Tasers in the news

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Taser abuse videos

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=police+taser+abuse&search_ty...
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Federal appellate court limits cops' use of Tasers

A federal appeals court on Monday issued one of the most comprehensive rulings yet limiting police use of Tasers against low-level offenders who seem to pose little threat and may be mentally ill.

In a case out of San Diego County, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals criticized an officer who, without warning, shot an emotionally troubled man with a Taser when he was unarmed, yards away, and neither fleeing nor advancing on the officer.

Sold as a nonlethal alternative to guns, Tasers deliver an electrical jolt meant to subdue a subject. The stun guns have become a common and increasingly controversial tool used by law enforcement.

There have been at least nine Taser-related fatalities in the Sacramento region, including the death earlier this month of Paul Martinez Jr., an inmate shot with a stun gun while allegedly resisting officers at the Roseville jail.

http://www.sacbee.com/topstories/story/2425481.html
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Sacramento Sheriff McGinness defends Taser use after ruling

http://www.sacbee.com/crime/story/2427227.html
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Why Are Cops Tasering Grandmothers, Pregnant Women and Kids?

http://www.aclusac.org/node/196
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Death reignites Taser debate

Over the weekend, a Sacramento man joined the growing tally of people who have died after police attempted to subdue them with Tasers.

While the manufacturer denies Tasers can be fatal, debates churn over whether the stun guns are being used in the way they were intended – as an alternative to lethal force – and whether police policies reflect the most recent scientific conclusions on the weapons' safety.

Because Paul Martinez Jr. was handcuffed and likely high on methamphetamine, his family and their lawyer question whether deploying the Taser might have been excessive.

"The way he died I don't like," said Martinez's grandmother, Natalia Martinez. "I know my grandson was bad. I know he was into drugs. But they already had him handcuffed and in the jail. Why did they have to kill him?"

Tasers were introduced in 1998, marketed as an alternative to guns, to temporarily disable a suspect until he could be apprehended or restrained. But an increasing number of incidents involve using a Taser on suspects already in police custody.
Three inmates in the Stanislaus County jail died this year after corrections officers used Tasers to subdue them. Merced police used a Taser in September on a legless man in a wheelchair during a domestic violence call.

http://www.sacbee.com/topstories/story/2402048.html
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Man dies after police in Calif. use Taser on him

SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. — Police say a 19-year-old man has died in Southern California after officers used a Taser to subdue him at a board-and-care facility. A San Bernardino police department statement says the man died at a hospital early Saturday.
The department says officers had been summoned to the facility to investigate a fight involving three people late Friday night.
Police say officers separated the trio but "one of the subjects became combative and a Taser was deployed to control him."
The man was having trouble breathing, and police called paramedics. He was pronounced dead at a hospital about an hour later.
The man's name and cause of death haven't been released.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hMbvcO70KhaM-q-KSew0VF...
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Taser Issues Advisory On Use Of Stun Guns

Scottsdale-based Taser International is advising police agencies here and across the nation not to shoot its stun guns at a suspect's chest, saying it could post an extremely low risk of an "adverse cardiac event."

The advisory was issued in an Oct. 12 training bulletin. It marks the first time that Taser has suggested there is any risk of a cardiac arrest related to the use of its 50,000 volt stun guns.

Taser officials said Tuesday the bulletin does not state that Tasers can cause cardiac arrest. They said the advisory means only that law-enforcement agencies can avoid controversy if their officers aim at areas other than the chest.

Civil-rights lawyers and human-rights advocates said the training bulletin was an admission by Taser that its guns could cause cardiac arrest.

Critics called it a stunning reversal for the company, which for years has maintained that its stun gun was incapable of inducing a cardiac arrest.

http://cbs13.com/local/taser.police.advisory.2.1261494.html
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TASER officials point out that officers can still shoot the guns at a suspect's chest, if needed

http://www.policeone.com/police-products/less-lethal/TASER/articles/1956...

IANAL but it seems to me that that is sort of contradictory
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Here are the new "alleged" target areas

http://policeone.com/policeone/data/TASERtargetareasHP1.jpg
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Lots of good articles at Tasered While Black, hard to pick out just one ...

http://taseredwhileblack.blogspot.com/

... well, how about this one

http://taseredwhileblack.blogspot.com/2009/11/455-taser-deaths-in-ameica...
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Coroner's report in shooting by Folsom police shows Tasers possibly ineffective

A Sacramento County coroner's report obtained by The Bee detailing the fatal shooting of a man by Folsom police on Easter indicates that police attempts to Taser him may not have been effective. The report also shows that Joseph Han, 23, was not under the influence

http://www.sacbee.com/crime/story/1956503.html?mi_rss=Crime