I stole this comment from the Truth ... Not Tasers blog [LINK].
Critical Mass wrote:
The Truth is that in a typical career as a police officer, the lethal gun will never be used, and that correlates pretty well with the 100 [times ratio of] Taser uses, versus the use of a firearm by a law enforcement professional.
None of my friends in Law Enforcement (over 10 persons) have ever fired their service guns in a police confrontation.
I have often alluded to the fact that many well-meaning law enforcement professionals who relied on their Taser Training and actually believed their Tasers could not cause death, and then saw their suspect die on the ground, writhing in pain and screaming, are burdened with a lifetime of knowing and suspecting that they caused the death of a human being who had not been charged, convicted or sentenced for any crime. Many of these police officers suffer in silence, and they too are "Taser Victims".
The "Lies Promoted/Sanctioned by Taser International" have real victims on both ends of a Taser use ~ The Officer involved in a Homicide, as well as the guiltless dead soul on the receiving end of a fatal electric torture shock.
Victims at both ends of the taser wires: one dead, and the other feeling damaged and deceived.
It's a very good point.
I wonder if and when one of those '2nd victims' will get around to speaking out about their feelings? So far it's been silence.
And maybe it's a new class of lawsuit ("I thought you told me this thing was 'safe'?") against the supplier of the training?
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5 comments:
If you want an example of a police officer demonstrating the psychological devastation of knowing his directive to fire a Taser caused the death of a human being, just remember this:
"The NYPD police lieutenant who gave orders to fire a Taser stun gun at a mentally disturbed man who then fell to his death in Brooklyn, committed suicide early this morning, according to the New York Times and other media.
Apparently, Lt. Michael W. Pigott was upset about the incident that occurred September 24th, but also because a supervisor had taunted him with the fact that he could be arrested and face trial. Though the Brooklyn district attorney's office had said that criminal charges were unlikely, the victim's family was seeking a lawyer to sue the city and the NYPD.
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/1079992/iman_morales_taser_death_leads_to_nyc.html
And he didn't even fire the Taser, but that good officer knew he was the "proximate cause of a homicidal Taser death".
That's not exactly a perfect example of what we were looking for. To be fair, Taser International does warn that victims may fall down and bang their heads. And that's exactly what happened in the incident you mention.
But it is, as you stated, an example of the devastating impact of being involved with a death. Police decision makers should keep that 'secondary' victim in mind when they choose to rely on the promises made by the slick and slippery stun gun salesmen. Such naive faith may have some blow-back very close to home.
That example came to mind, not because it was "perfect", but because it was recent and the officer killed himself within a few days.
Over the years I have read about police officers seeking counseling, disability and even monetary relief for the mental anguish of having been involved in a "Taser death". They have attributed their descent into alcoholism and other forms of destructive behavior, the break-up of their marriage and career to such an event.
More troublesome is the potential outfall of mental anguish for officers who have comforted themselves over the years, with the excuse that their Taser victims weren't killed by their actions, but were on a certain path to self-destruction.
Once the medical link between the electric shock from a Taser and the resultant death is definitively established, there are literally hundreds of law enforcement officers who will be re-living and re-evaluating their role in those homicides.
A whole new group of "Taser Victims" is waiting in the wings, if and when the FDA or UL Labs, or an truly independent, scientifically rigorous and valid medical study concludes that "Tasers Kill".
I agree with your concern.
My point about there being victims on both ends of a police shooting and/or homicide, is highlighted in this story:
"A 34-year-old Gibsons man remains in serious condition after being shot by police.
RCMP say he came at them with a hammer on Friday night. The officer who pulled the trigger was new on the job. And one veteran member of the VPD says the decision to shoot will likely haunt the young mountie forever.
"I think the worst thing that could have ever happened to me was pulling the trigger on somebody,'' said retired Vancouver Police Department Inspector Dave Jones.
"Back in those very early days, the late seventies if you shot somebody the superintendent would arrive with a bottle of rye and you'd sit down and have a few drinks to calm you down," he said.
It didn't work. Jones watched marriages and careers fall apart.
"I remember one young man who had just shot and killed a man in Stanley Park,'' Jones recalls. "And when I first saw him he still had the adrenalin coursing through him,'' he said. "I went to do something else and came to back to see him 15 minutes later and he was just literally a puddle on the ground."
The two officers involved in the Gibsons shooting are now themselves the focus of a police investigation."
http://www.ctvbc.ctv.ca/servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20090628/BC_gibsons_shooting_cops_090628/20090628/?hub=BritishColumbiaHome
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