Police Use Taser On Deaf And Disabled Man

[babylonsister]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/07/28/antonio-love-ala-police-u_n_246081.html

Antonio Love: Ala. Police Use Taser On Deaf And Disabled Man

| 07/28/09 09:17 AM | AP


MOBILE, Ala. — Police in Mobile, Ala., used pepper spray and a Taser on a deaf, mentally disabled man who they said wouldn't leave a store's bathroom.

The family of 37-year-old Antonio Love has filed a formal complaint over the incident on Friday.

Police tell the Press-Register of Mobile that officers shot pepper spray under the bathroom door after knocking several times. After forcing the door open, they used the stun gun on Love.

Police spokesman Christopher Levy says police didn't realize Love had a hearing impairment until after he was out of the bathroom. The officers' conduct is under investigation.

The newspaper says the officers attempted to book Love on charges including disorderly conduct, but a magistrate on duty wouldn't accept the charges.

[kentuck]

1. They need to take these toys away from the pigs.

They are a threat to our society.

[AspenRose]

4. That's a very good description

It's like a new toy.

[slampoet]

18. They treat them like toys. In RI the police filled a train tunnel full of people up with tear gas

and they had just been granted use of the stuff 2 weeks earlier. The party they broke up had been happening every year peacefully for 35 years.

The police denied they had even heard of it even though the security people told them.

[Mad_Dem_X]

24. ITA. I personally know two cops

They are brothers, and one in particular is the embodiment of every bad cop stereotype. I remember how overjoyed he was when he got his first taser; he said he "couldn't wait to use it."

Cops use these things like toys, I agree. This thread and the one about them tasering a dog is proof of that.

Edit: spelling

[paulsby]

31. anecdotal reports

don't prove your claim. there are many many cops who use tasers responsibly.

heck, i've carried one for 3 yrs and have never fired it. i've unholstered and threatened to fire it about 6 times, and got voluntary compliance in all those circ's, but never actually fired it.

i have seen (in my agency) a lot of restraint vis a vis tasers, and one firing i question. and that's based on many many many incidents.

anecdotes are nice but they don't prove that "cops use these things like toys". with scores of thousands of officers carrying tasers or ANY device, you will always have some mal and misfeasance. doesn't matter what the device is.

[fascisthunter]

2. just unreal....

[Liberal_in_LA]

3. Even after they realize their mistake they still try to stick him with false charges

[Xithras]

11. A futile attempt to defend themselves against the coming lawsuit.

Their asses are going to get owned. We had a similar case in Modesto several years ago, where an officer Tased an "uncooperative drunk" who turned out to be deaf and disabled. He's living quite comfortably now.

[Liberal_in_LA]

20. Even though it will be a taxpayer payout, I hope the guy gets a bundle

[tblue37]

23. They also Tase people in diabetic comas for being "uncooperatie" and "refusing" to get out of a car

or to get up when told to do so.

[Cali_Democrat]

5. They tasered him because he wouldn't leave the bathroom?

Oh ferchrissakes, let the man take a shit in peace!!

[Soylent Brice]

14. lol

[tblue37]

26. Well, they were called by the store manager because the guy had been in there for over an hour.

The cops were responding to a situation that needed to be responded to, but they responded very aggressively and with unnecessary force, and then Tased him because they were pissed off, no matter what reason they give for the Tasing. They were "teaching him a lesson," just as Crowley arrested Gates to "teach him who was boss."

In both cases, the police should have responded to the call, and their attempt to deal with a "situation" was not the problem. The problem was their asshole behavior while dealing with the situation and their automatic rush to use excessive force in the case of the deaf man in the bathroom (and in many other cases as well).

It's about police brutality and abuse of power.

[Cali_Democrat]

30. I agree 100%

[madaboutharry]

6. What is needed is some form of a test that will weed out

assholes from becoming cops.

[cdsilv]

7. Before they give a cop a taser or pepper spray....

...the cop should be required to undergo tasering and pepper spraying. Hey, it's non-lethal so they should experience what they are going to potentially inflict on someone.

[RamboLiberal]

17. Actually most do undergo taser & pepper spray

as part of their training. Especially pepper spray since spraying it the cop might get some on them.

Just for the record I'm among those DU'ers who think cops are getting too reliant on tasers to solve every incident. And I'm concerned about the number of deaths occurring among those tased.

[cdsilv]

8. dupe n/t

[BlooInBloo]

9. Then we'd need an almost entirely new set of cops.

[Echo In Light]

10. Problem is many of the A-hole traits are exalted, welcomed. From the perspective of authoritarians..

...many such traits/characteristics wouldn't be codified as being negative, but positive.

Also, the smarter sociopaths/sadists know how and when to lie, and have an entire system on their side to cover up and/or trivialize wrong doing. That's a big part of the allure for certain personality types.

[HiyaEmerald Eyes]

12. Taser unveils new 'semi-automatic' model

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/taser-unveils-new-semi-automatic-model/article1233039/

Taser unveils new 'semi-automatic' model

New stun gun capable of firing three probes silmutaniously; company says weapon will 'fit in' with tighter usage rules recommended by B.C. commission


Josh Wingrove
From Tuesday's Globe and Mail Last updated on Monday, Jul. 27, 2009 11:21PM EDT

Days after British Columbia's Braidwood commission recommended tighter rules around the use of tasers, the American manufacturer of the devices rolled a new product off the line that it says will “fit in” to the province's new guidelines.

Taser International debuted its X3 model Monday, the first new conducted energy weapon the company has released since 2003. The X3's main selling feature is its ability to fire three pairs of electrified probes in quick succession without reloading – giving an officer with a taser the chance to simultaneously zap up to three suspects. Older models, which have only one pair of probes, must be reloaded after each shot.

The Braidwood recommendations, released last Thursday and adopted almost immediately by the province, said that a taser should be discharged once, and not for more than five seconds. A second discharge, it recommended, should only happen if it will be “effective in eliminating the risk of bodily harm.”

Taser International says its new X3 – four years in the making – has a more consistent pulse than its predecessor, the X26.

The new weapon also tracks, second by second, the amount of energy being discharged into a target's body, the company argues. Its earlier model only tracked the time and total duration of a discharge.
“The log just on its own would be phenomenal for courts and some of the controversy in Canada,” Taser International spokesman Steve Tuttle told The Globe and Mail.
“The Taser X3 is the most sophisticated handheld weapon ever developed,” Rick Smith, the company's chief executive officer, added in a statement.

The X3's debut in Arizona came as Alberta announced Monday it would restrict the use of conducted energy weapons. The Alberta government is expected to release details of its new rules for police later this week. Three months ago, the province scrapped 50 tasers, or 12 per cent of its inventory, after tests showed they weren't working properly.

Taser International's promise of an improved “pulse calibration system” also comes on the heels of an award-winning CBC and Canadian Press investigation that found 10 per cent of tasers tested were either defective or behaved unexpectedly. Some gave out a higher charge than they were meant to.
The company has disputed the testing methodology of CP, the CBC, the province and the Braidwood commission, in which Mr. Tuttle believes “politics outweighs the science.”

[PA Democrat]

13. Good for the magistrate for throwing the case out.

[SleeplessInAlabama]

15. Jeebus. It would be Mobile.

I haven't even heard about this yet...

Of course they tried to book him on disorderly conduct, but it's good to know there are some judges out there who don't put up with that kind of BS.

[redqueen]

16. Good for that magistrate for not helping these bad cops to cover their asses.

Let's hope it's the start of a trend.

[TexasObserver]

19. Recommend

[tblue37]

21. Let's take a stroll down memory lane.

Remember these classics?

“Police Use Taser on Blind woman with Cancer”
http://www.wdtn.com/Global/story.asp?S=8693659
Posted: July 17, 2008 03:46 PM CDT
DAYTON, Ohio (WDTN) - Family members are angry and speaking out after Dayton police used a stun gun on a woman who is blind and suffering from cancer. Police said they were looking for a suspect when they knocked on Denise Harris's door Thursday morning. But according to both police and witnesses, things quickly got out of hand and Harris was tased.

"She was able to force herself down on to the floor and not be cooperative, grabbing on to the detective. A taser was dry stunned onto her arm to control her hand movement, then she was cuffed," said Sgt. Charles Anderson.

Her family said she was yelling at officers because she was scared.

"She was terrified. She was extremely terrified," said Harris's niece, Dionna. "She was scared because the person identified themselves as a police officer. But she's been robbed before by someone using the same technique."

They said police used unnecessary force when officers came to the Fernwood Avenue apartment looking for Harris's son, who is wanted. Officers said Harris attacked a detective.

"She's blind and they pulled her off her Futon, handcuffed her and tased her because he said she swung at him. She can't see," said Harris's sister Elvita Harris. "I'm very frustrated and upset. Dayton police need to implement a sensitivity program."
Neighbors said they told officers she was blind and sick.

"It was heartbreaking," Brenda Miles said. "I was almost in tears because I know the lady and I look out for her because she's blind."

Harris was taken to Good Samaritan for treatment.

The officers actions will be investigated, but Sgt. Anderson said Harris should have told them she was scared.

"She does not have to open her door. It was a voluntary thing for her to open her door," he said.

Harris is now facing charges for assault on a police officer and resisting arrest.


“Cops Waste Blind Geezer “
http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/steve_duin/index.ssf?/base/news/1082807738251705.xml

Thursday, April 29 @ 09:07PM CDT
Steve Duin

She was 71 years old. She was blind. She needed her 94-year-old mother to come to her rescue.

And in the middle of the dogfight -- in which Eunice Crowder was pepper-sprayed, Tasered and knocked to the ground by Portland's courageous men in blue -- the poor woman's fake right eye popped out of its socket and was bouncing around in the dirt.

How vicious and ugly can the Portland police get? Ladies and gentlemen, I think we have a winner. This 2003 case is so blatant, the use of force so excessive, the threat of liability so intimidating that the city just approved a $145,000 settlement.

But all those gung-ho fans of the cops can relax. Nothing has changed. Nothing will upset the status quo.

The cops aren't apologizing.

The cops aren't embarrassed.

The cops haven't been disciplined.

And the cops are still insisting, to the bitter end, that they "reasonably believed" this blind ol' bat was a threat to their safety and macho culture.

Eunice Crowder, you see, didn't follow orders. Eunice was uncooperative. Worried a city employee was hauling away a family heirloom, a 90-year-old red toy wagon, she had the nerve to feel her way toward the trailer in which her yard debris was being tossed.

Enter the police. Eunice, who is hard of hearing, ignored the calls of Officers Robert Miller and Eric Zajac to leave the trailer. When she tried, unsuccessfully, to bite the hands that were laid on her, she was knocked to the ground.

When she kicked out at the cops, she was pepper-sprayed in the face with such force that her prosthetic marble eye was dislodged. As she lay on her stomach, she was Tased four times with Zajac's electric stun gun.

And when Nellie Scott, Eunice's 94-year-old mother, tried to rinse out her daughter's eye with water from a two-quart Tupperware bowl, what does Miller do? According to Ernie Warren Jr., Eunice's lawyer, the cop pushed Nellie up against a fence and accused her of planning to use the water as a weapon.

Paranoia runs deep. Into your life it will creep. It starts when you're always afraid . . .

Afraid and belligerent. "Cops have changed," Warren said. "When I grew up, they weren't people who huddled together and their only friends were the cops. You had access to them all the time. You weren't afraid of them."

What did Police Chief Derrick Foxworth have to say about the case? "This did not turn out the way we wanted it to turn out," Foxworth said Friday. "Looking back, and I know the officers feel this as well, they may have done something differently. We would have wanted the minimal amount of force to have been used. But I feel we need to recognize Ms. Crowder has some responsibility. She contributed to the situation."

Granted. But Eunice was 71. She was blind. That probably explains why a judge threw out all charges against her and why the city, in a stone-cold panic, settled ASAP.

"This was like fighting Ray Charles or Stevie Wonder," Warren said. "It wasn't a fair fight."

No, but it was another excuse to haul out the usual code words about the cops' "reasonable" belief that they were justified to use a "reasonable amount of force to defend themselves."

If you have a different definition of "reasonable," you just don't understand the Portland police. You need to remember the words of Robert King, head of the police union, defending Officer Jason Sery in the March shooting of James Jahar Perez:

"What sets us apart from people like most of you is that you'll never face a situation in your job where -- in less than 10 seconds -- the routine can turn to truly life-threatening," King wrote. "When that happens to us, when we have to make that ultimate split-second decision, we don't just ask for your understanding, we ask for your support."

She was 71 years old. She was blind. She was lucky, I guess, that these cops -- set apart from people like most of us -- didn't make the usual split-second decision and draw their guns.

Notice, too, that the reason the cops in the second story got pissed at the nearly blind old lady with the glass eye is that she was deaf, too, so she didn't hear their commands. My "favorite" outrageous point is attacking the 94-year-old mother because she brought a bowl of water out to clean the glass yey--and they thought the water could be used as a weaopn.

(I collect these horror stories, BTW.)

[BlooInBloo]

22. And the state sponsored domestic terrorists get another one.

[PA Democrat]

25. OMG. Police are claiming the poor man was armed.....

with an UMBRELLA:

"A spokesman for the Mobile Police Department said the officers' actions were justified because the man was armed with a potential weapon – an umbrella."

Police always pull this crap when they are wrong. Hubby had a client who had the crap beat out of him because he made the mistake of giving one of his employees who lived in public housing, a ride home. The cops assumed it was a drug deal. The client was pulled out of the car with guns pointed at his head and then had his head repeatedly slammed into the hood of his car so hard it left a large dent.

During the civil trial against the cops, the cops tried to claim that a butter knife, which was in a box with a pie inside the client's car, was a weapon. My husband brought a similar pie in a box with the same type of knife into the courtroom and had the entire jury LAUGHING at the cops.

[Blue Diadem]

27. Cripes, I just read about the dog and now this. I'm glad the magistrate had some sense.

I hope the family sues the hell out of them.

[Gold Metal Flake]

28. In use, the Taser is a torture/punitive device.

That may not have originally been the intention of the designers, but it has become the common usage.

[Ignis]

29. "...but a magistrate on duty wouldn't accept the charges."

One very small glimmer of hope in an otherwise ridiculously authoritarian response.

Please, please, please stop handing shiny toys to thugs and bullies...even if they happen to pretend to "keep the peace."