festival grounds. He had more than enough opportunity to put his robe back on. Did he really think they would just leave him alone if he didn't follow instructions? Then he resisted, I just don't see how anyone can feel bad for this guy?
the guy was high as a kite. you could see it in the way he was patting the officers shoulder about 15 too many times (amazing he didnt get tazed then). im pretty sure it wasnt booze.
coachella should have a few people as sort of "response team" or whatever to deal with spunions in a calm and peaceful manner. or at the very least, a private security force that doesn't involve arrests / tasers. this was more of a medical issue than anything else.
itetime, I can't agree with your logic that any discussion about the use of tasers MUST be about the use of deadly force. All force is potentially deadly - a strike can kill someone who has a heart condition too, and it would have taken a MAJOR beating to bring that guy down. Such a beating would have at least as much of a chance to cause unintended death or serious injury as a taser, probably more. Given the choice between beating the living nuts out of the guy or tasering him, and those are the only choices left after he repeatedly resisted arrest, how can you say that the tasering was a worse choice than beating him into submission would have been?
I think it's also worth noting that the guy wasn't just naked - he was sweaty and fat naked, which means he was slippery. Add to the slippery factor his level of intoxication - if he doesn't choose to cooperate, there is probably no way they can wrestle him into it. His choices limited the choices available to the cops.
It really doesn't matter if there are naked wastoids running around Roo - Coachella is not Roo and they have different rules and regs - at Coachella you can't even drink beer outside the beer tents. It is also not private in the sense that public nudity laws are nullified once you walk onto the Polo Grounds. I've been to Coachella and not seen one single cop past the entry point the entire weekend , so if there were three of them there with this guy, you can bet they were called there to solve an issue caused by the guy. They could have walked right up and arrested him on the spot. They gave him more chances than he deserved or than they are required by law to give. The sympathy for that idiot is completely misplaced. Think about it - cops arrive on a scene and try to give the instigator an inch (metaphorically speaking, not referencing his alleged penis), but he takes a mile. What's a potential result of that? Next time they don't bother giving the inch. Basically his inability to act responsibly makes everyone else's future dealings with police officers less likely to be cordial. And the people in the crowd share some culpability here - most of them were egging the guy on and worsening the situation. They were looking for the situation to escalate and they got it. I don't feel sorry for most of them at all. The only people ruining the Coachella experience were these standard issue nimrods who don't know the difference between license and liberty.
Thank you for stating everything i wanted to......karmas
itetime, I can't agree with your logic that any discussion about the use of tasers MUST be about the use of deadly force. All force is potentially deadly - a strike can kill someone who has a heart condition too, and it would have taken a MAJOR beating to bring that guy down.
When the police start beating hundreds of people to death every year, then it will probably be a good idea to examine the tactics they are using.
They do kill hundreds of people every year with tasers. Yes, you can accidentally kill someone with any kind of force, but when the deaths are in the hundreds each year, we're no longer talking about anamolous situations.
I'll take your word about this particular situation, because like I said I can't watch the video. I asked if he deserved to be shot, clato said yes, and it appears you're saying that without tasers these cops may well have needed to use their guns. If that's the case, then the taser was a good alternative.
coachella should have a few people as sort of "response team" or whatever to deal with spunions in a calm and peaceful manner. or at the very least, a private security force that doesn't involve arrests / tasers. this was more of a medical issue than anything else.
in my opinion, it stopped being a medical issue when the authority figures asked him to put on his clothes and stop being a problem and he flat out denied them and disrespected them. maybe if he would have left peacefully he would have been treated medically but he was beginning to get out of control (based on the video). If I had been there and seen the whole thing (before and after the video recorded ) perhaps i'd view it differently.
Just because you think that a taser should ONLY be used as a substitute for a gun doesn't mean that that's the rule.
It is clearly not the rule. That's why there are so many taser deaths every year.
What if a guy was beating another guy up mercilessly and one or two cops are around and can't get the man under control. He's fighting back and super strong or high on druggs or whatever scenario you want to make up. What if the guy was on his way to beating that other man to death.........surely you don't shoot an unarmed man......
Actually, yes, that is a case where the police can and have justifiably shot unarmed people.
I'll take your word about this particular situation, because like I said I can't watch the video. I asked if he deserved to be shot, clato said yes, and it appears you're saying that without tasers these cops may well have needed to use their guns. If that's the case, then the taser was a good alternative.
I wasn't saying that if they hadn't used tasers they would have to use guns. I was saying that if they hadn't used tasers they would have used nightsticks, and in this situation, given the difficulty of subduing the guy, the nightsticks would have been worse than tasers.
Post by nitetimeritetime on Apr 24, 2009 11:17:39 GMT -5
I was using guns as a stand-in for "lethal force" but if you're saying that they would have needed to use the nightsticks with deadly force to be effective on this guy, then we're saying the same thing.
I did think that the continued use of the tazer was a bit excessive, but he was still resisting. With a crowd like that around, you don't want the situation like that to go on longer than necessary. The take-down was also quite awkward, but then again the guy was NAKED. I don't blame them for not wanting to struggle with the guy on the ground.
Agreed. Agreed. Agreed. The guy should have been tased...but tased over and over again??? ...the cop tasing him in the chest 3 times in a row is just a bit excessive. And did anyone notice the cop drop (hard) his knee in the dude's chest? THAT is when the dude got up and the tasing began. I would have jumped up too had someone just drop-kneed me in the damn chest!!!!
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Post by itrainmonkeys on Apr 24, 2009 11:24:11 GMT -5
just for a little discussion........here's a study that shows how the use of tasers in california police department caused a decrease in "in-custody sudden death" and "firearm-related-deaths".
In an attempt to gain a better understanding of the safety of devices in the real world, the researchers surveyed 126 police and sheriff departments in California cities, of which only 50 replied with sufficient data on the rates of death before and after the adoption of stun guns. They requested information on the rates of in-custody deaths in the absence of lethal force, firearm-related deaths, and officer injuries requiring emergency-department visits. Annual arrest data per city was obtained from the California Department of Justice.
The researchers obtained data for the five years prior to deployment of Tasers and in the following five years in which they were used. In the first year after Tasers were introduced to the departments, the risk of in-custody sudden death was 5.96 per 100 000 arrests, a sixfold increase over the five years prior, when Tasers weren't used. In years two to five after deployment, however, the in-custody death rate declined to 1.44 per 100 000 arrests, a number that was not significantly different when compared with the predeployment period.
Among 37 departments that provided sufficient data, the rate of firearm-related deaths increased from 6.66 per 100 000 arrests in the years before Tasers were used to 14.1 per 100 000 arrests in the first year of deployment. This rate declined to 9.1 per 100 000 between years two and five, a rate not statistically different from rates observed in the five-year period before Tasers were used.
that same group that did that study though, does seem to agree with ritetime about the tasers not being as safe as they are made out to be. they agree that they are potentially lethal, and easy to abuse.
people seem to forget that it can be a useful device if used properly.......but sadly it seems most of the time a taser is used - it is abused (people holding longer shocks than necessary or multiple shockings).
"Tasers are not the 'non-lethal' weapons they are portrayed to be," said Angela Wright, US researcher at Amnesty International and author of the report. "They can kill and should only be used as a last resort.
"The problem with Tasers is that they are inherently open to abuse, as they are easy to carry and easy to use and can inflict severe pain at the push of a button, without leaving substantial marks."
Amnesty International’s study – which includes information from 98 autopsies – found that 90 per cent of those who died after being struck with a Taser were unarmed and many did not appear to present a serious threat.
Many were subjected to repeated or prolonged shocks – far more than the five-second "standard" cycle – or by more than one officer at a time. Some people were even shocked for failing to comply with police commands after they had been incapacitated by a first shock.
just a little research/info to help the debate. I personally think tasers are okay if used correctly and properly and if the situation calls for it. moments like the famous "don't taze me bro" where a student got tasered for asking too many questions and not being told why he was being arrested is a clear case of abusing the taser use.
And did anyone notice the cop drop (hard) his knee in the dude's chest? THAT is when the dude got up and the tasing began. I would have jumped up too had someone just drop-kneed me in the damn chest!!!!
I've said this twice now and everyone just keeps ignoring it.
I mean I am definately pro-cop - and always will be - the thin blue line and all but - there are cops that are assholes and I just could see no justification for that at all.
I mean I am definately pro-cop - and always will be - the thin blue line and all but - there are cops that are bungholes and I just could see no justification for that at all.
Sadly it's true. Just like almost any profession, you will see bungholes that shouldn't really hold that position. Most cops are good guys....but a decent amount of them are just looking to apply force or abuse the little power they do have.
If you resist being handcuffed, naked and high, or not. They will get rough with you. It's not like the guy put his hands behind his back and the cop shoved him down and put his knee in his chest. They try and resolve the situation as fast as possible, I would guess a sharp blow to someone resisting, early on, is meant to send a message that they are not messing around. He didn't seem to get that message.
This is my opinion: if we continue to let authorities frame this debate in terms that say tazers are non-lethal, then we will see more and more people killed by tazers.
Because most police overuse tazer. Here in my town a man was tazed, the battery ran out, then the police got another tazer and continued to taze him all on HIGH...I agree they are misused but are safer then other alternatives. Some tazers are being made now that record everything from setting, movement, length of time used but they are not required by law so most police forces will not get them.
I think they need to taze him a little more to make his penis growth glans kick in....I mean, come on, why did he have to be a white guy now people really are gonna believe those stereotypes...
that same group that did that study though, does seem to agree with ritetime about the tasers not being as safe as they are made out to be. they agree that they are potentially lethal, and easy to abuse.
people seem to forget that it can be a useful device if used properly.......but sadly it seems most of the time a taser is used - it is abused (people holding longer shocks than necessary or multiple shockings).
This is exactly what I'm saying. I don't want to take guns, sticks, or tasers away from cops. I'm pretty sure I'd rather be tased than shot, and I think tasers can be a good alternative to other types of lethal force. But they should only be used if a cop is ready and willing to take the chance of killing someone, because they do kill a lot of people.
And did anyone notice the cop drop (hard) his knee in the dude's chest? THAT is when the dude got up and the tasing began. I would have jumped up too had someone just drop-kneed me in the damn chest!!!!
I've said this twice now and everyone just keeps ignoring it.
I mean I am definately pro-cop - and always will be - the thin blue line and all but - there are cops that are bungholes and I just could see no justification for that at all.
I totally agree that was excessive. On another note, did you see the way the police were holding his arm behind his back and twisting it up and pushing on it. I forgot what thats called its been almost 8 years since I did training in the DOC but thats is very painful and most people will submit after that. That guy didn't. When you have that happen and don't submit the police will start to escalate force. In the DOC it was called "least amount of force chain of events" In other words you always use the least amount of force going through each level unless obviously someones life is in danger. I am not sure what the police chain of force says but their should have been more officers called to hold him down definitely not knee him.
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