Healthy 29 year old man dies after police tase him
A 29-year-old man in Minnesota died soon after being shot with a Taser by state troopers on the site of a car crash Tuesday evening.
According to the State Patrol, he was involved in a rush-hour crash and troopers shot him with the Taser because he was uncooperative. He was breathing but unconscious when paramedics arrived, according to the Medical Transportation spokesman but was pronounced dead at the Hospital. The cause of death was listed as heart failure. The man's father is questioning the actions of the troopers, and claims that his son had no heart condition.Link (thanks, Adam)
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Yikes. So much for shooting first and asking questions later. I wonder if they'll turn up some sort of congenital heart defect on the autopsy.
In fairness, he was healthy before he crashed his car. He may not have been afterwards, although "don't tase the guy who plausibly might have internal injuries" doesn't sound like a bad guideline.
"Lt. Mark Peterson of the State Patrol wouldn't describe the uncooperative behavior. Five troopers at the scene were placed on routine administrative leave while the state Bureau of Criminal Apprehension investigates."
Got to have more time to make sure everyone has their stories straight
We will probably have the usual authoritarians defending the police ... and again, we will have to point out that tasers were supposed to be used *instead* of guns, and that it couldn't possibly have been appropriate here.
They call it "testilying". They teach it in all cop schools.
From the article: [Lt. Mark Peterson of the State Patrol] said no one in Minneapolis has died directly from a Taser. The Hennepin County medical examiner found a Minneapolis man shot with a Taser died from cocaine abuse, heart disease and emphysema in 2003. The next year, another Minneapolis man with heart disease and hypertension died from a heart attack after he was shot with a Taser.
No one has died directly from a gunshot wound. The medical examiner found that most of the victims died of hemorraging. Could have been due to a paper cut, or a rasor wound to the face. Nothing to see here. Move along.
With any luck, the 29 year old was a Republican driving an SUV with a Bush 04 sticker in the back window.
Idiocracy in Progress...
"The cause of death was listed as heart failure."
A good friend, who's an undertaker, has said
that "heart failure," "cardiac arrest," and so
on are common "causes of death" on death
certificates as a proxy for "I don't know,"
or "I'm not telling." After all, their hearts did stop beating eventually.
No matter how much this sort of thing happens, I see zero likelihood that the police in this country will ever give up their new taser toys (or actually learn to use and respect them as the potentially lethal weapons they really are). Welcome to everyday occurrences in America, circa 2012 or so.
It's possible that the young man had an undiagnosed heart problem. But this doesn't effect the conclusion that there's a significant chance that if you taser someone, that someone might die.
If there were a truly enforceable way to make cops use tasers only in situations where they would otherwise have to use deadly force, they could be a good thing. But it seems that too many cops will zap people for little more than talking back.
What is the point of posting this story on BB? Is this some sort of anti-authority political statement?
The police should never have any means of restraining a drugged-out, violent gangmember with a prior history of violence against women and police. Maybe the police should just ask politely: "Excuse me, citizen, could you please stop punching me and put these handcuffs on yourself?" Right.
Anywhere else in the world the police DO shoot first and ask questions later. We are lucky we have the option of being tasered after we've robbed a liquor store at gunpoint.
Slodo: Where do you get your brain washed?
In case anyone thinks Slodo was describing the accident victim who was killed, note the article says the young man was "...on his way to pick up his parents at the airport after they had taken a short trip to Florida." Not someone who had robbed a liquor store at gunpoint.
#12: This isn't the blog you're looking for. Move along.
And with the addition of #12 #4's comment have now been completed.
From the article: "In the United States, more than 290 people have died since June 2001 after being struck by police Tasers, according to the human rights group Amnesty International. It said in October that only 25 of the 290 were armed, and none had firearms."
Hardly "drugged-out, violent gangmembers", Slodo.
I also can't recall the last time someone in my country (England) was shot by the police.
Dear SLODO,
I just got a phone call. Your english teacher killed herself today after reading your use of analogy in your comment. She couldn't deal with the unshakeable feeling that she failed you somehow. I'm sorry to be the one to break the news to you.
Sincerely,
me
@ #12
There's only one flaw in your logic, sir. The man in question was not a "drugged-out, violent gangmember with a history of violence against women and police," as you so eloquently put it. He was a person who was being "uncooperative" after a traffic accident.
If the police ONLY tasered people who were "robbing liquor stores at gunpoint," then maybe this particular anti-authoritarian would feel better about blindly advocating their use as you have done.
FYI - if you followed the link and took the poll, the pro-taserites are winning.
Slodo just earned himself a trip down the memory hole!
@ Slodo: I'm not too sure what article you read, but the guy here was ambiguously described as "uncooperative," with absolutely no other detail offered. Of course for many cops, "uncooperative" behavior can involve anything from asking a question to laying unconscious ("unresponsive") in a vehicle after an accident.
At any rate, cops find tasers very helpful because it means that the physical activity previously involved with their job is significantly reduced. They don't have to get their hands dirty as much. Also, defusing situations with verbal communication is totally eliminated from the equation when you can just shoot some "non-lethal" barbs at someone.
Taser enthusiasts love claiming that the taser replaces lethal force. I'd like to know when, if ever, cops typically shot unarmed motorists or 80 year old women with dementia.
Another reason for DARPA to delvelop the Sick Stick, pronto.
Dear Slumo, er Dumbo, sorry ,, ,, ,, Slodo:
2+2=5 is incorrect, sorry.
BTW room 101 is down the hall on the right.
Taser enthusiasts love claiming that the taser replaces lethal force. I'd like to know when, if ever, cops typically shot unarmed motorists or 80 year old women with dementia.
You know that's a pretty good point. Are there stats that say that rounds fired has decreased since taser use has increased? Just because the cops get a new thrumbscrew doesn't mean that they're going to throw away the rack.
What, only one Taser killing defender
here?
Thanks for sharing, SLODO.
The messed up thing is that almost always coroners are intimidated or persuaded to pronounce the cause of death as unrelated. A man was tasered at a hotel in downtown Columbus last year and died shortly afterwards of a heart related problem, after being irrate and wrestling with police. They tasered him 10 times, but the coroner deemed it unknown whether the taser caused the death. Just googling this I found an article that the police are saying his death was caused by "excited delerium". Yes, this is not even a confirmed medical condition, but this is what has caused the tasered individuals to die, not the 10 tasering. See this
link.
"He said no one in Minneapolis has died directly from a Taser... ...The next year, another Minneapolis man with heart disease and hypertension died from a heart attack after he was shot with a Taser."
HA! What tortured logic. That's like saying no one ever died from cyanide poisoning, they died from cellular asphyxiation.
Coming from a family with a history of heart disease on both sides, even though I have been deemed "healthy" by my doc, this scares the f~ck out of me! Say I did get tasered, would my heart still be healthy afterwards even if I didn't die.
And why is being tasered multiple times even necessary?
Tasers are wonderful things, when used properly. Unfortunately, they have been used improperly in this and many other instances.
Proper use of a taser is to replace use of a firearm. Because tasers are less lethal than firarms and more effective at immobilizing the people they do not kill, proper use of tasers prevents many unnecessary deaths.
Improper use of a taser is to replace use of a nightstick, baton, wrist lock, come-along, handcuffs or any other form of restraint. Because tasers are more lethal than all these restraints yet no more effective at immobilizing people, improper use of tasers causes many unnecessary deaths.
I'd love to see authority served up a big old spoonful of its own horrible tasting medicine.
I think we as citizens should push our right to video tape any and all police activity, especially arrests made in public or our own encounters with police. After all, they're making us swallow the surveillance state with shit lines like "if you aren't doing anything wrong then you shouldn't care that we're watching."
If the police aren't doing anything wrong, then they shouldn't care that we're video taping their every action.
I can't understand why there's even a question as to whether or not Tasers can be fatal. Isn't an electric shock, especially to or through the chest, known to risk ventricular fibrillation? With a "direct path" to the heart, as little as 1mA AC can cause v.fib. Taser barbs pierce the skin. Couldn't that open a "direct path" for the current to reach the heart, especially if the barbs are on either side of the heart?
So yes, "heart failure" or "cardiac arrest" might be the 100% accurate cause of death in that case. It's just that the cause of the failure/arrest could've been the Taser itself.
#7: So Republicans are less deserving of life because they don't agree with you on a number of issues?
I'm no Republican, but seriously, you're an asshole.
If you read carefully, you'll see that it was the father that said the uncooperative man was healthy. He should have said his son had no known health problems. Also family members of people that die while in custody of the police are never usually not a reliable source when it comes to having unbiased information about the deceased, or the situation in which they died. Common sense should tell you that if the man had an undiagnosed heart problem, a stressful situation like the one in which he was involved could cause him to have a fatal heart attack or arrhythmia.
I have no doubt that there are some bully police officers that use their taser inappropriately, but in ANY profession you have bad apples. The taser has been tested and used for years (decades?) and has been determined to be a much more effective and safe way to control a violent person than having to try to control them than by manual force. Of course, I, not being an authority hater, am much more likely to believe years of testing and use reports than the families of thugs and the thugs themselves.
In 7 years, only 290 deaths related to tasers? I'd be willing to bet that the numbers are much higher for people detained by having several police officers jump on the violent individual to control them than by tasers.
"Human rights group Amnesty International" Read- anti authority, anti American and in the US, anti "the Man."
If every third firing of the taser carried a %30 chance of tasing the person holding the device instead, fatalities from police tasings would drop markedly.
Every police officer should be videotaped while on duty, and the video and audio should be encrypted, with separately-encrypted checksums, and the video and audio should be available to anyone connected to a case /immediately/ upon subpoena - no delay, no exceptions. Any police officer found to not be recording their on-duty time or any time when they are carrying their gun and/or badge - immediate dismissal.
I'm a natural-born, law-abiding and peaceful conscientious dissenter American. Any police officer that points a taser or gun at me and pulls the trigger had better be ready to pay for my child's and grandchildrens' college tuition, and any administrations that kidnaps me or declares me an enemy combatant had better have arranged to be paying for my great-great-grandchildren's tuition. Personally.
This bullshit has to stop.
How many more people will die before the police are forced to use far more restraint with tasers (like keeping the things under lock and key in the cruiser, only to be pulled out in TRUE emergencies)?
Call your congressman.
How soon before civilians buy their own tasers and have "Mexican standoffs" with taser-toting cops? (whoever shoots first guarantees the victim will clench up and thus pull his own trigger).
Various taser-like items are available on amazon.
t #34
Srry, lt m crrct my sttmnt:
Wth ny lck, th 29 yr ld ws BngBng rdr DDYMS.
Ill Lich, I have a sneaking suspicion that tasering a cop would most likely get you shot and killed.
Time was, police had to be good at unarmed combat. Either that, or big. Maybe both.
"Non-lethal" weapons fit into the gap between fist and gun. Gun had to be ruled by mind since constantly having to explain why you shot people to death is tedious.
Now, who needs to think first? Why get your hands dirty or worse, have to fill out paperwork when a "non-lethal" option is there. Tasers get used a lot because they are easy and clean. You don't even have to talk.
>>> "If there were a truly enforceable way to make cops use tasers only in situations where they would otherwise have to use deadly force"
There is: Digital Video camera which starts recording when the taser is removed from the holster and records for 60 seconds after it is fired.
On a purely academic note: What are the best ways to torture and kill with a taser?
Shots to the eyes and groin, multiple shots, shots in the same area... I've heard of all these, anyone else got any pointers?
Current crossing the chest is potentially lethal. That's why electrosex toys are meant for below the waist only. The best way to torture someone with a taser? Buy one, drop trou and use the empirical method to find out.
The situation would have been a lot LESS stressful had he not been TASERED.
just staying focused on this specific instance... on what basis are you making the assumption that this guy was a thug? If he had truly done something that was deserving of a tasering, it would most likely be described in a little bit more detail. Like a previous commenter said, they used the ambiguous term uncooperative.
Now I'm not saying the man was a model citizen who did absolutely nothing wrong, but I also think it's completely irrational to assume him to be a 'thug' and search for rationales as to why he passed.
Of course the officer wasn't trying to kill the man... that's the problem, the taser is looked at as a harmless tool by most. MY opinion is that the man, regardless of his health, would have a much better chance at surviving the situation had he not been tasered.
"Of course the officer wasn't trying to kill the man."
pure assumption.
I don't know all the details, but unless this guy was armed and threatening the police, I don't see any way this was justifiable. In a one-on-one unarmed fight, police should always be able to non-lethally subdue the suspect, partly because they're supposed to be trained to do so, and partly because they often outnumber the suspect (though I suppose if the "criminal" is just some guy in a car accident, that's not necessarily likely).
It seems like this sort of thing happens more and more, and you never, ever hear about what happened to the cops afterwards. Did they get fired? Did they go to jail? Did they get a reprimand? Did ANYTHING happen to them at all? If a cop murders an unarmed citizen, it seems inconceivable to me that there wouldn't be massive protests, maybe even riots, calling for justice against that cop. But the only people who ever seem to care are the family members of the deceased.
I think the cirular logic goes that tasers are only used on thugs, and if you got tasered you were obviously a thug.
It's not that I don't want police to have non-lethal options that don't require them to resort to hand to hand combat, I don't want to write them a blank check to use said force on anyone simply because it's supposedly nonlethal and the suspect was 'uncooperative'. Being 'uncooperative' does NOT mean you pose a threat, and force is to be used on clearly defined threats. I wonder if as a nation we'll ever even think to debate the Constitutionality of inducing immobilizing pain in someone just for refusing to do as authorities say.
@JRUCIFER,
"The situation would have been a lot LESS stressful had he not been TASERED" -You're absolutely right there, assuming that the man was merely being "uncooperative," in a non aggressive/violent manner. If so, the police officers were indeed misusing the device and should be held accountable. Bt, y knw wht hppns whn y ssm.
Cnsdrng th bvsly bsd wy n whch ths rtcl ws wrttn, dbt f fllw p wld b md f n tpsy th mn s fnd t hv ny prxstng hrt prblms. In my line of work I meet a surprising number of people in their late twenties/early thirties that have coronary blockages due to a genetic predisposition towards heart disease. Recently I met a 24 year old male having a MI. His cholesterol was over 700.
The dangers of so called "non-lethal" weapons. They're much more likely to be used when they don;t need to be.
Didymos (34), I doubt that's what XOPL meant. I'd rather have him explain it in more detail.
Trvth (35), if, as you say, any profession is going to have its bad apples, then we ought not issue weapons to them that are far too easy to use in inappropriate situations, and have a lengthening history of abuse.
Forty-plus deaths a year isn't very "only."First: I challenge you on that statistic as it stands.Second: that's an inappropriate challenge. The subject under discussion -- this one comes up a lot on Boing Boing -- is police using tasers in situations that warrant little or no use of force, much less situations that could legitimately result in "having several police officers jump on the violent individual to control them."
you're a cop.
you've pulled over a car.
you tell the driver to get out.
he quietly sits, staring ahead,unmoving.
shoot him with your taser gun?
5,4,3,2,1..... answer NOW!
Back in the day, cops used to have to physically restrain you if you resisted. Now they just taze you from a distance and dump you in the back of their car. So much easier and safer for the officer. It seems rather obvious that the risk of using tazers (i.e. death) outweigh the benefits (i.e. physical strain on police muscles).
so if I shot a cop with a taser and he happened to die from a heart-attack on the spot, that'd be OK? They wouldn't try to put me in the chair for killing a cop?
Discount all the "extenuating circumstances". Some people have heart conditions or drug addictions and are going to be killed by tasers.
How many times is a taser fired and the person lives, versus how many times it's fired and the person dies of heart attack? Is it 1%? 3%?
If I did something to someone that I knew beforehand had a 1% risk of killing them, and then they died, and what I did was unnecessary, I bet the jury would convict me for manslaughter.
I don't see the cops should get treated any different.
Wow - I never realized so many people were there to see this in person. Then they all went to BB and chastise the police for making the wrong decision.
Sure is fun to rush to judgment, huh?
Well, cops do like to shoot people. They have as much education as a Taco Bell manager and tools at their disposal to remedy any resentment they may have against the world, their parents, bullies from junior high, etc. Add to this the "testilying" (as above) and psychological training to produce aggressive confrontations with citizens and you have a problem waiting for headlines. Thing is, since all of this is a part of police training, the POAs of the country have a head start on counter-PR tactics.
An Anaesthesiologist writes:
A solid blow to the chest (such as you can sustain by coming to an abrupt halt in a head-on car accident) can cause bruising to the heart (a myocardial contusion) which if severe enough can lead to a reduction in cardiac output and a tendency to cardiac arrhythmias even in someone who is completely fit and well. People with reduced cardiac output may not to have enough blood and oxygen going to their brain to remain entirely rational.
This situation is regularly seen in Emergency Departments and is dealt with by persuasion and gentle physical restraint with sedation or anaesthesia if there is no other way of dealing with the patient. Being hit with a taser in this state could well be the final nail in someone's coffin.
In other words, the cop was probably a macho dick who got his gun off because someone was wandering around stunned in a hypoxic daze after a traumatic event and so didn't do as he was told. As an emergency worker he should know better. If I'm correct the officer should face charges.
#17, NIL, "I also can't recall the last time someone in my country (England) was shot by the police."
Let me refresh your memory whilst helping you off of your high horse.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/kent/7164054.stm
giddyup
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/11/16/ucla_taser_incident/
Here's an interesting FACT for you. There are, on average, 90 deaths caused by lightening strikes every year in the US. That's a LOT more than deaths supposedly caused by the tasers used by our law enforcement officers. Sure, one is an act of God, the other by man, but I think this puts things in a better prospective.
Personally. I think they should ditch the tasers and go back to pepper spraying violent, or uncooperative people, either one though is tons better than the billy clubs and flash lights they used to use. Also, I'm sure that, as in this case, all deaths related to taser use are thoroughly investigated and anyone found to be guilty of improper use of the devise is reprimanded, fired and/or punished criminally.
how much money is the Taser company spending right now on keeping their product profitable? (and out there)
#47, Finc, you're spot on. Anyone here watch "Cops"? They had a taser-themed episode on recently (I'm not kidding), and NONE of the instances they showed warrented anything more than a vigorous bum-rush. One guy, skinny little drunk dude, was literally sitting in a chair when he got zapped. Fox, Court TV (or "Tru TV" now, I guess) et al really have a lot to answer for given how much pro-police abuse authoritarian propaganda they spew. Who knows what sort of shit doesn't make the final cut.
There is, of course, a rather famous incident in the recent past of UK Police shooting someone dead, which I hope people haven't forgotten yet.
Failing to follow "orders" from a police officer is not always mandatory under the law - on only needs to follow LAWFUL orders, and much of what an officer insist's one complies with are not lawful orders.
Of course if you don't follow their orders, lawful or not, there is a really good chance they will use force.
Personally, I'm a handicapped individual, and I dread the day some * with a badge demands I do something I cannot do (like "step out of the car" being bellowed over a loudspeaker), then either Tases me or shoots me for being "uncoperative."
Yes, these days the very real possibility of just such a thing happening terrifies me.
The only terrorists I've ever encountered in my 61 years are those whose wages I pay to protect me. *sigh*
(And no, I don't have a police record - heck, my last traffic ticket was for 5MPH over in 1978... on an interstate freeway.)
Unless the person in the original story would have been SHOT if the taser was unavailable, there was no legitimate reason for using it. It is an alternative to lethal force, not a "fits all conditions" way to gain compliance.
University Place, WA
stay out of Texas then
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/06/20/diabteic_tasering/
and Florida especially
http://www.newsinferno.com/archives/1116
Tasers are random elements introduced into potentially violent situations. Their uncertain results make them seem like less and less of a reliable tool. Add the aggressive, often militaristic attitude encouraged among cops of late (War on Drugs/Terror/Gangs breeds a war mentality) by politicians, the jittery media and a fearful populace and the only shocking part is how few people have died.
If more time and money was spent on teaching officers how to deal with tense situations peacefuly, more effort put into community policing and outreach efforts. If people (including people in this thread) didn't see cops are the enemy or a threat...it's damn sad.
And when it comes to non-lethal force
You're telling me that at this point in the history of law enforcement technology the best pacifying weapons we have are irritant sprays and electric shock? That's just sad.
the best pacifying weapon is, was and always will be a dedicated, trained, disciplined and compassionate human being who sees him or herself as a PEACE officer. People who aren't so jaded, tired, mis-chosen etc. that they can't use their brain and mouth before their physical weapons.
Most of the time, talking, LISTENING, thinking and exercising a little patience will either defuse the situation (it there WAS a situation in the first place) or at least give the policeman time to assess and arrive at a solution of least harm.
If people are dying of taserings, it is time to get rid of them until the human element is brought up to a safe standard.
If we wanted law-breakers killed on the spot we would be using soldiers.
What does the heart condition have to do with anything? If you tase someone with a heart condition and he dies, you're somehow NOT to blame? Or less to blame than when he would have been healthy?
I really don't get it.
For the technically curious, IEEE Spectrum recently ran a good series of articles on tasers.
@REMMELT,
The reason I mentioned heart disease is because the article emphasized that the man that died was healthy, according to his father. You have to realize the taser must have been tested countless times before it was allowed to be sold to the public and especially for it to be used by law enforcement. My point was that the man most likely died because he had an undiagnosed heart condition and was in a very stressful situation, not because he was tasered (tased?).
As far as blaming someone, I blame the uncooperative man. You're supposed to do what the police orders you to do in an emergency situation, such as an automobile accident. It just sucked for him that he died.
@Tomas:
Deaf man tased after exiting shower on a false cop call:
http://www.kwch.com/global/story.asp?s=7446220
"As far as blaming someone, I blame the uncooperative man. You're supposed to do what the police orders you to do in an emergency situation, such as an automobile accident. It just sucked for him that he died."
I take it you have never been in nor seen the result of an auto accident where even a minor head injury can produce altered level of consciousness (ALOC). Either this office was poorly trained as a first responder (he was responding to a traffic accident, wasn't he?) or he was a trigger-happy douche who relies on his taser to "incapacitate now, sort it out later". As stated above, even a small head injury or even heart trauma from chest impact can cause ALOC in the PATIENT.
#70: "As far as blaming someone, I blame the uncooperative man. You're supposed to do what the police orders you to do in an emergency situation, such as an automobile accident. It just sucked for him that he died."
Does this also apply to shock victims or people so injured that they cannot process or comply with police "orders." Do cops exist to simply throw around random orders that people should be expected to "obey" regardless of their condition? Is it ok that they act like temperamental dictators? If so, that's a sad state of affairs. It's difficult for me to see how a rational person could argue this. Of course, your logic brings to mind the Fouad Kaady case.
I assumed that his health was emphasized because it makes the taser even more dangerous - it induces heart attacks in those who have no risk for them - but in a practical sense it doesn't matter. A policeman in a crisis situation isn't going to ask for a medical history before tasering. IMHO, if a "non-lethal" weapon is killing 40 people a year, it needs to be treated more like a gun and less like a nightstick. We should demand similar accountability, investigation, and paperwork as a firearm deployment.
So many of you are so quick to assume that the man was an injured innocent victim that was tasered by a bullying cop, why is that? I work around police officers often and just as in any job, the less paperwork they have to write, the better. Why would they want to create more work for themselves by purposely turning a calm accident scene into one in which they have to taser and detain someone? That scenario simply does not compute.
I'd be willing to bet that after the autopsy's final results are released and the investigation is complete, the man will be proven to have a medical condition that was the main cause of his death and the officer was attempting to put a halt to a possible violent confrontation.
I'm willing to bet that many victims of police brutality are convinced not to "create paperwork" on threat of more violence. That and knowing damn well the cop always gets off.
So many of you are so quick to assume that the man was an injured innocent victim that was tasered by a bullying cop...
Well, yes, we do have this sort of presumed innocence thing in the US. Of course, he can't defend himself - because he's dead, irrevocably terminated at age 29.
I'm starting to wonder if this Blame The Victim cult is a natural facet of human behavior or a plot by the Bush administration to further dehumanize us.
I don't know much about tasering, and I had a brother who was a cop his whole life. There are 7 counties that make up Minneapolis/St Paul and at one point I knew half of the cops in one of those counties. Even they didn't like the State Patrol guys. Not because they weren't good cops, but because they were more like a military unit then even the county SWAT guys were. They honestly saw themselves as a bulwark between the State Patrol and the citizens they protected.