Mission Statement - De-Spinning the Pro-Taser Propaganda

Yeah right, 'Excited Delirium' my ass...

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The primary purpose of this blog is to provide an outlet for my observations and analysis about tasers, taser "associated" deaths, and the behaviour exhibited by the management, employees and minions of Taser International. In general, everything is linked back to external sources, often via previous posts on the same topic, so that readers can fact-check to their heart's content. This blog was started in late-2007 when Canadians were enraged by the taser death of Robert Dziekanski and four others in a short three month period. The cocky attitude exhibited by the Taser International spokespuppet, and his preposterous proposal that Mr. Dziekanski coincidentally died of "excited delirium" at the time of his taser-death, led me to choose the blog name I did and provides my motivation. I have zero financial ties to this issue.



Wednesday, July 7, 2010

Taser Internation (TASR) caught in taser-death-risk discrepancy

When you find yourself in a hole, Stop Digging!!!

Reading about the discrepancies from Taser International's safety claims versus their legal risk warnings is amusing. Amusing except for the tragic outcomes that arose from their deceptive marketing.

Times Colonist (JULY 7, 2010) - Taser shooting itself in the foot [LINK]

... Taser International's refusal to acknowledge the risk has created trouble for the company and police forces that accepted the claims. Officers made decisions on Taser use based on the belief there was no risk. That led to inappropriate use, injuries, death and damage to respect for the police forces. ...

A long time ago, I posted about my observation that tasers were being used about one-hundred times as often as police had historically used bullets. This 100x ratio is a rough ratio and varies with jurisdiction and time. But it's a fair and reasonable value.

Based on that, I suggested that taser use should be reduced by at least 95% from the insane taser-everyone peak around 2007/2008. The extra four percentage points is me being extremely generous and reasonable in allowing that the pyramid of lawful force might be just a bit wider one step below bullets.

I recently saw a report that taser use (BC?) in 2009 was down 91% compared to 2008.

This sort of more-limited use of tasers would obviously have an impact on the bottom line of Taser International.

Which explains everything.

What's needed are significant legal liability to hold them responsible for the tragic outcomes that arose directly from their deceptive marketing, combined with the organization naivety of their law enforcement customers.

The only language they understand is money. The courts need to explain this issue to them in those terms.

Liability.

Vast liability.

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