Federal court reigns in use of Tasers

[Bob Hubbard]

Federal court reigns in use of Tasers

The ruling by the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco this week will affect most of the western United States, including Alaska, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington, along with two territories.

It stems from an incident where a 21-year-old California man was Tased after a traffic stop even though he did not threaten the officer or attempted to flee.

According to The New York Times:

In a vividly worded opinion issued by the court this week, Judge Kim McLane Wardlaw described a “bad morning” for Carl Bryan, a 21-year-old Californian who drove over large stretches of Southern California to retrieve car keys mistakenly taken by a friend and ended up being Tasered by a Coronado, Calif., policeman and breaking four teeth when he fell to the ground.

Mr. Bryan was stopped twice on his driving odyssey, once for speeding and again for not wearing his seat belt. After the second stop, Mr. Bryan was “agitated, standing outside his car, yelling gibberish and hitting his thighs, clad only in his boxer shorts and tennis shoes,” the court said.

The judge noted, however, Mr. Bryan did not threaten the officer, Brian McPherson, and was not attempting to flee — all elements of a three-part test that the United States Supreme Court has used to determine when significant force is justified. As for the third factor in the Supreme Court test, the severity of the offense at issue, the Ninth Circuit judges observed that “traffic violations generally will not support the use of a significant level of force.”

 

[Big Don]

OK, Now, they'll shoot the suspects with their sidearms, MUCH better...

 

[Dave Leverich]

They just need to codify what 'going *******' is, and allow that as reasonable reasoning for taser use. Guy goes *******? Tase him.

 

[Dave Leverich]

Er sorry, apparently 'ape feces' is censored ;p.

 

[Archangel M]

Currently only impacts the left coast. Typical 9th Circuit ruling. It does set prescident for similar cases in the rest of the nation however. Lets see how the other circuits rule.

 

[Carol]

OK, Now, they'll shoot the suspects with their sidearms, MUCH better...

Perhaps for someone with a more extreme viewpoint (read: a significant motive), that IS much better, because to sue targets with deep pockets (city treasuries) and/or paint cops (and the disliked weapon of choice) as a really bad thing.

 

[seasoned]

Force continuum,
Presents
verbal
soft hand
hard hand
oc spray
baton
firearm
The taser is one more tool that can be used in many situations where compliance is needed and officer safety is required. Although the above list seems adequate, the taser has a place.

 

[MJS]

Federal court reigns in use of Tasers

"Mr. Bryan was stopped twice on his driving odyssey, once for speeding and again for not wearing his seat belt. After the second stop, Mr. Bryan was “agitated, standing outside his car, yelling gibberish and hitting his thighs, clad only in his boxer shorts and tennis shoes,” the court said."

While Bryan may not have made threats or attempted to leave, his actions seem less than cooperative. The link does not state, unless I missed it, whether or not the officer told him to get back into his car. Mistake #1 was the fact that the guy got out of his car. Sorry, no matter how agitated this guy may have been, he got out and was basically acting like an ***. Perhaps failing to comply with the officers request, if in fact one was made, was grounds enough to fall into the resisting category, thus him being tased.

Of course, had the cop blasted him with OC, I have to wonder if this story would have been posted in the paper.

As always, we only get part of the story with cases like this, and oddly enough, important questions are never included. One of those questions being what are the use of force policies for this PD? Until we know that, then all we can do is speculate, because for all we know, the officer could have been well within his rights to use the taser.

 

[Bob Hubbard]

Once could speculate that while the newspaper account is missing information, that the court case did have that. If not, they had a bad laywer on the defense.

 

[jks9199]

Currently only impacts the left coast. Typical 9th Circuit ruling. It does set prescident for similar cases in the rest of the nation however. Lets see how the other circuits rule.

Ninth Circus... The most overturned federal circuit. I think this is really just about articulation...

Once could speculate that while the newspaper account is missing information, that the court case did have that. If not, they had a bad laywer on the defense.

The ruling is HERE. A few things leapt out at me as I read it:

"Bryan and his brother were stopped by a California Highway Patrolman who issued Bryan a ticket. This upset him greatly. He began crying and moping, ultimately removing his t-shirt to wipe his face."

"Bryan was stopped at an intersection when
Officer McPherson, who was stationed there to enforce seatbelt
regulations, stepped in front of his car and signaled to
Bryan that he was not to proceed. Bryan immediately realized
that he had mistakenly failed to buckle his seatbelt after his
earlier encounter with the police. Officer McPherson
approached the passenger window and asked Bryan whether
he knew why he had been stopped. Bryan, knowing full well
why and becoming increasingly angry at himself, simply
stared straight ahead. Officer McPherson requested that Bryan
turn down his radio and pull over to the curb. Bryan complied
with both requests, but as he pulled his car to the curb, angry
with himself over the prospects of another citation, he hit his
steering wheel and yelled expletives to himself. Having pulled
his car over and placed it in park, Bryan stepped out of his
car.
There is no dispute that Bryan was agitated, standing outside
his car, yelling gibberish and hitting his thighs, clad only
in his boxer shorts and tennis shoes." (The ruling goes on to note that there is no dispute that there were no verbal threats by Bryan, and says that McPherson told Bryan to return to the car, which Bryan did not do, saying Bryan didn't hear him.)

"The one material dispute concerns whether
Bryan made any movement toward the officer. Officer
McPherson testified that Bryan took “one step” toward him,
but Bryan says he did not take any step, and the physical evidence
indicates that Bryan was actually facing away from
Officer McPherson."

Let's look more closely at Bryan's described behavior: He's upset to the point of tears and "moping" by a speeding ticket. Officer McPherson didn't know this, I assume, but he clearly saw someone behaving abnormally. (I've probably issued several thousand tickets; tears do happen, and people get pissed, but most folks at least grudgingly accept the ticket.)

McPherson stops a car, and the driver is acting a little odd. OK... Then the driver begins to act angry, beating on his own car. This is a little more odd... The driver exits his car, and is dressed a bit unusually -- no shirt, only boxers. Basically, running around in his underwear... The scale tilting further and further to the odd scale, no? Bryan then begins beating on himself, cursing and spouting "gibberish." That description tells me nothing about what he's saying, other than it makes no sense. I think we can all agree he's pretty far on the odd behavior scale, right? And that oddness is including self destructive behavior and violence directed at his car and himself.

Bryan than fails to comply with a command to get back in his car, and apparently starts to turn away from Officer McPherson. This can easily be perceived as something called conspicious ignoring which often precedes an attack. McPherson deploys the Taser; he may or may not have done so before Bryan turned. It's not at all uncommon for an officer to appear to shoot someone in the back due to reaction times.

(Side note: The court states that the Taser causes "excruciating pain"; it doesn't except when employed in drive stun. I've ridden the lightning. It wasn't fun, but I'd do it again versus being sprayed with OC.)

I think the court is using the wonders of hindsight and expressing a bias against the Taser. I don't think there'd have been a lawsuit had Officer McPherson simply tackled Bryan, or had he used pepper spray. However, tackling him would have increased the likelihood of both the officer and suspect being injured, and could have easily caused more serious injuries. By bad luck, Bryan landed on his face; this probably reflects the momentum of his movement in the first place. Fall injuries are a common result of the use of the Taser, and they are often fairly minor. I don't think McPherson had the time or circumstances available to fully assess where Bryan would fall... And, in many places, deeply embedded barbs are removed in the ER, because they are classified as puncture wounds.

And I think that Bryan's behavior did justify Officer McPherson using force to control him; Officer McPherson didn't have the advantage of hindsight and knowing all about Bryan's bad luck morning that the court does. Was the Taser reasonable and appropriate? I think so; again, his behavior suggested that Bryan posed a threat to himself -- and possibly anyone else in the area. He was clearly acting less than rationally. The Taser allowed McPherson to rapidly gain control of Bryan, with reduced risk of injury to himself, and less risk of severe injury to Bryan.

 

[Bob Hubbard]

I went looking for information on Taser deaths.
Found this site. It provides a number, a list, and lots of rambling.
http://electronicvillage.blogspot.com/2009/05/taser-related-deaths-in-united-states.html

It claims that the Taser was first deployed in 1998, and that since then there have been 59 related deaths.

Tasers are now deployed in law enforcement agencies in 29 of the 33 largest U.S. cities.

...

First available to law enforcement in February 1998, now used by more than 14,200 law enforcement agencies in more than 40 http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_DmtdGP6kz.../VDDvFO1L_3k/s1600-h/taser-StatuteLiberty.jpgcountries. More than 406,000 taser guns have been sold since the product hit the market.

Bolding mine.

59 US deaths in 13 years.

Course they claim cops are killing people every week.....it looks like the site failed at math skills to me.

Another site focusing on killings by cops claims

About 9,500 people nationally were killed by police during the years 1980 to 2005–an average of nearly one fatal shooting per day.

(I make no promise of accuracy, but am just pulling a number from a 1st page google search) The average here is 634 people per year die as a result of interaction with police.

Based on these numbers, 4-5 people a year die from a police tasering.
5:634 Not great odds, but acceptable.

Of course on any given day there are thousands and thousands of police actions, investigations, pull overs, arrests, etc going on.

Sounds to me that the odds of dying as a result of a police tasering are on par with winning the lottery.

Tell ya what, I'll take the lotto win and smile at the nice guy or gal in uniform.

 

[Archangel M]

By and large most of them have to do with excited delirium and narcotics. Strangely enough some of the most dangerous people to deal with in the first place and prime examples for Taser deployment.

And Im with JKS. I think this case revolves entirely around articulation. An officer needs to be able to explain his use of force and he will be fine 9 out of 10.

 

[Archangel M]

Apparently we now have to go "hands on" with people acting crazy and/or ignoring our commands and then If we get hurt the Taser will be "OK".

 

[JDenver]

In Canada, Tasers are being used FAR too often, most famously against a disoriented man at Vancouver airport. He died. There were at least 4 officers there facing an unarmed man. Why taser him?! In my province officers tasered a teenage girl who was already in a holding cell. It's getting ridiculous.

The CBC did a study of Tasers and found that up to 20% or so administer more voltage than is listed by the manufacturer. These things are insanely dangerous weapons that some police seem far too willing to use.

Bring on more regulations!

 

[Carol]

In Canada, Tasers are being used FAR too often, most famously against a disoriented man at Vancouver airport. He died. There were at least 4 officers there facing an unarmed man. Why taser him?! In my province officers tasered a teenage girl who was already in a holding cell. It's getting ridiculous.

The CBC did a study of Tasers and found that up to 20% or so administer more voltage than is listed by the manufacturer. These things are insanely dangerous weapons that some police seem far too willing to use.

Bring on more regulations!

Insanely dangerous? No.

Remember. the average TASER uses between 5,000 - 10,000 volts. The average stun gun uses 100,000 volts.

Electricity's ability to do work, or its "power", is measured in watts.

TASER units receive their electrical power from a battery which provides a fixed amount of power.

Ohm's law says P=EI, or Watts = Volts x Amps, and also says that resistance and voltage are inversely proportional.

A 20% overvoltage condition could easily be reproduced by a test material with an Ohm rating that was 20 percent less than the material that was used by TASER.

Even if the tests revealed a 20% overvolt, the impact to the human body would be negligible, because it is the pulse (the power) that has the impact on human tissue.

A 20% overvolt does not mean the power of the pulse was increased by 20%, because power equals volt x amps. A 20% overvolt would have also corresponded with 20% drop in current flow. If anything, that would result in a safer pulse. It is not the voltage that has the impact, it is the ampereage.

Keep in mind, the power levels used in the delivery of the pulse for a TASER are less than 1% of the power of the same pulse used in medical applications.

 

[jks9199]

In Canada, Tasers are being used FAR too often, most famously against a disoriented man at Vancouver airport. He died. There were at least 4 officers there facing an unarmed man. Why taser him?! In my province officers tasered a teenage girl who was already in a holding cell. It's getting ridiculous.

The CBC did a study of Tasers and found that up to 20% or so administer more voltage than is listed by the manufacturer. These things are insanely dangerous weapons that some police seem far too willing to use.

Bring on more regulations!

Since their introduction, the Taser has been used hundreds of thousands of times; lots of testing and training exposures as well as real world uses. In fact, the RCMP did extensive (and downright NUTS) testing of the Taser, including things like using it on running subjects.

The Taser is an excellent tool for law enforcement; it reduces the likelihood of serious injury to both the resisting subject and the officer. I'm going to assume you train in the martial arts, and have done some sparring. You should have some idea that real fighting is never neat, and never follows exactly what happens in a two-person drill or kata (like one-, two-, or three-step sparring). This is only amplified in the real world where subjects are drunk, high, or otherwise in altered states -- or just plain pissed off. You say there were four officers -- but it's not easy to control a person who doesn't want to be controlled. I recall a time when it took 4 of us just to get a guy who was already cuffed out of an apartment; he was very uncooperative! And each of us outweighed him significantly; none of us were small guys!

Is the Taser being used in some cases where it may not be necessary? Sure. So was and is OC, batons, and even empty hand tactics. As long as there wasn't a grievously inappropriate use of force -- I'm not going to second guess a guy trying to use a tool that will reduce the risk of injury and the overall amount of force used!

 

[Carol]

I'm curious about something...

On the surface, a LEO tasering a subject in a traffic stop where the subject isn't threatening the officer and isn't trying to flee can be painted as an overzealous that for some reason just has to use the TASER on the guy.

But aren't there still risks in that situation? JKS wrote in the LEO forum that in an encounter, the police are responsible for the subject's safety. IIRC, intersections are where the most accidents occur.

Could there be a situation where the subject isn't directly threatening the officer, but is still placing himself or the officer in danger by behaving erratically enough to place himself or the officer in a position where they are at substantial risk of being accidentally hit by oncoming traffic?

 

[Big Don]

R E I N S
REINS in
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1. Often, reins. a leather strap, fastened to each end of the bit of a bridle, by which the rider or driver controls a horse or other animal by pulling so as to exert pressure on the bit. 2. any of certain other straps or thongs forming part of a harness, as a checkrein. 3. any means of curbing, controlling, or directing; check; restraint. 4. reins, the controlling or directing power: the reins of government.
–verb (used with object) 5. to check or guide (a horse or other animal) by exerting pressure on a bridle bit by means of the reins. 6. to curb; restrain; control.REIGN is different:
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[5-0 Kenpo]

Insanely dangerous? No.

Remember. the average TASER uses between 5,000 - 10,000 volts. The average stun gun uses 100,000 volts.

Electricity's ability to do work, or its "power", is measured in watts.

TASER units receive their electrical power from a battery which provides a fixed amount of power.

Ohm's law says P=EI, or Watts = Volts x Amps, and also says that resistance and voltage are inversely proportional.

A 20% overvoltage condition could easily be reproduced by a test material with an Ohm rating that was 20 percent less than the material that was used by TASER.

Even if the tests revealed a 20% overvolt, the impact to the human body would be negligible, because it is the pulse (the power) that has the impact on human tissue.

A 20% overvolt does not mean the power of the pulse was increased by 20%, because power equals volt x amps. A 20% overvolt would have also corresponded with 20% drop in current flow. If anything, that would result in a safer pulse. It is not the voltage that has the impact, it is the ampereage.

Keep in mind, the power levels used in the delivery of the pulse for a TASER are less than 1% of the power of the same pulse used in medical applications.

Ok, I didn't understand any of that, but it sounds GREAT!!!

 

[5-0 Kenpo]

Could there be a situation where the subject isn't directly threatening the officer, but is still placing himself or the officer in danger by behaving erratically enough to place himself or the officer in a position where they are at substantial risk of being accidentally hit by oncoming traffic?

Here's a perfect example:

The more recent of the two incidents occurred November 5, when a 12-year-old girl who was skipping school was found drinking and smoking in a swimming pool, Miami-Dade police officer William Nelson stated in an incident report. He said he responded to an anonymous call about the activities.

He said he told the girl he was taking her to school. As they walked to the police car, she ran away.

"I advised her to stop several times," he said in the report. She "continued running even to the point of starting to run into lanes of traffic."

Nelson said he used the Taser for his and the girl's safety, striking her in the base of the neck and lower right back