It should be
obvious by now that cops and tasers do not go together. It appears
far too many cops use the devices to electrocute people simply
because they refuse to cooperate, not because they pose a threat to
the officers.
For instance, a woman was tased in a Sheffield Lake, Ohio, police
station not because she threatened officers — in fact, she was
restrained in handcuffs — but rather because she refused to
“cooperate,” as the video at the left demonstrates.
“Last November, [Kristina Fretter] was stunned with a Taser while in
handcuffs in the Sheffield Police Department booking room after
being picked up for drunken driving. The officer who fired the Taser,
Edward Long, resigned, and charges were dropped against Fretter in
exchange for her promise not to sue the village,” the
Chronicle-Telegram reports.
“Tasers occupy a strange place in the police rulebook,” notes Peter
Gorman, writing for the Fort Worth Weekly. “Law enforcement officers
learn what is called a ‘use of force continuum’ to determine what
means or weapons they may use in different situations. The
‘continuum’ begins with simple police presence, then moves up to
issuing commands, then the use of open hands, and after that, pepper
or other chemical sprays, closed hands (including elbows and knees
and other takedown moves), the use of a hard baton, and finally, the
use of lethal force.”
You might think Tasers would fit somewhere near the “lethal force”
end of that list, right before a gun. Instead, however, many police
agencies place Tasers immediately after the “issuing commands” force
level — which suggests to officers that using a Taser is less
serious even than a push or pepper spray. Which also means that if
an officer asks you to produce your driver’s license and you ask
“Why?” rather than immediately complying with the order, there’s a
chance, in some jurisdictions, that you could, within their rules,
be hit with a Taser for refusing the command. That’s in part how
Tasers have begun to be used, not as serious, life-threatening
weapons, but as a bully’s tool of compliance, something to get
people in line — with sometimes egregious consequences.
One such jurisdiction seems to be Austin, where a man was tased for
producing his license too slowly (see video). It appears the cop in
the video was looking for somebody to use a taser on, as the man in
the vehicle seemed to be following orders, albeit too slowly for the
cop. The man’s crime? He was driving 70 miles per hour on a 65 mph
road. Please keep this in mind the next time you are in Austin and
you are driving five miles per hour over the limit.
As an increasing number of disturbing incidents reveal, far too many
cops apparently get off on electrocuting people, thus prompting an
obvious question: are police departments hiring sadists who revel in
inflicting pain and suffering on others? Sadly, it appears the
answer is affirmative.
It’s an inescapable conclusion: cops love their taser guns and they
love even more to use them on people not quick enough to respect
their authority.
