Rayshard Brooks failed a breathalyzer test in a 2020 DUI and resisted arrest, struggling with officers, grabbing a taser from one of them, and trying to use it as he fled. Officer Garrett Rolfe executed him on the spot with two shots to the back, and footage shows him and another officer, Devin Brosnan, delivering a beating to the dying man. — Read the rest
Anti-vaxxer Brad Flutey, who missed his calling as a Zach Galifianakis impersonator, received a police tasering outside a liquor store in Whangārei, New Zealand. Officers were called to the scene after complaints were made about Flutey hassling employees who told him to wear a mask. — Read the rest
Disturbing video taken in Barrie, Ontario, shows an angry police officer striking a detainee in the head with a taser, then striking him again with his fists. — Read the rest
My grandmother used to make dandelion wine, which is probably why an 87-year-old woman named Martha Al-Bishara was in the lawn of a Boys and Girls Club in Georgia, cutting and collecting the dandelion plants. Police confronted Al-Bishara after an employee called police to complain that she was in the yard, "looking around for vegetation to cut down or something." — Read the rest
Logan Paul made a video posing near of a suicide victim in Japan's Aokigahara forest. He was widely condemned, seemed chastened, made a soft-focus video about his learning experience, then went back in front of the camera to taser a dead rat and poke a fish. — Read the rest
The official party line from Taser — who make less-lethal electrical weapons as well as a range of police body-cameras and other forensic devices — is that its weapons don't kill ("no one has died directly from the device's shock"). Reuters reporters who heard this claim decided it was highly suspect and took action, mining America's court records to find "150 autopsy reports citing Tasers as a cause or contributor to deaths," and that those deaths were disproportionately inflicted on "society's vulnerable – unarmed, in psychological distress and seeking help" — all told, they found 1005 deaths in which Tasers were implicated.
California criminal defense attorney Rick Horowitz had a juvenile client, he was shocked when the prosecutor in the case told him that to see the evidence against his client, he'd have to log in to evidence.com, run by Taser International (now rebranded as Axon).
The Signal Sidearm is a sensor designed to be fitted to a police pistol holster: when triggered, it wirelessly signals all nearby police bodycams to go into record-and-archive mode. It's made by Axon, the bodycam division of Taser International.
Judah Adunbi is a 63-year-old black man who lives in Bristol, England, where he volunteered as chairman of the independent advisory group on race relations; police confronted him while he was walking his dog in front of his home on Saturday. — Read the rest
Chase Alan Sherman experienced a psychiatric episode after taking the drug spice, that prompted his family to call the police and an ambulance. When sheriff's deputies from Coweta County, GA arrived, they subdued him by kneeling on his chest and, according to the family, handcuffed him, and then two deputies repeated tasered him until he went into "medical distress" and died.
Taser inventor Jack Cover named his gadget after a zapper from Tom Swift and His Electric Rifle, a 1911 YA science fiction novel by Victor Appleton that tells the story of a hero who travels to Africa to get rich by killing elephants for their ivory, and who encounters racist caricatures of "natives" who he fights off with his "electric rifle."
Bruce Burkett of the North Dakota Peace Officer's Association introduced an amendment to ND HB 1328 that allows cops to shoot at citizens with drone-borne rubber bullets, tear gas, pepper spray, tasers and sound cannon.
Vanderbilt University biologists studied how electric eels can zap their prey with 600 volts from even a few meters away. Turns out, the fish are like living TASERs. Professor Kenneth Catania and his colleagues published their work in the journal Science. — Read the rest
On Hackaday, Shenzhen demonstrates some proof-of-concept "taser-proof clothing" created by adding carbon fiber to the clothes' lining. The carbon fiber textile can be procured in a variety of forms, including upholstery fabric (58" wide, $19.50/yard) and peel-and-stick 50cm tape rolls (this is vinyl, not carbon fiber). — Read the rest
At the Sonic Bloom Colorado music festival, a naked guy was tasered by police. Onlookers charge that the police used excessive force. Another man at the festival died in a separate incident. (Thanks, Gabe McKinnon, via BB FB)
In case you were wondering. (Also: tasers play merry hell with digital video cameras, it seems)
(via JWZ)
Salon: "According to the complaint, [New Mexico police officer Chris] Webb shot his Taser at the child after he said he did not want to join fellow classmates in cleaning the officer's patrol car. Courthouse News reported: Defendant Webb responded by pointing his Taser at R.D. — Read the rest
A federal appeals court in Seattle ruled this week that three policemen in Seattle did not use excessive force when they tasered Malaika Brooks, a "visibly pregnant woman," multiple times after she refused to sign a speeding ticket. Refusing to sign a ticket is something south of a non-arrestable misdemeanor in the state.
The mayor of Ozark, Arkansas, has fired the policeman who tased a 10-year-old girl. He apparently had to exploit the same technicality previously used to suspend him: failure to use the built-in camera. [KATV]
The Arkansas cop who used a Taser on a 10-year-old girl was punished with a 7-day paid vacation — not for stungunning a little girl, but for not having a camera on his Taser.
