& Chemical Weapons on Canadian Citizens. |
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& Chemical Weapons on Canadian Citizens. |
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Amnesty International calls the use of pepper spray tantamount to torture, and anyone who has suffered its effects knows it is torture. A democratic country like Canada should not allow such chemicals to be used in what are clearly political protests, and the spray should not be used against civilians at all. Aside from torture the spray can kill, especially when used for crowd control. Many people in crowds, with varying degrees of health, are at risk of dying quickly should they be hit by pepper spray.
There isn't any real political advantage in using pepper spray. The present investigation into the use of force at the APEC demonstrations in Vancouver is linked to pepper spray. It is because of heavy use of the spray, and the very visible effects on those hit by it that the event became memorable and a national story in the media. Had the RCMP used simple manpower and muscles to hold back demonstrators, the incidents would have been much less memorable.
Of course the better road for governments is to avoid using force at political demonstrations and to outline new guidelines that will allow demonstrators a greater measure of freedom before physical force is used to block them. On the international level it should also be made clear that Canada is a country that shows tolerance when it comes to political protests and demonstrations.
With the use of pepper spray growing by provincial governments, the police and even organizations that are semi police like Toronto Transit Officers, there are certain to be more fatalities and embarrassing incidents for governments. A quick and outright national ban on pepper spray is what we need now.
Canadian citizens do not have political freedom when they are faced with the possibility of pepper spray and death, should they exercise their right to protest.
All Canadians and politicians should identify themselves as members of the Coalition Against Pepper Spray and take immediate action to eliminate it and related weapons.
Contact me and say you want to help. G. Morton
======================================
The Case Against Pepper Spray
--
Special Agent Thomas Ward of the Firearms Training Unit in Quantico, Virginia, authored a 1989 study that approved pepper spray for use by the FBI. In February 1996, he pleaded guilty to charges of accepting $57,000 in payments from the manufacturer of Cap-Stun, a pepper spray brand he had tested for the FBI.
Pepper Spray does not bring about a peaceful resolution to rowdy protests, it increases confusion and can lead to more violence.
In 32 Ontario complaints involving pepper spray half the complainants were already in some form of custody when they were sprayed.
Pepper Spray could not be used against another country or we would be international war criminals. The spray is a banned substance under the international convention prohibiting the use of chemical weapons.
Pepper Spray is used on psychiatric patients and on people in poor health. Tests have not been done as to its interaction with medication and disease.
Pepper Spray gas causes the protective layer across the eye to become denuded, which can lead to blindness.
Pepper Spray causes severe pain to the skin and scalp and this persists, often forcing the victim to shave off contaminated hair.
In Police situations the means for necessary decontamination of a person sprayed are usually not available.
Pepper Spray is toxic, and it causes severe gastritis & diarrhea. Pepper Spray also causes severe breathing problems.
Pepper Spray kills but that rarely comes out as the deaths are usually related to positional asphyxia and cardiac arrests that occur a while after spraying. That is a person sprayed cannot withstand being tied and incarcerated and dies due to weakened lungs and heart. There have been 26 of these cases in California where people who were pepper sprayed died.
Pepper Spray can provoke “…sudden decrease in heart rate and cardiac output and a profound fall in blood pressure. In experiments in anaesthetized animals, the decrease in heart rate induced when the active agent, capsaicin, stimulates airways and nerve endings is accompanied by slowing, or even a block, of the normal sequences of electrical conduction through the heart. This change, although transient, may have the potential for inducing life threatening arrhythmias (irregular heart beats), even in healthy people, especially if they are physically stressed in the immediate aftermath of pepper spray exposure.”
Deaths are certain to increase as pepper spray is being used more frequently by police as a restraining technique. Its use can't be controlled -- once in the hands of police reports show that they begin to use it regularly in situations where it is not needed.
Pepper Spray runs counter to democracy as people who fear being sprayed will not speak out or demonstrate.
Stop Pepper Spray Abuse! Page
http://www.enviroweb.org/headwaters-ef/actions/pepperspray.html
==========================
Letter Protesting the November
1999 Pepper Spraying of Housing Protesters on Parliament Hill
To all Members of Parliament
From the Coalition for a Federal Ban on Pepper Spray
November, 1999
This letter deals with the first use of the spary on parliament hill
- the details are at our Collected News
Articles on Pepper Spray.
Don, here is the finished letter I will be emailing
to politicians this week, and including on the web site under Letters to
Politicians on Pepper Spray.
http://www.interlog.com/~cjazz/pepper.htm
Since politicians rarely respond to email I want
to get out a print version of the letter eventually.
I include some of your letter as an anonymous
eyewitness report and I included the letter from the TDRC you forwarded.
Let me know what you think.
Also - try to get as many groups as possible
to send letters to Ottawa.
--------
Letter Protesting the November 1999 Pepper Spraying
of Housing Protesters on Parliament Hill
To all Members of Parliament
From the Coalition for a Federal Ban on Pepper
Spray
November, 1999
Over the last year the Coalition for a Federal Ban on Pepper Spray has e-mailed nearly every federal MP outlining the dangers of pepper spray and calling for its ban.
There were few replies, little action on the issue and now the spray has been used to injure housing/homeless protesters on parliament hill.
Yesterday I put together a cost package
to provide protective gear. Dust masks, clear face plates of the cheap
variety or welder's goggles and a baseball cap can be supplied at a cost
of less than ten dollars per person to protect them from pepper spray.
I already have a sample kit for myself.
--------
Medical research shows a long list of harmful effects of pepper spray including death and possible genetic damage. Even those groups that support its use only favour it in one-on-one confrontations with violent criminals. No one publicly supports using it as chemical weaponry to attack demonstrators.
A complete list of the deadly effects is on the Coalition for a Federal Ban on Pepper Spray web site listed at bottom.
Here I include a letter from the TDRC that mentions some of those effects.
November 18, 1999 - RCMP PEPPER SPRAYS CANADIANS
WITH FERVOUR
......AGAIN!
The Toronto Disaster Relief Committee (TDRC), which initiated the call that homelessness be declared a Disaster one year ago, condemns the state military treatment of homeless protesters and anti-poverty activists on Parliament Hill yesterday. It is particularly outrageous that the very first use of pepper spray on Parliament Hill was against the homeless, who are amongst the most vulnerable in our society, and their advocates.
At least 12 people were pepper sprayed and 6 were taken to hospital for treatment. RCMP did not give a verbal warning to protesters with the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty protesters before its use.
We call this a crime because the following facts
are known:
# pepper spray can cause the protective layer
of the eye to become denuded, which can lead to blindness
# pepper spray can cause severe pain to skin
and mucous membranes
# pepper spray can cause respiratory distress
including an asthmatic attack and severe shortness of breath
# pepper spray can cause severe gastritis and
diarrhea
# there are numerous documented cases of death
due to pepper spray both in the United States and Canada
# people are more susceptible to pepper spray
if they are elderly, have weakened immune systems, are on neuroleptics
or antidepressants, have heart or respiratory problems
Cathy Crowe, an experienced community health nurse
says "I thought I was watching what would only be possible in a repressive
military regime. The RCMP is out of control!" TDRC demands an immediate
moratorium on pepper spray use in Canada.
For more information: Cathy Crowe, RN - 416-703-8482
(117)
crowe@web.net
Michael Shapcott - 416-605-8316
--------
I should mention at this point that a large number of groups in Toronto are opposing this use of pepper spray and not just the TDRC.
Cathy compares the government to a military regime. Yet another aspect is that the RCMP is becoming a squad of officers that doesn't want to do the work of policing protests, but would rather just sweep democracy and the right to protest away with chemical weapons.
Sending officers to visit the protesters on route to say that they didn't want to have to beat homeless people was just a form of legal intimidation by the RCMP. Perhaps it was even a diversionary tactic so the protesters wouldn't guess that a chemical attack had been prepared.
The RCMP is also by law supposed to immediately decontaminate those sprayed and that was not done.
In the print media a victim of the spray was interviewed who said there was violence and pushing at the barricades. She also said that she didn't like the violence and was there to protest peacefully.
She was still hit in the blanket pepper spraying, so whether or not there was a shoving match with police, that is still no excuse for use of the spray. Some violent people can also become frenzied when hit by the spray and then hurt others in a crowd situation.
And what about the innocent people hit by spray? They were publicly tortured by the RCMP for exercising their right to protest in a democracy. A good government would not continue with such a policy of cruel corporal punishment.
It is fundamental in our society that citizens have the right to be charged and given a fair trial and even then cruel chemical torture is not administered.
The people sprayed were not arrested for any crime. They were humiliated and tortured in public. The volume of this spray was huge and fired from guns the size of fire extinguishers. Some people had their faces turned completely orange.
They also fired the pepper in a wide spray on the crowd chemical-weapons fashion (see photos on the web site.)
The RCMP should have controlled those who were pushing barricades by using other means.
A member of the Coalition for a Federal Ban on Pepper Spray who was at the demo states that the police presence consisted of roughly 100 heavily armed police including the Ottawa Police riot squad. The RCMP launched two pepper spray attacks on protesters within 10-15 minutes of their arrival at the top of Parliament Hill. Before the first attack, he saw no major violent action by any protesters. At various times, he saw some protesters push toward the police barricades, others tried to lift and remove a couple fences and/or throw a few empty cans at the police. There was no serious violence and no use of weapons by any protester.
He also says a few people were in so much pain and agony they had to sit or lie down and several had trouble breathing and could not speak for some minutes. One protester said the police sprayed him from only "1 foot away". And he saw no police officer providing any water or first aid to any of the people who had been pepper-sprayed.
Studies repeatedly show that police can't follow guidelines when using chemicals like pepper spray. The pattern of abuse always develops. It is a part of human nature.
We request that all MPs support an apology to the people sprayed on parliament hill and a ban on pepper spray, especially its use as a crowd control chemical weapon. We also request that the federal government compensate those injured by the spray.
Gary L. Morton
Coalition for a Federal Ban on Pepper Spray
--------
Support from CONNIE FOGALcfogal@netcom.ca
The Defence of Canadian Liberty Committee supports you entirely.
I will be linking your website ot ours and posting your letter there.
Connie Fogal and the Defence of Canadian Liberty Committee
http://www.canadianliberty.bc.ca
Pepper Spray/letter to Toronto Police Services Board
dweitz@interlog.com (Don Weitz)
September 24, 1998
Pepper Spray:Health Risks and Deaths
Documents submitted to the Toronto Police Services Board by Don Weitz
on
behalf ofPeople Against Coercive Treatment (PACT)
To: Norman Gardner, Chairperson:
I am co-founder of PACT, a grassroots political action group of psychiatric survivors in Toronto who are totally opposed to the use of force in the psychiatric system and society generally.
PACT stongly supports the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP) in totally opposing the use of Pepper Spray by the TTC and police, because we believe it is a serious health hazard, soemtimes a deadly force weapon. Pepper Spray has already been used against psychiatric survivors in Ontario. In one 15-month period (1994-1995),three of our brothers died shortly after being sprayed.(see The Toronto Star article listed below). We fear Pepper Spray will continue to be used against some of us and other poor and homeless citizens on the street or on psychiatric wards.
Pepper Spray has also caused or been involved in over 70 deaths in the
United States, including at least 30 in California. Pepper Spray has also
been used against many peaceful protestors in Vancouver during the OPEC
conference last fall, and it caused considerable pain and anguish -
fortunately no deaths from this documented and televised incident.
Documents:
- Pepper Spray Update: More Fatalities, More Questions, a report by
the
American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California,
June 1995,
Executive summary (full report on request: Public Affairs Dept., ACLU
of
Southern California, 1616 Beverly Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90026 U.S.A.,
tel:
213-977-9500 x250).
- A National Survey into the Use and Effects of CS Spray in the U.K.
by
Frazer Bell and Ben Thomas (Maudsley Hospital, London), 1998 (E-mailed)
- G.R.N. Jones, "Are CS sprays safe?" Lancet, vol.350, August 30, 1997
- "Doctors call for ban on CS spray", The Independent, August 16, 1998
.
- "Doctors tell of dangers in CS spray", by Roger Dobson, The Independent,
August 24, 1998.
- "Deaths raise doubts on pepper spray", The Toronto Star, October
17, 1995.
- Brian McKinnon, re Pepper Spray, letter to The Toronto Star
October 20,
1995 (unpublished).
- Don Weitz, "Pepper spray is too dangerous to be used by TTC", The
Toronto
Star, August 31, 1998.
Don Weitz
#802-38 Orchard View Blvd.
Toronto,ON M4R 2G3
t: 416-545-0796
Oppose Pepper Spray for TTC Cops:
The TTC has voted to arm transit cops with pepper
spray. Transit commissioners yesterday supported a call to equip the system's
57 special constables with capsicum spray for a one-year trial period.
Toronto's police services board and Ontario's solicitor general's office
must now okay the plan if the TTC's security force can use pepper
spray. The use of pepper spray on transit platforms and areas is too dangerous
to even consider. Studies show that pepper spray is a form of state sanctioned
torture. A lot of people have died from it -- often people have to shave
their hair off to stop the nerve pain, and one side effect is that pepper
spray can bring on heart attacks as it effects the electrical ability of
the heart.
There is also a question as to whether transit cops are
needed at all. There was little TTC crime to begin with and that small
amount is declining. Why would special weapons come in at a time when crime
is on the decrease
Tell the Ontario Solicitor General you oppose pepper spray
Runciman, Hon. Robert W. PC Leeds-Grenville Solicitor General / Minister
of Correctional Services 175 Bloor St. E., Suite 400,
M4W 3R8 Telephone : 326-5075 Facsimile : 326-5085
-----------------------------
October 2, 1998
Bob Runciman
Solicitor-General
Ontario government
fax: (416) 326-7085
No Pepper Spray for TTC
Dear Mr.Runciman:
This is a follow-up to my letter re opposition to Pepper Spray and its
possible use by staff of the Toronto Transit Commission(TTC), which I faxed
to you on September 30,1998. As a matter of urgency, I am writing again
to urge you to refuse to sign a recent motion from the Toronto Police Services
Board authorizing the use of Pepper Spray (oleoresin capsicum) by TTC "special
constables"; it passed by the narrow margin of 3-2 on September 24, 1998.
It's bad enough that the Toronto police and OPP have this deadly chemical weapon. Now you're being pressured by TTC administration and staff, police chief David Boothby and the Toronto Police Services Board to authorize the use of Pepper Spray by TTC personnel recently deputized as "special constables".
As you may be aware, Pepper Spray constitutes a direct and serious
danger to the health and sometimes life of many citizens sprayed with this
chemical. As I pointed out in my letter of September 24,1998 addressed
to board chairman Norman Gardner, Pepper Spray has already been directly
linked to the deaths of at least three persons (all psychiatric survivors)
in Ontario during a two-year period,the deaths of over seventy persons
in the United States during a three-year period, including approximately
thirty-five in California, and several recent deaths in the UK.
In its groundbreaking June 1995 report titled "Pepper Spray Update:More
Fatalities, More Questions", the Southern California chapter of the
American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) thoroughly documented the deaths
of 26 men--mainly in their 30s and 40s and in poor health-- who died in
custody shortly after being pepper-sprayed. If you would like a copy
of this report, please let me know and I will personally deliver a copy
to
your office as soon as possible next week.
At its last meeting on September 24, Mr.Gardner and other board members not only ignored or refused to discuss the alarming findings and conclusions in the ACLU report. They also minimized the powerful and personal testimony of Ms.PJ Lilley, a courageous protestor who suffered "excruciating" pain after being pepper-sprayed while exercising her constitutional right of peaceful protest during the APEC conference in Vancouver last fall. You may have seen scenes from this protest featuring RCMP use of Pepper Spray on the CBC.
Given the fact that the board made no recommendation for any study of the many health effects of Pepper Spray, the board's decision to rubber-stamp police chief Boothby's motion to approve Pepper Spray for TTC "constables" is particularly irresponsible, reckless and shameful. I again ask that you refuse to approve it without delay.
I would appreciate your written reply.
Sincerely,
Don Weitz
#802-38 Orchard View Blvd.
Toronto,Ontario M4R 2G3
tel/fax: (416) 545-0796
E-mail: dweitz@interlog.com
c: Elizabeth Witmer, Minister of Health
Dr.Sheela Basrur, Medical Officer of Health
John Filion, chair, Toronto Board of Health
College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario
Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP)
Street Health
Ontario College of Nurses
Amnesty International
media
Protection:
I still need info as to what gear and methods can be used against pepper
spray. Anyone with such info send it to command@interlog.com
One item I used in the past at protests is one of those Nu skin
Halloween masks. They are in the drug stores now so people might want to
pick some up. They are skin like rubber with a tiny air hole for the mouth
and mirrored plastic protecting the eyes. They also cover your head.
---------------------
According to Staff Srgt. Stewart, you can protect yourself from
pepper spray by wearing swimming goggles, and finging some way to cover
your mouth (duct tape?)
pepper spray attacks your mucus-membranes, so in certain situations,
you might want to protect your genitals as well....
jono
---------------------
So from your info - if you are attending a protest with a potential
for violence, it may best to wear goggles and one of those rubber skin
halloween masks which look so lovely to police. And as you say it attacks
mucuse membranes and genitals, be sure to pad your underwear or possibly
wear more than one pair. Enough so that it can't soak through even in tiny
amounts. A bandana or cloth tied around your mouth would also be helpful
so you could breathe
If you do get hit you must immediatey be decontaminated with water.
-- police are required by law to decontaminate people they spray.
You need large amounts of water to wash and spray off pepper spray
quickly.
==================
The A16 Medical Team's
General Advice for Protesters
The goal of the A16 Medical Team is to assist with the efforts to shut down the World Bank/IMF which is robbing our sisters and brothers worldwide of their ability to provide and receive health care, education, a living wage and other life essentials. The Medical Team will help you, the warriors for global justice, stay as active, healthy and engaged in the struggle as possible. We will provide free treatment to the best of our ability to anyone who requests it. We will offer 'straight' (allopathic) and 'complementary' (herbal, homeopathic, etc.) care.
The primary health care will take place in the protest zone by trained Street Medics, and you the protesters. The medics will facilitate assistance to anyone who desires it. The medics will be assigned to areas of action, affinity groups, and/or hot zones.
More intensive treatment will be provided in the vicinity of the protests.
Outside the protest zone, skilled health practitioners who can provide
further assistance will care for people who need more intensive treatment
than what is available in the field, or refer people to other health care
-- i.e. hospital, adjunct therapy, etc..
You Need to Know:
If you are well prepared mentally and have essential supplies and knowledge, you will probably not need our medical assistance. Fear & confusion are the State's major weapon. Confidence, determination, preparation and awareness of your strength is your best weapon.
If you are going to be associated with the civil disobedience / direct-action at the World Bank and IMF, the A16 Medical Team wants you and your affinity groups to learn simple preparations, and bring along essential supplies. This will help you avoid the worst effects of the POSSIBLE use of police violence from tear gas, pepper spray and plastic bullets. They may use different tactics and weapons. Our advice is designed to help you remain in action for global justice, so be sure to read it and pass it around.
We will supply and train as many medics as possible. But you, the regular protesters are the primary health care providers.
You need to know about essential and optional supplies, clothes and gear to bring to the protest, and basic knowledge, prevention and treatment of effects from tear gas, pepper spray, plastic bullets and common injuries.
Each affinity group is asked to designate someone as their medical monitor. This person will be responsible for:
Use Your Head
The A16 Medical Team's
Recommended Supplies for Protestors
Every protester to the World Bank / IMF demonstration that risks encountering
police tear gas, pepper spray and plastic bullets should bring along the
following health supplies:
The ESSENTIALS:
DO NOT BRING/USE ON SKIN:
Vaseline, detergent soap, skin moisturizers, make up, because the chemicals
bind with them - anything acidic will cause stronger reaction. Do not wear
Vaseline, mineral oil for protection!!!
OPTIONAL Supplies / Clothing info:
Recommended Extra JUMP KIT supplies for Affinity Groups:
------------------------
Pepper spray paper
Adam Sitze
Program for Comparative Studies in Discourse
and Society
University of Minnesota, Twin Cities
sitz0007@umn.edu
August 2000
Re-evaluating pepper spray.
1. Short history of pepper spray.
American law enforcement
learned from the mistakes of the 1960s.
During that period, police treated protests and civil disobedience
with an
attitude of "lump 'em and leave 'em." That attitude proved ineffective
for
a number of reasons: it brought on excessive force lawsuits against
officers, created a negative public perception of police forces in
general
(e.g. Chicago 1968), and put police officers themselves in physical
danger.
In the early 1970s a new way of dealing with protests began to emerge.
Instead of subduing citizens through hands-on contact or with nightsticks,
police began to rely upon a set of instruments called "non-lethal devices"
ó mace, pepper spray, stun guns, bean bags, even potatoes. These
devices
were developed by U.S. industries at the request of the U.S. government.
In 1971, the Department of Justice issued a paper citing "the development
of electrical or chemical weapons as the greatest short-term priority
to
augment traditional weapons." Industry responded: in 1974, mace
would be
heralded as "a breakthrough into 'a new era in police weaponry.'"
It was in this context that
pepper spray, or oleoresin capsicum
(OC), was developed. Although it existed as early as the 1960s,
its
deployment during that period was indiscriminate ó sprayed from
helicopters
ó and therefore largely ineffective, particularly under windy
conditions.
It was not until the 1980s that researchers discovered how to concentrate
its active agents and to develop technologies capable of aiming it
with
precision. Used by wildlife agents and the Postal Service during
the
1980s, it was approved for use by the FBI in 1987 and for nation-wide
use
by police officers in 1993.
The new technology proved
attractive to police departments for a
number of reasons. Before the introduction of pepper spray, police
cadets
were trained to gain control of unruly situations according to a five-stage
"use of force continuum," beginning with (1) the physical presence
of an
officer on the scene and (2) the verbalization of a command.
In certain
conditions, this could escalate into (3) hands-on physical contact,
(4) use
of a hand-held impact weapon (nightstick or truncheon), and, finally,
(5)
use of lethal force. The introduction of "non-lethal devices"
like OC
bridged a gap in this continuum.2 The burning effects of OC allowed
police
to achieve the result of hands-on physical contact without actually
having
to resort to such contact themselves. As Chief Deputy John Hunter
of the
Skagit County, Washington Sheriffís Office explains, "[a]fter
being exposed
to the spray, subjects' reactions become reflexive in nature.
They
immediately cover their eyes and bend over into a defensive posture
to
avoid further contact. This reactive behavior allows officers
to control
subjects without resorting to a physical confrontation or to the deadly
use
of force level of the force continuum."3 As a Minneapolis Police
Lieutenant (who wishes to remain anonymous) put it: "if I can accomplish
things without having to touch people, but still get compliance with
lawful
orders, that's a good thing."4 At the same time OC added flexibility
to
the use of force continuum, then, it protected officers themselves
from the
possibility of injury. Officers ó and, it was said, citizens
too.
According to Hunter, "[t]he effects of the spray generally last 20
to 45
minutes and leave no residual effects."5 To ensure that
permanent
injuries would not result from use of the spray, officers were to be
trained to "help subjects rinse their faces with free-flowing, cool
water"
and to monitor the breathing of those they had sprayed. If these
precautions are taken, the effects of pepper spray are ultimately
"uncomfortable, but not life-threatening."6
The advantages are obvious:
the introduction of pepper spray
allowed police to have forceful interactions with citizens without
either
permanently injuring those citizens or putting police officers themselves
at risk.
But pepper spray was desirable
for police departments for another
reason as well. Because its residual effects are not empirically
verifiable, it reduces the likelihood that its use will lead to police
liability in excessive force lawsuits. Whereas citizens injured
in more
"physical" encounters with police could adduce lasting injuries such
as
bruises, cuts, and broken bones as evidence of excessive force, the
brief,
intense pain of pepper spray can only be described. The act of
pepper
spraying can be verified by others; but the experience, which is profoundly
internal, cannot. In excessive force cases involving pepper spray,
judges
are thus compelled to assess the "excessiveness" of the force in question
solely on the basis of the testimony of the injured party.
In this respect, it is no
accident that many police departments
require officers undergoing training in the use of OC to be sprayed
with
it. For if police officers are able to testify that they themselves
endured the pain of pepper spray before using it on others, and that
that
pain is only "uncomfortable" or "short-lived," then any claims that
a
plaintiff may make about the "excessiveness" of his or her pain will
be
significantly undercut. Thus Hunter observes that "[c]ourts may
be more
willing to side with law enforcement officers who have themselves been
exposed to the spray and survived with minimal short-term discomfort."7
Word against word: in a litigious culture, the tracelessness of pepper
spray leaves Police Departments an easy way out of lawsuits that are
not
only usually very expensive, but that undermine the legitimacy that
most
police officers work hard to create anew each day in their dealings
with
the public they serve.
Those in favor of "mandatory
exposure programs" suggest that the
real reason they are required is one of sensitivity training ó
"to help
officers understand an exposed person's behavior and the need for prompt
aftercare."8 But the very police officers who would ostensibly
be "helped"
by such programs are dubious. After all, some note, one does
not have to
be shot to understand the effects of a gun. Some officers have
flatly
refused to undergo pepper spray exposure, and the necessity of the
procedure has been fiercely debated almost everywhere it has been
proposed.
2. Problems with pepper spray.
It's easy to understand
why. The hottest hot pepper familiar to
most of us is the cayenne pepper. The "heat" of a regular cayenne
pepper
is listed at 35,000 Scoville Heat Units (or SHU: the unit used by spice
companies to gauge the potency of a spice). By contrast, the
OC
concentrate approved for use by police departments ranges from 500,000
to
2
million SHUs.
You can imagine what it
would be like to chew and swallow a cayenne
pepper all by itself. Now imagine a substance 14 to 57 times
as intense
burning for 30 to 45 minutes not only in your mouth but in your eyes
and in
the insides of your nose, throat, lungs, and any other mucous-lined
orifice
on your body, including your genitals. The peculiar inhumanity
of OC is
that it produces an inexpressible, unimaginable degree of pain in the
most
intimate, interior, private places of the body. This is why organizations
like Amnesty International and the National Coalition on Police
Accountability argue that pepper spray is a form of torture as defined
by
the United Nations Convention on Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman,
and
Degrading Treatment signed by the United States in 1997.
Excruciatingly painful, its effects are also fundamentally unpredictable.
Even the most conservative police estimates cede that pepper spray
has been
a contributing factor in dozens of deaths since its introduction9;
organizations such as the American Civil Liberties Union and the Canadian
Civil Liberties Union regularly put the number at well over one hundred.10
Whatever the numbers, all
agree that most of these deaths occur
when pepper spray exacerbates a pre-existing heart or lung condition
(like
asthma or arrhythmia), or melts down a cardio-vascular system already
racing from the effects of drugs or alcohol, leading in either case
to
asphyxia or cardiac arrest.11
It's the unpredictability
of these deaths that poses the most
serious problems for police. Since heart and lung conditions
are by nature
hidden from view, if not unknown to the very person they affect, officers
cannot know before they spray a citizen whether or not he or she is
stricken with such a condition.12 Neither, then, can they know
whether the
force they employ when spraying will turn out to be on a par with a
headlock or a gunshot. Once this unpredictability is taken into
account,
it quickly becomes clear that pepper spray cannot be located with certainty
anywhere on the use of force continuum. It adds flexibility to
that
continuum, but it adds far too much: it adds unintentional effects
to the
use of force, thus putting force itself beyond the control of the very
officer who would use it to gain control.13
If OC is so unpredictable,
how did it get approved for use in the
first place? It's key at this point to recall that the study
which
approved pepper spray for use by the FBI was authored by a government
employee who allegedly took $57,000 in payments from the manufacturer
of
Cap-Stun, the very pepper spray brand whose effectiveness and safety
he
was
testing. That employee, Special Agent Thomas Ward of the Firearms
Training
Unit in Quantico, Virginia pled guilty to these charges in 1996.
OC, it
seems, has been implemented without passing through the rigors of a
truly
independent and scientific study.
This is not to say that
it hasn't been researched. Studies funded
by the International Association of Chiefs of Police (1994) and the
National Institute of Justice (1997) found that OC was not the primary
cause in any of the deaths associated with its use.14 Since then,
however,
unaffiliated and independent medical doctors and professors of genetics
have disputed those findings, linking OC to blindness, hair loss, severe
gastritis and diarrhea, cancer, and death.15 These uncertainties
and
disagreements lead to only one reasonable conclusion: we still don't
know
with certainty what OC does to the human body.
To cite a very crucial example:
indications exist that the
effectiveness of OC depends on the color of one's skin. The aforementioned
Minneapolis Police Lieutenant observed that "a lot of the black races
can
be somewhat immune to the stuff. For whatever reason, the chemicals
don't
interact with some of the darker-skinned races, so it's futile to put
it on
them. You're spraying the stuff out, it's irritating them, and
it's just
heightening the situation, making them madder. So it might not
be a good
time to use it."16 The theory of this correlation is widespread.
Monty
Jett, an instructor in the Firearms Training Unit at the FBI Academy
in
Quantico, noted that "the burning sensation on the skin [of someone
who has
been pepper sprayed] should subside in approximately 1 hour, sometimes
longer for fair-skinned people."17 Jett does not attempt to elaborate
on
this claim, which implies that those of us who are not "fair-skinned"
are
less susceptible to the effects of pepper-spray than those of us who
are.
If he had, he might have enlisted the aid of weird science, as did
instructors at the Cambridge, Massachusetts Police Academy in an August
1,
1999 interview on pepper spray. In that interview, use of force
instructor
Robert Ames and pepper spray instructor Frank Gutoski noted that they
regularly teach cadets that pepper-spray doesn't always subdue
Mexican-American, Indians, Cajuns and certain other ethnic groups because
of those groups' preference for spicy foods. Habitual ingestion
or
handling of cayenne, they explained, leads those groups to develop
a
tolerance to pepper spray.18
The theory would be a laughing
matter were it not for its striking
resemblance to other theories positing a correlation between skin color
and
OC and for the practical applications that seem to logically follow
from
those theories. Here we need to pause and ask a set of very serious
questions. How do theories like these translate into police practices?
Do
police officers decide whether or not to use OC on a citizen on the
basis
of his or her observation of the color of that citizen's skin?
More
troubling, if a police officer's operating hypothesis is that pepper-spray
doesn't work on "darker-skinned" citizens, is he or she likely to decide
to
use less force on the use of force continuum ó or more?
Clearly, we need to know more about pepper-spray both as a chemical
and
as
a technique of everyday policing. Specifically, we need to know
(1)
whether or not correlations between OC effectiveness and skin color
are
scientifically valid. Yet regardless of whether they are or not,
we also
need to know (2) how, if at all, theories of such correlations inform
actual police practices. To what extent and in what ways does
racial
profiling govern police use of pepper spray, which is to say, police
decisions about use of force against citizens with dark skin?
Moreover, we
still need to know (3) whether or not OC can be used without accidentally
killing those of us who have heart or lung conditions. Finally
we need to
know (4) what, if any, are the permanent effects of OC in and on the
human
body.
Until we know with certainty the answers to these four questions, every
use
of OC by police officers will be an unreasonable use of force.
In the meantime, we must ask ourselves if we can reasonably and with
good
conscience allow OC to continue to be used by Minneapolis Police.
A number of city officials and police departments have already been
forced
to ask themselves this question ó after it was already too late.
In
September of 1999, the Tucson Police Department temporarily suspended
the
use of OC after two OC-related incidents. In the first, pepper-spray
caused an intoxicated man to foam at the mouth, requiring his
hospitalization; in the second, a former high school football star
with
asthma died after police sprayed him.19 In June of 1999, the
Ottawa Police
Department filed suit against the manufacturer of its pepper spray
after
the Department was sued by Jean-Paul Gravelle, a man who continues
to
have
difficulty breathing after being pepper sprayed. The Police Department's
suit contends that the injuries suffered by Gravelle are the responsibility
of the pepper spray manufacturer itself, since its product was advertised
to be harmless. And in 1996, the San Francisco District Attorney's
Office
ordered its investigators to cease to use OC after it was linked to
two
accidental deaths in the Bay Area. Importantly, neither of the
deaths was
caused by the DA's own investigators: the San Francisco Office's suspension
of use of OC was a cautionary, pre-emptive measure. "Why wait
until we
have a problem?" said Chief Investigator Dan Addario.20
Why wait indeed.
3. Recommendations.
Given the complexity and
gravity of the problems with pepper spray,
I urge the City of Minneapolis to both follow and surpass the examples
of
Eugene, Oregon and Alberta, Canada, which have each recently instituted
carefully negotiated restrictions on the use of pepper spray by police.21
Specifically, I recommend that the City:
(1) Set a national precedent by commissioning
a systematic and
independent study addressing the four questions posed above.
Although
there have been many studies of the technical ìeffectivenessî
and medical
ìhealth risksî of pepper spray, there have been no systematic
studies of
the way in which social practices such as racial profiling govern pepper
spray use. Such a study would be carried out by qualified, independent
social science researchers in conjunction with medical experts on pepper
spray.22
(2) Adopt a ban on the use of pepper spray by
Minneapolis Police
pending the findings of that study.
Problems associated with pepper spray are not going to go away.
Let us not
defer or ignore them, but set an example by addressing them more directly
and forthrightly than ever before.
Samuel Faulkner and Larry Danaher, "Controlling Subjects: Realistic
Training vs. Magic Bullets," FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin (February
1997),
p. 21.
2 John Hunter, "Focus on Use of Force: Pepper Spray," FBI Law Enforcement
Bulletin, (May 1994), p. 24-5.
3 Ibid., p. 24.
4 Personal interview, July 15, 1999, University of Minnesota Law School.
5 See Hunter, p. 26.
6 Monty Jett, "Pepper Spray: Training for Safety," FBI Law Enforcement
Bulletin (November 1997), p. 20.
7 See Hunter, p. 25.
8 See Jett, p. 22.
9 Steven Edwards, John Gransfield, and Jamie Onnen, ìEvaluation
of Pepper
Spray,î National Institute of Justice: Research in Brief, February
1997.
10 "Pepper Spray Update: More Fatalities," American Civil Liberties
Union
of Southern California, Executive Summary, June 1995. These estimates
do
not include the long-term risks associated with pepper sprays which
contain
known carcinogenics such as metyl isobutyl ketonmine.
11 See Jett, p. 22.
12 Chris Wood, Macleanís legal correspondent, indicates that
this is the
most serious objection against police use of pepper spray. ìWhy
so much
pepper spray?î Macleanís, January 1, 2000, p. 249.
13 One of the most recent accidental deaths from pepper spray occurred
in
Pittsburgh on May 31, 2000. Officers following proper use of
force
procedures nevertheless found 31-year old Dale Jackson dead in the
back of
their vehicle forty minutes after their application of pepper spray.
See
Charlie Dietch, ìAssault and Pepper Spray,î In Pittsburgh
Weekly, August 9,
2000.
14 John Granfield, Jami Onnen, and Charles S. Petty, M.D., "Pepper
Spray
and In-Custody Deaths," Executive Brief, International Association
of
Chiefs of Police, Alexandria, VA, March 1994.
15 The most recent and comprehensive of these independent studies is
C.
Gregory Smith, MD, MPH, and Woodhal Stopford, MD, MSPH, ìHealth
Hazards
of
Pepper Spray,î North Carolina Medical Journal, v60 n5 (Sept/Oct
1999). In
Canada and Britain, psychiatrists and health workers have been the
most
vocal critics of the effects of pepper spray on the human body.
See
"Doctors call for ban on CS spray," The Independent (London), August
16,
1998; and "Doctors tell of dangers in CS spray," The Independent (London),
August 24, 1998.
16 Personal interview, July 15, 1999.
17 See Jett, p. 20.
18 For the pertinent moments of Hazel Trice Edneyís interview
with Ames and
Gutoski, see ìAssault and Pepper,î Harperís Magazine,
November 1999, v299,
p. 29.
19 Phil Villarreal, "Tucson police halt pepper spray use," The Arizona
Daily Star, August 22, 1999. Tuscon police have since reinstated
use of
pepper spray, arguing that the deaths were caused for unrelated reasons.
20 This policy remains in place as of August 2000.
21 In March 1998, the Alberta Law Enforcement Review Board issued rules
preventing officers from using pepper spray ìagainst a subject
who the
officer knows, or has reasonable cause to believe, is suffering from
a
serious breathing disorder or respiratory ailment.î This
policy is,
however, severely limited. (See n12 above.) On February
25, 2000 the
Eugene Police Department, working together with the ACLU, formulated
a
pepper spray policy preventing police from using pepper spray to disperse
crowds.
22 Such a study could be placed under the supervision of john powell,
Executive Director of the University of Minnesota Institute on Race
and
Poverty, and could be advised by Duke Universityís Dr. Woodhall
Stopford,
who has studied pepper spray extensively from a medical perspective.
I
wish to emphasize the strictly propositional status of this suggestion;
I
have not spoken to either scholar about this idea.
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