Comments on: Oklahoma police tase an 86-year-old bedridden grandmother

By: Antinous / Moderator

Antinous / Moderator — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

If you even hint that maybe, possibly, at some point, the cops could have been right about something, then people jump to the kind of response we’ve seen here.

Fascinating. What does that have to do with a dozen jack-booted thugs asphyxiating and electrocuting a feeble, elderly woman in her bed?

By: stagendogs

stagendogs — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Killing a 14 year old boy “armed” with stones at the border
Tazing an old lady and depriving her of oxygen
Is anyone connecting any points yet…?

By: weeklyrob

weeklyrob — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

“WTF did cops do before tazers were invented?”

My guess is that more of them were stabbed. Also, more non-cops were probably shot.

I don’t know what happened in the room and this was an old lady, so the chances are that they handled it wrong.

But as a general rule, I can’t agree that cops should risk their own necks in order to not hurt someone who’s threatening them.

By: igpajo

igpajo — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Yeah, ’cause that’s gonna make her take her medicine!

Freakin’ insane!

By: Viriathus

Viriathus — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

S.O.P.

By: phisrow

phisrow — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Not to worry, it is heinous abuses of power like this for which paid leave(up to a week, if you really want to send a message) was invented.

“New Professionalism”, aw yeah…

By: Brainspore

Brainspore — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

El Reno 911!

By: 54N71460

54N71460 — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

America!!!! FUCK YEAH!!!!

By: TheAntipodean

TheAntipodean — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

People in delirium or “acute confusional state” as presumably this little old lady was suffering, are really hard to deal with – but the key is that they are terrified, confused, and often agitated. A calm voice, a non-threatening posture, a desire to help – it’s all you need. I attended an old fella who was trying to open the door of the 747 we were in – about 28,000 above the Indian Ocean. He just kept demanding to be “let off this bus”, and refused to acknowledge his wife was his wife.

By: nerd

nerd — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

“Taze her ’til her Depends catch on fire, Sergeant!”
“OK, but keep stepping on that oxy, this mama looks mean.”

By: weeklyrob

weeklyrob — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

“Fascinating. What does that have to do with a dozen jack-booted thugs asphyxiating and electrocuting a feeble, elderly woman in her bed?”

Nothing at all. Next question.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

It’s like you can taste the lawsuit

By: fnc

fnc — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

She’s got a knife! Someone suffocate and electrocute her before she harms herself!

By: Naberius

Naberius — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

I make no claim to know the facts of the case, but the police side of the story is that the grandmother was disoriented, armed with a knife, and actively threatening to kill herself.

IF that is true, it would at least start to explain tasing her to get the knife away, and why she was then committed for psychiatric examination.

As I said, I can’t say who’s telling the truth, but there are at least conceivable circumstances in which this is something other than absurdly egregious police rampaging dialed up to 11.

By: Ichabod

Ichabod — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Did you have a problem reading the words, 86 years old, bedridden? Causing her to nearly pass out from lack of O2 not enough?
OK, one real question: exactly how was a 86 year old bedridden woman a threat?

By: dw_funk

dw_funk — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

I can’t believe the polemics here; this wasn’t only excellent police work, it was government healthcare! Do you know how much they charge for electroshock therapy these days? You bleeding hearts should be thrilled!

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Try to think back: when was the last time a cop ever *helped* you?

By: lewis stoole

lewis stoole — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

i look forward to read how all of the officers involved were fired, but something tells me i will be reading about how we “do not have all the facts to make a proper judgement”

By: Antinous / Moderator

Antinous / Moderator — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Taser + oxygen could = explosion and fiery death. That would have taught her to take her meds. Of course, it also would have obliterated the local police force.

By: Severius

Severius — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Even if that’s true, are you telling me 12 police officers can’t subdue a bedridden 86-year-old woman without suffocating her or potentially killing her with electricity? I don’t understand people. A cop’s job is supposed to be hard. Enabling them to abuse people in order to make their job easy defeats the purpose of a police force and laws.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

I guess this is probably a moot point, but I hope when I am 86, If I want to refuse my medicine, no one will call the cops or anyone else to force me to.

Again, maybe this lady was so crazy that she stopped being able to be responsible for her own choices. Just.. I wonder if she had a reason not to want to take them, if any alternatives were available, and if they were in her bast interest given her stage of life.

By: memcf

memcf — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

To follow up from Naberius, an article that provides the police’s version: .

By: Joe

Joe — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Ichabod, you don’t understand: the cops are always right. If it appears that the cops are wrong, that just means that we don’t have the full story. It doesn’t matter that medical personnel deal with freaked out and violent patients every day, without the use of weapons and with minimal harm to the patient.

You see, cops are much more important than medical orderlies, so naturally they should take fewer risks. Also, cops are entitled to instant obedience at all times, so anyone who hesitates to obey a police officer’s order should expect to be tased. Being unable to understand English, or being in shock, or suffering from dementia, or being too injured to comply is not an excuse.

By: memcf

memcf — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

To follow up from Naberius, an article that quotes the police: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/06/28/taser_lawsuit/

By: Thebes

Thebes — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

All government eventually leads to tyranny.

This senseless brutality is the inevitable result of government, which always seeks to aggrandize it’s own Powers until it stomps on the throat of those it feeds from. Its hubris to think America is somehow different or immune.

Governments ultimately compel compliance through threats of pain, prison, or death. As they grow larger and more corrupt they loose their earlier semblances of civility about it, tazing grannies and such. Soon we’ll have “camps”.

By: mdh

mdh — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Oklahoma = !OK

By: schmod

schmod — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Screw firing them. Those cops deserve to be IN PRISON.

Also, using a Tazer in an oxygen-rich environment is presumably a huge no-no.

By: mdh

mdh — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

“Call the Brute Squad!”

By: hep cat

hep cat — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

“But as a general rule, I can’t agree that cops should risk their own necks in order to not hurt someone who’s threatening them.”

But that’s their job, just like doctors risk their lives to care for people who could infect them, and firemen don’t do much *but* risk their necks.

The idea that cops somehow have dangerous jobs is bullshit. Farmers have *much* more dangerous jobs. Even sanitation workers have more dangerous jobs.

What makes cops so entitled and special? And no, it’s not a rhetorical question.

What makes cops so entitled and special? If they can’t handle their job professionally they should quit. It’s not like they were forced into being cops.

By: weeklyrob

weeklyrob — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Did you have a problem reading:

“I don’t know what happened in the room and this was an old lady, so the chances are that they handled it wrong”?

I was stating a general rule, and you were reading that no matter what I say to the contrary, I must be talking about this specific situation.