Miami Police Use Taser To Subdue Wheelchair-Bound Man

[Minstrel Boy]

Miami Police Use Taser To Subdue Wheelchair-Bound Man

Dec 21, 2004
AP

MIAMI -- Miami police say they used a Taser stun gun to subdue a wheelchair-bound man who threatened them with scissors.

Police say they responded to a domestic violence call at a home where the man got into an argument with his girlfriend, then threw a soda can at her 13-year-old daughter.

Police say the man resisted officers and threatened them.

The man's name was not released. He was taken to jail, but no charges were immediately filed.
http://www.wftv.com/news/4013678/detail.html

[roguevalley]

1. I'm waiting for the time they tazer a quadriplegic. Did you know

that they anethesitized five or six dogs and tazered them each over two hundred times to see if they could induce heart attack on their latest model? What a buncha humanitarians. I won't tell you what they did to pigs.

[saigon68]

27. Next time they will throw him out of the chair

And use their night-sticks (nigger knockers) to do a tattoo job on his dome.

THEN they will feed him a DOSE of "OLD SPARKY"


(nigger knockers)= RACIST WHITE POLICE lovingly refer to their night sticks as this implement.

[Obviousman]

2. A pregnant woman was tasered in my neighborhood

It's so ridiculous
William Donohue

[patdem]

3. So in order for the threat from a man in a wheelchair to be carried out

the police would have had to have thrown themselves onto the scissors? But instead they used a stun gun?? I think if they just waited the man would have fallen asleep with the scissors in his hand and they could have taken them away peaceably???

[bobthedrummer]

4. Eugenics, life unworthy of life, you know that's how it began in the Third

Reich-this isn't surprising news from Florida where many kids have gotten their share of 50,000 volts too.
We are into fascism and a police state here.

[Pastiche423]

5. If this man was "bound" to his w/c

how the hell could he have been a threat? (God, I hate that ignorant term.)

Even if he was not bound to his w/c, how could he move w/scissors in one hand? The image that comes to my mind, is a man w/scissors in one hand, the other hand is pushing his chair........ which would make it very difficult to get anywhere.

Think about it.

[HuffleClaw]

6. what if he had an ELECTRIC wheelchair :-)

what a bunch of fascists. like they were SCARED of the guy?

[Pastiche423]

12. An ELECTRIC chair?

As in a killing machine? Why would anyone have an elctric chair in their home?

But, if you mean a powerchair, same thing goes. One hand has to be free to control the chair. (Unless he was in a sip and puff chair.)

[truthisfreedom]

7. if he was indeed threatening police with scissors, he wasn't being very

smart. i guess it's better than being shot with a gun, right?

[patdem]

8. I guess it depends if you die from a tazer shot...some do

Are you saying death from a tazer is better than death from a bullet??

[blue northern]

9. Jeez they could have sodomized him

still that would be better than being shot with a gun.
A man in a wheelchair was tazzered for pete's sake.
think about it

[truthisfreedom]

25. hey, tell it to the cops, not me.

i didn't tazer the guy. i don't care if you're 90 and in an insane asylum, you won't make friends with a cop by swinging a scissors at one, and US cops are trained to respond with extreme measures to threats of violence. Canadian cops are a heck of a lot nicer. i wish we didn't live in such a violent country. it's a sickness that operates cyclicly. if we made tazers illegal, they'd use guns instead.

[Trillo]

10. It's about punishment and control as much as any other stated reason.

Pain compliance.

One day, if you don't think like them, they'll punish until you do.

[MisterP]

11. just waiting for people to say how it's probably the best thing that's

happened to him and it's better than being shot and we should thank the cops for their compassion and blah blah blah blah blah.

[lostnfound]

13. Well, some people are born really naiive

and others have to work at it really hard..!

:eyes:

[Ian David]

14. They could have just stuck a nightstick in his spokes

[TaleWgnDg]

24. Here's an added tidbit of interest . . .

Here's an added tidbit of interest . . .


"Democrats also were focusing on (former NYC police commissioner and Homeland Security Office secretary-elect Bernard) Kerik's recent financial windfall from exercising stock options in a stun gun company that does business with the Department of Homeland Security. He earned $6.2 million from the options received from Taser International." (italized emphasis added by TaleWgnDg)
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2004/12/11/kerik_apologizes_after_withdrawing_as_homeland_security_nominee?pg=full

Uuummm, did Kerik hold these stock options while Kerik was New York City Police Commissioner? SIX MILLION TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND ($6,200,000) DOLLARS !!!!


.

[RadicalMom]

29. Well at least they gave the guy an exciting afternoon.

I'm handicapped and I know how boring the day can be! What are we all complaining about?

[murray hill farm]

38. ?wheelchair bound"?

I hate that expression!!! people "use" wheelchairs for mobility..they are not "bound" to them...a degrading expression. Given that, the guy sounds like an asshole!! An abusive and nasty asshole!! Taser away!!!

[wellst0nev0ter]

15. I Once Saw A Tape Where Australian Police

used a police dog to bring down a guy with a sword. And I said to myself "why can't our police be that smart?"

[TwentyFive]

16. Too many donuts?

[Catherine Vincent]

17. oh my...

I guess we had to be there.:wtf:

[proudbluestater]

18. Sick bastard cops

Threatening them with scissors from a wheelchair? Um, that's not all that threatening when you get right down to it.

My mom was in a wheelchair for 20 years. She used to "chase" me, an able-bodied young girl, with a yard stick. I suppose I should have called the authorities, but -- well, since I could easily outrun her, I didn't feel all that threatened.

Bet these fucking cops didn't feel all that threatened either.

The Taser Corp. bigwigs all sold off their stock a week before a report came out stating the tasers were not as safe as they were purported to be. And still they are used on people.

[TaleWgnDg]

19. Hey, hey, hey . . . . kudos to the cops!!!

Hey, hey, hey . . . . kudos to the cops!!!

Yup. Now, I've heard that there's a federal law that says there should be no discrimination against people w/ disabilities!! Whooaaa. And these cops sure know how to apply that law, too, huh?

In all seriousness, the first and only reaction of a cop is to "control his/her environment" for the sake of the public's safety (here the household) and for the sake of the cops! Now, in light of that what should the cops have done? Was the person in the wheelchair an imminent threat to others? to the cops? Or was it just more expedient for the lazy eeerrrrrrr cops to zap the wheelchair-bound-person?

I wonder . . . can I fly there and drop my business cards around this wheelchair? ROFL . . .


.

[iconoclastic cat]

20. 3 kids tasered in the last 2 months, now this?

Has anyone told them that those things aren't just toys?

[TaleWgnDg]

21. Yes, many attorneys have *reminded* the officer, the department,

Yes, many plaintiffs' attorneys (on behalf of injured clients and/or their families) have *reminded* the officer, the police department, the city, and the manufacturer that tazer-guns are lethal weapons. There's been many many reported deaths as a result of the use of taser-guns by cops. Sad to say. However, cops continue to use them.

edited to add: Of course there's one way to stop all these *reminders* . . . George Walker Bush's "tort reform."

.

[raysr]

22. Good thing he

wasn't in Seattle, they blow everybody away!

[Miami Liberal]

23. I'm so ashamed of my city's police department

what's next? Using tasers on crying babies?

[Pastiche423]

26. Pepper spray was used on a baby

in Portland, Oregon.

[Sirveri]

28. That's HILLARIOUS!

I love it! Taser fun time, we should just round up homeless folks and make is a pay per view special, think of the money!

[scarletlib]

30. Jesus 'effin H. Christ

someone needs to take these toys away from the boys until they are big enough to play with them nicely.

[Cooley Hurd]

31. These chickenshit civil servants need to stop using tasers...

...when one is CLEARLY not needed! Fucking fascists!:grr:

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

32. WTF is it with FL police & Tasers?????

Do they have a new policy of tasering the defenseless?

[biftonnorton]

33. How Else Could They Reduce Threat As Quickly And Safely?

The cops apparently had to remove him to ensure safety of his domestic violence victims. The faster they can remove him, the better for his victims-- the cops can remove the domestic violence threat and move on to protecting additional citizens,too. The guy was holding a weapon that could have hurt the cops when they got close enough to physically control him (as was necessary, apparently), so compliance was needed. Tasers seem to bring about compliance quickly and with a good margin of safety that supports their use. "Talking him down" wouldn't have been nearly as quick or safe for the victims or cops.

[tblue37]

35. Someone always defends the use of Tasers on the helpless.

What's the hurry? If it takes an extra 20 minutes to "talk him down," then the cops should take the extra 20 minutes. No one was at risk. The guy was in a wheelchair! Besides, if there were 2 cops, and you know there were, then it would be a piece of cake to disarm him. In fact, I guarantee I, an out of shape 54-year-old woman, could have disarmed him, even without another person's help.

A pair of scissors, however big they might be, are poking weapons. Unless the guy has a clear shot for stabbing, he can't do diddlysquat with the scissors. Approach scary wheelchair guy from the back. The scissors would become ineffective as a weapon.

It isn't about getting control of a dangerous person. It's about punishing some "SOB" for his refusal to cooperate. A lot of cops develop contempt for civilians and rage against anyone who fails to immediately surrender to their authority.

You should read about the Standford Prison Experiment, done in 1971:
http://www.prisonexp.org/slide-2.htm

It showed that once people were divided into "guards" and "prisoners," even arbitrarily, as part of an experiment, the "guards" would see the "prisoners" as the enemy and punish them outrageously for any form of self assertion or any failure to cooperate 150%. They even punished them when they did nothing uncooperative, just because having the power to do so, plus their general contempt for "civilians," prompted them to. The experimental subjects were screened beforehand to weed out anyone with sadistic tendencies or any other personality glitch. Then the roles of guards and prisoners were randomly assigned. But the animosity toward the "prisoners" and the abuse inflicted on them by the "guards" were pretty much the same sort of thing that developed in Abu Graib--even the sexual abuse. When the Stanford "guards" thought there was no one around to catch them at it, they sexually abused the prisoners. (They didn't know they were being taped by hidden cameras the whole time.)

Even without authorization from above (which I believe they did have), some of the guards would almost certainly have abused the prisoners at Abu Graib, unless there had been a rigorous policy against it and active control to prevent it. It isn't because cops or guards are any worse than other people, but because it is in human nature to behave that way. Such tendencies can be supressed by proper socialization (which we don't much have here in this country) and controlled, but they are natural and given the opportunity to be expressed, they will be expressed.

The way the cops abuse peaceful protesters here in the US is another example of this tendency. Another thing the Stanford Experiment showed was that most civilians will not interfere or protest against abuse of civilians by "authorities," even if they are appalled by it. Look at how the civilian population in the US remained passive despite the Miami and New York cops' extraordinary abuse of protesters, the police state imposed at the G8 Summit in Georgia, etc.

BTW, on this site and on smirkingchimp.com, where I also post, some people also defended the use of Tasers against the 6-year-old boy and against the hooky-playing 12-year-old girl.

One of the things investigations have shown, BTW, is that even after Tasering someone and completely incapacitating that person, cops will sometimes administer another shock--or even more--as "punishment." I am quite certain that the guy in the wheelchair was Tasered for pissing the cops off, not because they needed the Taser to control him.

[colonel odis]

34. sounds like cops have become a bunch of p*ssies more than anything else.

cops in florida are so intimidated by people in wheelchairs and drunken 12-year-old girls, they have to taser them.

a cop in hendersonville, tennessee, was so afraid of a dog on a leash, he had to pull out his gun and shoot him. right next to a park full of people.

two years ago, a cop in cookeville, tennessee, felled a family's pit bull -- that wasn't being aggressive -- with a shotgun blast.

what kind of chickenshit wimps are making it onto police forces these days? to me, that's the big question.

as an aside, it sure would be awful if people down in florida got tasers and began sneaking up on cops at random and giving them a taste of their own medicine. i'd absolutely hate to see something like that.

[TahitiNut]

36. BREAKING NEWS: Assault Scissors Banned In Florida

Millions of elementary school children arrested and sent to internment camps.

[Purrfessor]

37. Must'a been one of those wheelchair ninjas I've read about

n/t

[psychopomp]

39. He's comin' straight at us!

Sorry, I used to like South Park.

[Ezlivin]

40. These are the scissors he held

I'm in a wheelchair and I'm getting a bigger pair for self-defense.

And, hell, I don't even run with scissors!

[RadicalMom]

42. When you find those, could you send ME a pair?

I'm not bound to my wheelchair, but I sure need it.

[muriel_volestrangler]

43. Maybe you should attach them to your chair's axles

and race with them, Ben Hur style. :-)

[sakabatou]

41. Those gosh-darned Miami Police

A little trigger happy aren't they?

[NYC]

44. Couldn't they have sidestepped him?

[Freebird12004]

45. talk about injustice

a wee bit of overacting ???

[Solly Mack]

46. Next up: Woman in coma tasered for her own protection