LA hospital bans police stun gun use on patients

[Kadie]

LA hospital bans police stun gun use on patients

The Associated Press
Last Updated: June 24, 2004, 05:10:14 AM PDT


LOS ANGELES (AP) - Martin Luther King Jr./Drew Medical Center has temporarily barred police from using Taser stun guns to subdue mental patients after federal health officials threatened to pull tens of millions of dollars in funding.

Eight patients in the past year have been shot with Tasers by Los Angeles County public safety officers. Federal officials said earlier this month that psychiatric patients were in "immediate jeopardy" of harm.

According to a federal report, one patient was shot with Taser darts four times in February after he hit and bit officers. He finally was placed in restraints. In June 2003, a patient who had grabbed a worker by the neck was shot four or five times.

Some patients shot with Taser darts suffered injuries but none died.

more... http://www.modbee.com/state_wire/story/8753997p-9633565c.html

[SoCalDem]

1. Visions of "Eat your oatmeal , Granny ...or you're gonna get it "

:)

[Solly Mack]

2. Damn

That's all..just Damn

[KansDem]

3. "Grandma, age 66, tasered for honking horn"

Have we gone "taser-crazy" in this country?

(excerpt)
KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- What could a 66-year-old grandmother do that would force police to use a Taser on her?

That was exactly what some Metro preachers wanted to know Friday.

........

What was so unusual was that she was a 66-year-old grandmother brought down by a Taser gun in her own home.

Officers Cory Lemoine and Ryan Van Deusen were answering a disturbance call down the street. Louise Jones said she bumped her car horn on accident. The officers went to her door to get her driver's license. She was getting a ticket for horn honking, then the stories differ.
http://www.kctv5.com/Global/story.asp?S=1953314&nav=1PubO2Y5

Of course, we don't know what transpired, but this does seem a bit excessive...

(edited for clarity)

[Kadie]

5. Wow. In her own home.

She must have been a big threat two those officers.

Do they really give you a ticket for honking your horn? That sounds crazy, unless she was honking it continually just to annoy the neighbors.

[Guaranteed]

6. Sounds like there's more to the story. nt

[gratuitous]

4. I don't know for sure, but . . .

I would hazard a guess that the patients at Martin Luther King Jr. Hospital aren't quite of the same financial and ethnic make-up as the folks who get treatment at, say, Cedars Sinai Medical Center.