Man hit with Taser, baton in critical condition

 Updated Tue. Nov. 20 2007 11:16 PM ET

 CTV.ca News Staff

A B.C. man was fighting for his life in hospital Tuesday after a police confrontation involving the use of a Taser the day before.

 RCMP in Chilliwack, B.C., say they used pepper spray, batons, and an electric stun gun known as a Taser to subdue a man who appeared to be acting aggressively at a rental store.

 Witnesses told CTV British Columbia that the man had been driving erratically before entering the business. They add that he became extremely agitated when he learned that police had been called.

 RCMP Assistant Commissioner Peter German said that when police arrived on the scene, "They encountered a very aggressive individual and the members, as we are informed at this point and time, were engaged in a very difficult struggle to control this person who was combative and aggressive." 

When none of the police tactics worked, the two Mounties who initially responded had to call for back-up.

 The 36-year-old man was taken to a local hospital after police subdued him. He was initially conscious and talking, but his condition worsened overnight.

 The man is listed in extremely critical condition with cuts to his head.

 The RCMP noted, however, it is not clear what led to the man's current medical condition.

 The Mounties have been in the middle of a public firestorm since mid-October when a Polish immigrant died after a Taser incident with police.

 A video recording of the incident released last week showed that RCMP officers used a Taser on Robert Dziekanski within 30 seconds of confronting him at Vancouver International Airport on Oct. 14.

 Although there is no evidence to suggest that either Dziekanski's injuries or those of the man in Chilliwack were the direct result of Taser use, the Mounties noted Tuesday that they will reconsider the use of electric stun guns if research warrants.

 "Should we ever be provided with any credible research or evidence that it shouldn't be used, we would certainly be in favour of a moratorium for its use," said Gary Bass, the RCMP Deputy Commissioner for the Pacific Region.

 Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day announced on Tuesday that he will appoint Paul Kennedy -- the head of the Public Complaints Against the RCMP -- to review the use of Tasers by the Mounties.

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 Another Taser Death - In Clearwater 

April 07, 2006 

By Bob Carroll  

Before the Taser was invented, law enforcement officers were able to subdue unarmed persons with various well-recognized techniques, some of which I learned during my training as an FBI Agent in the mid 1960's. These techniques almost always accomplished their purpose without causing any serious injury.

 Enter the Taser. With the new, supposedly non-lethal, weapon now being used against both armed and unarmed persons deaths are being reported frequently throughout the country. The most recent death occurring after multiple Taser jolts occurred in Clearwater and is detailed in the St. Pete Times. 

Whenever a death of an unarmed person occurs as a result of police intervention or restraint involving a Taser there should be a full investigation conducted by persons not connected to the government. The most obvious reason for an independent inquiry is the potential for a Wrongful Death Claim on behalf of the survivors of the deceased. Two potential defendants in such a claim would be the manufacturer of the Taser and the police agency. Permitting a government investigation, which does need to be accomplished, to be the only inquiry does not strike me as the best route to the whole truth.

================= 

    Suspect dies after shock from Taser

     CLEARWATER - The first time police shocked Thomas C. Tipton with a Taser, it barely slowed him down, a witness said.

     The second time, it did nothing. 

    "He was uncannily powerful," said Cesar Cuevas, 47, who saw Tipton fight police in the courtyard of the Tropic Isle Motel late Wednesday night. "He was like a bull in a china shop." 

    Three officers eventually handcuffed Tipton, who continued to struggle, police said. Then, suddenly, he went limp.

     By the time Tipton, 34, of Tampa reached a hospital, he was dead.

     Police said Thursday they don't know what killed Tipton or why he fought with officers. The violent confrontation and another in Pasco County involving a 92-year-old man are likely to fuel the debate about the growing prevalence of Tasers and the risks involved.

     Since 2001, more than 150 people nationwide have died after they were shocked by Tasers, according to an Amnesty International report released last week.

     Most deaths were later attributed to drugs, pre-existing heart problems or "excited delirium," a psychotic and typically drug-induced state in which the heart is susceptible to cardiac arrest.

     Taser International, which makes the weapons, has challenged those statistics, saying the deaths had not been officially connected to a Taser shock. 

    The company has said it knows of just six cases in which an autopsy found that a Taser shock was a contributing factor in someone's death. 

    In Tipton's case, it will fall to Pinellas-Pasco medical examiner Jon Thogmartin to determine the cause of death. Thogmartin, who declined to comment Thursday, said in October that it was a medical fact that a Taser alone would not kill.

     He said, however, that Tasers can contribute to a death by exacerbating an existing medical condition.

     Clearwater police policy requires officers to be trained before they are issued a Taser and requires that it "never be used as a tool for coercion." The policy further outlines when the Taser can't be used - such as when a person could fall from a high place, is pregnant or when another option is available - and bans shooting the Taser at someone's head, neck or genitals. 

    Tasers are used by deputies in Hillsborough, Pasco and Citrus counties, and police officers in Tampa, St. Petersburg, Clearwater, Temple Terrace, Dade City, Port Richey and Tarpon Springs.

     Before Tipton, one person had died in the Tampa Bay area after a Taser shot. An autopsy attributed that 2004 death involving Hillsborough deputies to "accidental cocaine-induced agitated delirium."

========================

 Another Taser death

 Back to the Taser story. On the heels of a cardiac arrest in a 14 year old hit with a Taser (the boy is recovering) comes news of a death of a male "in his forties" after a Taser was used "to subdue him," also in Chicago. The local NBC station said police are conducting an "in-custody death investigation" (NBC5/WMAQ via Officer.com) and the police chief is putting a hold on a new order for 100 additional Tasers. On the same day the legal guardian of the 14 year old (The Department of Children and Family Services' guardianship administrator) filed a lawsuit on the boy's behalf in Cook country court (AP via TeamAmberAlert). Taser's stock price slumped.

Meanwhile, Taser International, Inc. has issued a press-release contesting a CBS News report that an Air Force study found repeated shocks from a Taser led to evidence of cardiac damage in pigs. The scientific dispute, judging from the Taser press release, relates to two scientific issues: (1) whether the blood chemistry findings in pigs subjected to repeated Taser applications (reportedly 18 applications in 3 minutes done twice, separated by an hour) are relevant to actual use; and, (2) nor are the blood chemistry findings (elevated Troponin I) relevant nor were they statistically significant, in any case.

The statistical significance objection is easily disposed of. Lack of statistical significance does not mean what the press release implies. A finding that a result is "not statistically significant" merely means you do not reject the null hypothesis (no elevated Troponin levels), not that you accept the null hypothesis, which is what Taser and its experts imply. The lack of statistical significance can easily be a consequence of a small sample size. Without seeing the actual numbers it is hard to judge. A common mistake, but a mistake nonetheless.

The objections are also difficult to assess without seeing the actual paper, presented orally at a "Non-Lethal Technology and Academic Research (NTAR) symposium" in November, 2004. (I'd like to see more of these. I have been subjected to enough lethal academic research symposia.) While I am thus not sure what to think about elevated Troponin levels in repeatedly shocked pigs in an Air Force experiment, I surely do know what to think about the mounting evidence of sudden death in human beings after being Tasered once.

I can't wait to see a press release saying the deaths are "not statistically significant" nor evidence of genuine damage.

=======================

Death by Taser: The Killer Alternative to Guns 

By Silja J.A. Talvi, In These Times. Posted November 18, 2006.

Long touted as a safer alternative to handguns for law enforcement, tasers are potentially deadly weapons that have a growing history of abuse by police and security guards.

Editor's note: This article is especially relevant given the recent unwarranted and brutal taser attack on a UCLA student. The video to the right is the taped recording of the attack this week.

Taser International Inc. maintains that its stun-guns are "changing the world and saving lives everyday." There is no question that they changed Jack Wilson's life. On Aug. 4, in Lafayette, Colo., policemen on a stakeout approached Jack's son Ryan as he entered a field of a dozen young marijuana plants. When Ryan took off running, officer John Harris pursued the 22-year-old for a half-mile and then shot him once with an X-26 Taser. Ryan fell to the ground and began to convulse. The officer attempted cardiopulmonary resuscitation, but Ryan died.

According to his family and friends, Ryan was in very good physical shape. The county coroner found no evidence of alcohol or drugs in his system and ruled that Ryan's death could be attributed to the Taser shock, physical exertion from the chase and the fact that one of his heart arteries was unusually small.

In October, an internal investigation cleared Officer Harris of any wrongdoing and concluded that he had used appropriate force.

Wilson says that while his son had had brushes with the law as a juvenile and struggled financially, he was a gentle and sensitive young man who always looked out for his disabled younger brother's welfare, and was trying to better his job prospects by becoming a plumber's apprentice.

"Ryan was not a defiant kid," says his father. "I don't understand why the cop would chase him for a half-mile, and then 'Tase' him while he had an elevated heart rate. If [the officer] hadn't done that, we know that he would still be alive today."

Ryan is one of nearly 200 people who have died in the last five years after being shot by a Taser stun gun. In June, the U.S. Department of Justice announced that it would review these deaths.

Over the same period, Taser has developed a near-monopoly in the market for non-lethal weaponry. Increasingly, law enforcement officials use such weapons to subdue society's most vulnerable members: prisoners, drug addicts and the mentally ill, along with "passive resisters," like the protesters demonstrating against Florida Governor Jeb Bush's attendance of a Rick Santorum fundraiser in Pittsburgh on Oct. 9.

Taser has built this monopoly through influence peddling, savvy public relations and by hiring former law enforcement and military officers -- including one-time Homeland Security chief hopeful, Bernard Kerik. And now that questions are being raised about the safety of Taser weaponry, the company is fighting back with legal and marketing campaigns.

Birth of a Taser

In 1974, a NASA scientist named Jack Cover invented the first stun gun, which he named the TASER, or "Thomas A. Swift Electric Rifle," after Tom Swift, a fictional young inventor who was the hero of a series of early 20th century adventure novels. Because it relied on gunpowder, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms classified Tasers as registered firearms.

That changed in the early '90s. According to Taser's corporate creation story, co-founder Rick Smith became interested in the device after friends of his "were brutally murdered by an angry motorist." Smith contacted Cover in the hopes of bringing the Taser as a self-defense weapon to a larger market. In 1993, with money from Smith's brother Tom, they created Air Taser Inc., which would later become Taser International Inc. When Tasers were re-engineered to work with a nitrogen propellant rather than gunpowder, the weapon was no longer categorized as a firearm. The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department adopted the guns, but they were not widely embraced by other departments.

Taser's fortunes improved in 1998, after the company embarked on a new development program, named "Project Stealth." The goal was to streamline stun gun design and deliver enough voltage to stop "extremely combative, violent individuals," especially those who couldn't be controlled by non-lethal chemicals like mace.

Out of Project Stealth, the Advanced Taser was born. When the weapon premiered in 2000 -- a model eventually redesigned as the M-26 -- the company brought on a cadre of active and retired military and law enforcement personnel to vouch for the weapon's efficacy. The new spokespersons ranged from Arizona SWAT members to a former Chief Instructor of hand-to-hand combat for the U.S. Marine Corps.

Taser began to showcase the Advanced Taser at technology-related conventions throughout North America and Europe, billing it as a non-lethal weapon that could take down even the toughest adversary. Soon to be among those "dangerous" opponents were the protesters assembling in Philadelphia for the 2000 Republican National Convention.

By the following year, 750 law enforcement agencies had either tested or deployed the weapon. Today, more than 9,500 law enforcement, correctional and military agencies in 43 countries use Taser weaponry. In the past eight years, more than 184,000 Tasers have been sold to law enforcement agencies, with another 115,000 to citizens in the 43 states where it is legal to possess a stun gun.

When the electricity hits

Taser's stun guns are designed to shoot a maximum of 50,000 volts into a person's body through two compressed nitrogen-fueled probes, thereby disrupting the target's electromuscular system. The probes are connected to the Taser gun by insulated wires, and can deliver repeat shocks in quick succession. The probes can pierce clothing and skin from a distance or be directly applied to a person's body -- a process known as "dry stunning" -- for an ostensibly less-incapacitating, cattle-prod effect.

"The impetus for Tasers came from the often community-led search for 'less-than-lethal' police weapons," explains Norm Stamper, former chief of the Seattle Police Department and author of Breaking Rank. "[There were] too many questionable or bad police shootings, and cops saying, correctly, that there are many ambiguous situations where a moment's hesitation could lead to their own deaths or the death of an innocent other."

According to Taser's promotional materials, its stun guns are designed to "temporarily override the nervous system [and take] over muscular control." People who have experienced the effect of a Taser typically liken it to a debilitating, full-body seizure, complete with mental disorientation and loss of control over bodily functions.

Many Taser-associated deaths have been written up by coroners as being attributable to "excited delirium," a condition that includes frenzied or aggressive behavior, rapid heart rate and aggravating factors related to an acute mental state and/or drug-related psychosis. When such suspects are stunned, especially while already being held down or hogtied, deaths seem to occur after a period of "sudden tranquility," as Taser explains in its CD-ROM training material entitled, "Sudden Custody Death: Who's Right and Who's Wrong." In that same material, the company warns officers to "try to minimize the appearance of mishandling suspects."

Taser did not respond to requests for an interview. But its press and business-related statements have consistently echoed the company's official position: "TASER devices use proprietary technology to quickly incapacitate dangerous, combative or high-risk subjects who pose a risk to law enforcement officers, innocent citizens or themselves." Another brochure, specifically designed for law enforcement, clearly states that the X26 has "no after effects."

Ryan Wilson's family can attest otherwise, as can many others.

Casualties and cruelties

In the span of three months -- July, August and September -- Wilson's Taser-related death was only one among several. Larry Noles, 52, died after being stunned three times on his body (and finally on his neck) after walking around naked and "behaving erratically." An autopsy found no drugs or alcohol in his system. Mark L. Lee, 30, was suffering from an inoperable brain tumor and having a seizure when a Rochester, N.Y., police officer stunned him. In Cookeville, Ala., 31-year-old Jason Dockery was stunned because police maintain he was being combative while on hallucinogenic mushrooms. Family members believe he was having an aneurysm. And Nickolos Cyrus, a 29-year-old man diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, was shocked 12 times with a Taser stun gun after a Mukwonago, Wis., police officer caught him trespassing on a home under construction. An inquest jury has already ruled that the officer who shot Cyrus -- who was delusional and naked from the waist down when he was stunned -- was within his rights to act as he did.

Although the company spins it otherwise, Taser-associated deaths are definitely on the rise. In 2001, Amnesty International documented three Taser-associated deaths. The number has steadily increased each year, peaking at 61 in 2005. So far almost 50 deaths have occurred in 2006, for an approximate total of 200 deaths in the last five years.

Amnesty International and other human rights groups have also drawn attention to the use of Tasers on captive populations in hospitals, jails and prisons.

In fact, the first field tests relating to the efficacy of the "Advanced Taser" model in North America were conducted on incarcerated men. In December 1999, the weapon was used, with "success," against a Clackamas County (Ore.) Jail inmate. The following year, the first-ever Canadian use of an Advanced Taser was by the Victoria Police, on an inmate in psychiatric lockdown. Since that time, Taser deployment in jails and prisons has become increasingly commonplace, raising concerns about violations of 8th Amendment prohibitions against cruel and unusual punishment.

This summer, the ACLU of Colorado filed a class action suit on behalf of prisoners in the Garfield County Jail, where jail staff have allegedly used Tasers and electroshock belts, restraint chairs, pepper spray and pepperball guns as methods of torture. According to Mark Silverstein, legal director for ACLU of Colorado, inmates have told him that Tasers are pulled out and "displayed" by officers on a daily basis, either as a form of intimidation and threat compliance, or to shock the inmates for disobeying orders.

A recent report from the ACLU's National Prison Project (NPP), "Abandoned and Abused: Orleans Parish Prisoners in the Wake of Hurricane Katrina," concerns the plight of the estimated 6,500 New Orleans prisoners left to fend for themselves in the days after the monumental New Orleans flood. The NPP's Tom Jawetz says that the organization has been looking into abuses at Orleans Parish Prison (OPP) since 1999, but that the incidents that took place in jails and prisons in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina were unprecedented.

Take the case of New Orleans resident Ivy Gisclair. Held at OPP for unpaid parking tickets, Gisclair was about to be released on his own recognizance when Hurricane Katrina hit. After languishing with thousands of other prisoners in a flooded jail, Gisclair was sent to the Bossier Parish Maximum Security Prison. Once there, Gisclair apparently had the nerve to inquire about being held past his release date. Gisclair has testified that he was then restrained and stunned repeatedly with a Taser, before being thrown, naked and unconscious, into solitary confinement.

"I can't imagine any justification for that," says Jawetz. "[Prison guards] were kicking, beating and 'Tasing' him until he lost consciousness. A line was crossed that should never have been crossed."

In March, Reuben Heath, a handcuffed and subdued Montana inmate, was shocked while lying prone in his bed. The deputy involved -- a one-time candidate for sheriff -- now faces felony charges.

Gisclair and Heath are among the inmates who have survived in-custody incidents involving the abuse of Tasers. Others haven't been as fortunate. This year alone, those who have died in custody in the aftermath of being stunned by Tasers include Arapahoe County Jail (Colorado) inmate Raul Gallegos-Reyes, 34, who was strapped to a restraint chair and stunned; Jerry Preyer, 45, who suffered from a severe mental illness in an Escambia County, Fla., jail and was shocked twice by a Taser; and Karl Marshall, 32, who died in Kansas City police custody two hours after he was stunned with PCP and crack cocaine in his system.

Appropriate uses

"We are seeing far too many cases where Tasers are not being used for their intended purposes," says Sheley Secrest, president of NAACP Seattle. "And many of these cases don't end up getting reported or properly investigated because people are so humiliated by the experience."

Former U.S. Marshal Matthew Fogg, a long-time SWAT specialist and vice president of Blacks in Government, says that if stun guns are going to be used by law enforcement, training on their use should be extensive, and that the weapons should also be placed high up on what police officers call the "use-of-force continuum."

Fogg isn't alone in calling for such measures. In October 2005, the Police Executive Research Forum, an influential police research and advocacy group, recommended that law enforcement only be allowed to use Tasers on people aggressively resisting arrest. The organization also recommended that law enforcement officers needed to step back and evaluate the condition of suspects after they had been shocked once. Similar recommendations were included in an April 2005 report from the International Association of Chiefs of Police. That report also urged police departments to evaluate whether certain vulnerable groups -- including the mentally ill -- should be excluded altogether from being shot with Tasers.

Although Fogg's organization has called for an outright ban of Tasers until further research can be conducted, Fogg says that he knows responsible members of law enforcement are perfectly capable of using the weapons effectively. Officers who are willing to put their lives on the line for the sake of the community, he emphasizes, must be given the tools and training to be able to minimize harm to themselves and to others.

Fogg, who also serves on the board of Amnesty International USA, says that too many members of law enforcement seem to be using them as compliance mechanisms. "It's something along the lines of, 'If I don't like you, I can torture you,' " he says.

Some law enforcement agencies have already implemented careful use policies, including the San Francisco Sheriff's Department, which selectively hands out Tasers to carefully trained deputies. The department also prohibits use of Tasers on subjects already "under control." According to Sheriff Michael Hennessey, deputies are not allowed to use stun guns in response to minor ineffectual threats, as a form of punishment, or on juveniles or pregnant women. Within the department, stun guns are purposely set to turn off after five seconds. Additionally, every use of the weapon in a jail facility must be videotaped.

"I authorize Tasers to be used on people who are at high risk of hurting themselves or deputies," Sheriff Hennessey emphasizes. "Without options like these, the inmate and the deputies are much more likely to get seriously hurt."

But when stun guns are used on people who don't fit that criteria, Secrest says, the public should be asking serious questions about the efficacy of Taser use, particularly because of the emotional trauma related to Taser-related take-downs.

"When a person comes into our office after they've been [Tased], it's not as much the physical pain they talk about as much as the humiliation, the disrespect," she says. "The people [who are stunned by these guns] talk about not being able to move, and thinking that they were going to die."

As for actual Taser-associated deaths, Secrest believes that they should be investigated just as thoroughly as deaths involving firearms. Instead, Taser injuries and deaths are typically justified because officers report that the suspect was resisting an arrest.

"That's the magic word: 'resisted,'" says Secrest. "Any kind of police oversight investigation tends to end right there." Capitalizing on 9/11

Despite these concerns, Taser International Inc. has thrived. The 9/11 terrorist attacks sent the company's profits soaring. Many domestic and international airlines -- as well a variety of major law enforcement agencies -- were eager to acquire a new arsenal of weapons. Homeland Security money flooded into both state and federal-level departments, many of which were gung-ho to acquire a new arsenal of high-tech gadgets.

In 2002, Taser brought on former New York police commissioner Bernard Kerik as the company's director. Kerik had attained popularity in the wake of 9/11 as a law-and-order-minded hero; the company had seemingly picked one of the best spokespersons imaginable.

With Kerik's help, company's profits grew to $68 million in 2004, up from just under $7 million in 2001, and stockholders were able to cash in, including the Smith family, who raked in $91.5 million in just one fiscal quarter in 2004.

Unbeknownst to most stockholders, however, sales have been helped along by police officers who have received payments and/or stock options from Taser to serve as instructors and trainers. (The exact number of officers on the payroll is unknown because the company declines to identify active-duty officers who have received stock options.)

The recruitment of law enforcement has been crucial to fostering market penetration. For instance, Sgt. Jim Halsted of the Chandler, Ariz., Police Department, joined Taser President Rick Smith in making a presentation to the Chandler city council in March 2003. He made the case for arming the entire police patrol squad with M-26 Tasers. According to the Associated Press, Halsted said, "No deaths are attributed to the M-26 at all."

The council approved a $193,000 deal later that day.

As it turned out, Halsted was already being rewarded with Taser stock options as a member of the company's "Master Instructor Board." Two months after the sale, Halsted became Taser's Southwest regional sales manager.

In addition, Taser has developed a potent gimmick to sell its futuristic line of weapons. In 2003, Taser premiered the X-26. According to Taser's promotional materials, the X-26 features an enhanced dataport to help "save officer's careers from false allegations" by recording discharge date and time, number and length and date of discharges, and the optional ability to record the event with the Taser webcam. The X-26 also boasts a more powerful incapacitation rating of 105 "Muscular Disruption Units", up from 100 MDU's for the M-26.

The X-26 is apparently far more pleasing to the eye. As Taser spokesperson Steve Tuttle told a law enforcement trade journal, "It's a much sexier-looking product."

Lawsuits jolt Taser

As increasing numbers of police departments obtained Taser stun guns, the weapons started to be deployed against civilians with greater frequency.

Many of the civilian Taser-associated incidents have resulted in lawsuits, most of which have either been dismissed or settled out of court. But there have been a few exceptions.

In late September, Kevin Alexander, 29, was awarded $82,500 to settle an excessive force federal lawsuit after being shocked 17 times with a Taser by a New Orleans Parish police officer. The department's explanation: the shocks were intended to make him cough up drugs he had allegedly swallowed.

One recently settled Colorado case involved Christopher Nielsen, 37, who was "acting strangely" and was not responsive to police orders after he crashed his car. For his disobedience, he was stunned five times. When it was revealed that Nielsen was suffering from seizures, the county settled the case for $90,000.

An Akron, Ohio, man also recently accepted a $35,000 city settlement. One day in May 2005, he had gone into diabetic shock and police found him slumped over his steering wheel. Two officers proceeded to physically beat, Mace and Taser him after he did not respond to orders to get out of the car.

Taser's lack of response to the misuse of the company's weapons is troubling. The company relentlessly puts a positive spin on Taser use, most recently with a "The Truth is Undeniable" Web ad campaign, which contrasts mock courtroom scenes with the fictionalized, violent antics of civilians that prompt police to stungun them.

The campaign involves print ads, direct mail DVDs and online commercials that "draw attention to a rampant problem in this country: false allegations against law enforcement officers," according to Steve Ward, Taser's vice president of marketing.

"We're going to win"

The lawsuits have scared off some investors, making Taser's stock extremely volatile over the years. But press coverage of the company this past summer largely centered around Taser's "successes" in the courtroom. In addition to settling a $21.8 million shareholder lawsuit revolving around allegations that the company had exaggerated the safety of their product (they admitted no wrongdoing), Taser has triumphed in more than 20 liability dismissals and judgments in favor of the company. And the company's finances are on the upswing: Third-quarter 2006 revenues increased nearly 60 percent.

Regardless, CEO Rick Smith claims his company is target of a witchhunt. "We're waiting for people to dunk me in water and see if I float," is how he put it during a March 2005 debate with William Schulz, the executive director of Amnesty International USA.

Last year, with 40 new lawsuits filed against it, Taser dedicated $7 million in its budget to defending the company's reputation and "brand equity." The company has also gone on the offense, hiring two full-time, in-house litigators.

At one point, Taser hinted that it might sue Amnesty International for taking a critical position regarding Taser-associated injuries and deaths. In November 2004 Smith announced that the company's legal team had begun a "comprehensive review of AI's disparaging and unsupported public statements [to] advise me as to various means to protect our company's good name."

In one of the company's brashest legal maneuvers to date, Taser sued Gannett Newspapers for libel in 2005. The lawsuit alleged USA Today "sensationalized" the power of Taser guns by inaccurately reporting that the electrical output of the gun was more than 100 times that of the electric chair. This past January, a judge threw the case out, saying that the error in the article was not malicious, and that the story was protected by the First Amendment.

The company remains unwavering and aggressively protective, even as Taser-associated deaths mount each month. As Smith told the Associated Press in February, "If you're coming to sue Taser, bring your game face, strap it on and let's go. We're gonna win."

From Jack Wilson's standpoint, citizens are the real losers. His son Ryan lost his life in a situation that could have been handled any number of other ways, and no amount of legal posturing can bring Ryan back.

"I still can't believe my son is gone," he says. "The fact is that these Tasers can be lethal. No matter how they're categorized, Tasers shouldn't be treated as toys."

Thanks to the Nation Institute's Investigative Fund for research support, and to David Burnett for research assistance.

Man Dies After Police Use Stun Gun on Him

Associated Press | November 5 2004

FORT WORTH, Texas -- A man suspected of trying to illegally hook up electrical service died after police shocked him with a stun gun when he was found hiding at an apartment complex, authorities said.

Robert Guerrero, 21, was pronounced dead Tuesday at John Peter Smith Hospital where he was taken after officers subdued him with a Taser stun gun and he stopped breathing, police said.

Officers were called to the complex where residents said someone was illegally hooking up electrical service at a unit, police Lt. Abdul Pridgen said.

When they arrived, Guerrero hid in a closet and refused to come out, Pridgen said. Officers shot Guerrero with a Taser stun gun after asking him twice to come out. Pridgen said the man was then handcuffed but stopped breathing shortly thereafter.

"They had dealt with him before and had a history with him," Pridgen said. "They believed he might have had a weapon."

The stun guns, used primarily by police, temporarily incapacitate people by sending electrical charges through their bodies.

While some deaths have been linked to their use, officials of Scottsdale, Ariz.-based Taser International have defended their product, now used by thousands of law enforcement agencies nationwide.

====================

Police back Tasers despite deaths

After the latest fatality, HPD and others call stun guns safer options

Houston Chronicle | November 5, 2004

By LISE OLSEN and RHEA DAVIS

The death of a man in Fort Worth after being shot with an electrified dart this week has recharged debate about the safety of the increasingly popular stun guns.

Touted as a life-saving alternative to deadly force, Tasers are used by every major law-enforcement department in Harris County and 300 across Texas.

The sudden death of 21-year-old Robert Guerrero on Tuesday is the state's third that occurred in police custody after the use of a stun gun, based on reports from the manufacturer and the media.

The incident did not shake Houston Police Chief Harold Hurtt's conviction that his pending order for $4.7 million in Tasers will help save lives, not end them.

"Tasers give officers another option besides their handguns when they are confronted by someone with a weapon other than a gun or by someone who is mentally ill," he said.

Houston's City Council approved buying 3,600 Tasers this week.

Guerrero's death occurred after Fort Worth police officers responded to a tip that someone was illegally running electrical lines into an apartment. They followed the lines, discovered Guerrero hiding in a closet and threatened to stun him if he didn't come out. Shortly after being zapped with 50,000 volts, Guerrero stopped breathing and died, said Fort Worth Police Department spokesman Lt. Abdul Pridgen.

It was the third recent death in Texas of someone who had been stunned by a Taser.

Guerrero and a 22-year-old from Johnson County who died in September were both described as having used drugs before their deaths, based on media reports. But no autopsy report in Guerrero's case was available Thursday to confirm that. In the third Texas fatality, a 51-year-old Amarillo man with heart disease suffered a heart attack after being stunned in September 2003.

TASER International defended the safety of its product in e-mail to the Houston Chronicle on Thursday and said it was prepared to assist in the ongoing review of Guerrero's death.

"Until all the facts surrounding this tragic incident are known, it is inappropriate to jump to conclusions on a cause of death," according to the company's statement.

"What we do know is that Taser technology saves lives every day, and that the circumstances surrounding this incident appear to be consistent with other in-custody death incidents where a Taser device was not used," the statement said.

Few fatal cases found

Nationally, more than 70 similar fatal incidents have been reported, said Ed Jackson, a spokesman for Amnesty International USA.

The human rights group has called for a moratorium and independent research on Tasers.

However, a 2004 Arizona Republic review of autopsy reports for people who died nationwide after being stunned showed that medical examiners mentioned Tasers as a factor in only five deaths.

TASER International, an Arizona-based company, is recording record sales and touts its product as saving at least 600 lives, based on reports received by the company from police officers who have used it.

Tasers are unregulated by the federal government.

They are available for sale both to police and civilians in almost every state, based on the company's most recent annual report.

Popular device in local area

HPD is ordering Tasers, as have the Harris County Sheriff's Department and the Pasadena Police Department.

Baytown police got them in 2000.

A few Houston police officers have used a limited number of older stun guns for several years, but the order approved this week will make new models available to all patrol officers. Police in Miami, Seattle and Phoenix all have claimed to have seen shooting incidents drop dramatically after deploying Tasers.

Local departments hope the availability of stun guns will reduce injuries and deaths to officers and citizens.

Annually, about 30 civilians are shot each year in Harris County, based on statistics provided by the Harris County District Attorney's Office.

There have been 18 shootings so far in 2004.

The local chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union has called upon Tasers to be used only as a last resort to avoid lethal force, said Randall Kallinen, the chapter's president.

Since 1999, three officers have been prosecuted by the Harris County District Attorney's Office in two incidents involving alleged misuse of stun guns, but none was convicted.

Two HPD officers were fired in a 1996 incident involving the misuse of an older model of Taser, said Assistant District Attorney Tommy LaFon, who works in the Harris County District Attorney's public-accountability division.

Officer acquitted

In a more recent case, a Baytown officer was acquitted of charges he used a stun gun on a 59-year-old woman who was trying to collect mail for a relative in July 2003. The woman was knocking on the door with a brick and turned toward the officer with the brick in her hand when he confronted her.

In the Baytown case, the officer's supervisor defended his use of force at trial, and the officer was not disciplined.

But Lafon, the prosecutor, continues to disagree that the force used by the officer was appropriate.

D. Matthew Freeman, a Houston attorney, is representing the woman and two others stunned by Baytown officers in three civil suits pending in federal court.

Freeman says he believes Tasers are a valuable tool but can be easily misused.

Saving 'several lives'

Baytown's Lt. David Alford, who oversees internal affairs, said he believes use of force in all three cases was justified because of the erratic and violent behavior exhibited by the people who were stunned.

Alford said he's aware of several situations in which he believes that Tasers saved lives in Baytown.

"It has saved several lives," he said. "Officer injuries are down, injuries to suspects are down. It's an awesome tool."

Taser victim's widow remembers a great, passionate man

Peter O'Neil, CanWest Europe Correspondent, CanWest News Service

Published: Sunday, November 18, 2007

GLIWICE, Poland -- A vodka bottle lies on the floor beside a coffee table featuring a half-eaten breast of chicken, an overflowing ashtray and large photographs of Robert Dziekanski's final hysterical moments before dying in the grip of Taser-wielding Mounties in Vancouver.

Widow Elzbieta Dubon, grief-stricken throughout her first interview with the Canadian media, manages a faint smile when asked what Canada meant to her common-law husband of eight years.

The smile somehow brightens and warms a pasty, alcohol- and nicotine-abused face that could be the visage of someone two decades older.

Sophia Cisowski (L) is comforted by a friend during a memorial for her son Robert Dziekanski in Kamloops, British Columbia, Nov. 17, 2007. Dziekanski collapsed and died after he was hit by a police officer's Taser stun gun at Vancouver International Airport, Oct. 14, 2007. On the right is Cisowski's husband Peter.View Larger Image View Larger Image

Sophia Cisowski (L) is comforted by a friend during a memorial for her son Robert Dziekanski in Kamloops, British Columbia, Nov. 17, 2007. Dziekanski collapsed and died after he was hit by a police officer's Taser stun gun at Vancouver International Airport, Oct. 14, 2007. On the right is Cisowski's husband Peter.

REUTERS/Andy Clark

"Make sure he knows that I am smiling," Dubon, 46, said to a Polish interpreter while she nodded to a Canadian journalist.

"When Robert left he told me, 'Ella, if I go to the Rocky Mountains, and if I see a grizzly bear, I will walk up to it and kiss it.'"

She said he kept a Canadian flag above the door to their tiny bedroom, but gave it to a friend before leaving for Canada.

Her smile was brief. Then she stood, pulled the interpreter and journalist to her and moaned incomprehensible words of sorrow into their chests.

Four Mounties using Tasers subdued an agitated Dziekanski at the Vancouver airport in October. Dziekanski died soon after being shocked with the weapons.

The police actions, she said, can't be explained. "They are murderers."

Dubon described Dziekanski, 40, as a "great man" and an animal lover who adored his mother, was respected by friends, and had a "fanatic" passion for geography.

She said the police asked Dziekanski's mother why his suitcase was packed with geography books and atlases. "It was because those textbooks were his life," she said.

She said she may have joined Dziekanski in Kamloops, even though others have said he went to live with his mother to escape a toxic existence in the ground floor of this derelict, century-old apartment building.

Dubon's tiny $77-a-month flat is warmed only by a single electric heater with red-hot coils dangerously exposed next to a wall peeling as a result of water damage.

She somehow ignored two friends outside, both severely intoxicated, who banged on her door shouting "Ella! Ella!" for most of the hour-long interview.

Then she looked at the photographs. "He looks like a terrorist in these pictures, but he was scared," she explained.

"Robert was at a breaking point. He could show his desperation in no other way. He wanted someone to help him."

Dubon's analysis, while rambling and alcohol-blurred, was in many ways consistent with that of one of Poland's best-known psychiatrists.

Stanislaw Telesniski, who specializes in courtroom testimony in nearby Krakow, told CanWest News Service that Dziekanski was obviously weakened by fatigue, hunger, fear, nicotine deprivation, and panic over an inability to speak any English.

"All those things make the self-defence system weaker," said Telesniski, who analyzed the video for TVN-24, Poland's largest private television network.

"And you're starting to be more intuitive, like an animal. And after a while you feel you are surrounded by animals, because your rational way of thinking has been stopped because of stress.

"In that state of mind there is a disintegration of your personality, and you start to be aggressive and irrational, behaving in a way no one around you can understand.

"And aggression is one of the ways of communicating to people and showing the sign that something's wrong with you."

He said the four RCMP officers made a fundamental mistake when they approached him aggressively and sent jolts of electricity through his adrenalin-charged body.

"They should have been trained to deal with this situation, and the first rule is to become his friend as fast as possible, and not increase his stress more and more. Make him calm."

Most Poles interviewed in a shopping mall in the nearby city of Katowice, in the heart of Poland's once powerful coal-mining industry about 70 kilometres north of the Czech Republic, agreed that the police were brutally quick.

Several also said the incident has affected their previous view of Canada as a peaceful country.

"You expect something like that in America, but not in Canada," said Adrian Wawrzynczak, 31, a clothing store manager.

Radislaw Shupensky, a 28-year-old salesman, was harshly critical of the Mounties, but noted that a Brazilian man was mistakenly shot dead by London police after the subway terror bombings there.

"Everybody is afraid of terrorists."

One woman, who spoke on condition she not be identified, said she recently spent time in Italy and managed fine without being able to speak a word of Italian. Communication is possible, she said, with gestures.

"If he'd behaved like a normal person this wouldn't have happened."

The four Mounties involved in the incident have been assigned to other duties.

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Deputy tasers high school student against direct orders
David Edwards and Adam Doster
Published: Tuesday February 19, 2008