Tasers are under fire in Australia where a manufacturer’s warning is seen as a possible bonanza for lawsuit seeking lawyers. The Courier-Mail reports:
Manufacturer Taser International has issued the directive based on controversy over the impact of the stun guns on the human heart.
It recommends Tasers instead be aimed at a suspect’s legs or back.
Queensland Police are considering the directive as part of its revamped Taser training package to be rolled out next year.
But criminal defence lawyer Jim Coburn of Ryan and Bosscher said the official warning from Taser was a “spectacular disclosure of the possible health risks from firing the devices into a person’s chest and seriously undermined Queensland police and state government assurances that Tasers were safe to use.”
“Why has it taken so long for authorities to realise tasering in the chest could be life threatening ? ” he said.
“It seems to be yet again evidence of the rushed manner in which these weapons were introduced.”
Queensland’s Police Union has also criticised the directive, calling it impractical.
The manufacturer is now arguing that the warning is being misunderstood:
The Australasian distributor of Taser stun guns says a warning to avoid firing the weapons at the chests of offenders has been misinterpreted.
George Hately says the directive from Taser International recommends avoiding firing the weapon at a number of areas of the body, including the face, neck, groin and chest.
But he told AAP the advice to avoid the chest where possible was not because of medical concerns or fears the stun guns are lethal.
“They’re simply trying to minimise controversy for police officers and police departments,” he said.
“The advice is that if an officer has time they should pick the ideal target zones, which are the large muscle groups but if they haven’t got time to be selective they should deploy the Taser as best they can.
“So they’re not being told not to shoot the chest at all, just to pick a better spot if the situation allows that.”
However, Brisbane criminal defence lawyer Jim Coburn insists the directive confirms fears the stun guns are lethal and should be scrapped.
According to the CBC, some Canadian police have already started changing their procedures due to the warning:
A number of Canadian police agencies are changing their policies on stun-gun use in light of a new training bulletin from the manufacturer of the weapon.
Taser International says the guns should not be aimed at a suspect’s chest whenever possible. Instead, officers are advised to target the abdomen, legs or back.
“Note, we have lowered the recommended point of aim from centre of mass to lower centre of mass for front shots,” the company says in the bulletin on its website.
“When possible, avoiding chest shots with electronic control devices avoids the controversy about whether ECDs [electronic control devices] do or do not affect the human heart,” said the bulletin said.
‘The RCMP is immediately directing members to, where practical, avoid intentionally targeting the chest, the head and pre-existing injury areas, if known.’—Sgt. Greg Cox, RCMP spokesman in Ottawa.
Tasers have been controversial in Australia for some time now.
Australia’s World News has this item from June:
Civil libertarians say a national review of police use of Tasers is needed, following revelations a man who died after being tasered by police could have endured shocks for more than two minutes.
Thirty-nine-year-old Antonio Galeano died after he was shot with a 50,000 volt Taser during a violent confrontation with police at a unit in Brandon, near Townsville, on June 12.
Police initially said Mr Galeano was shot three times, but data recorded from the Taser has shown it operated on 28 separate cycles during the confrontation.
An average Taser shot lasts up to five seconds, meaning the man could have suffered millions of electric shocks for more than two minutes.
The incident, which involved two officers, is now being investigated by the Queensland coroner and the police service’s ethical standards command, overseen by the Crime and Misconduct Commission (CMC).
The state’s police service has also suspended the further roll-out of Tasers.
But civil liberties lawyer Terry O’Gorman said an independent investigation was needed.
“We are calling for an independent group of experts to review the use of Tasers Australia-wide,” Mr O’Gorman said.
“There has already been two deaths from Tasers in the past two months, Queensland last week and one in the Northern Territory last month and the problems of Tasers being over used in everyday policing situations need to be addressed nationally.”
Amnesty International says US authorities recommend one standard cycle of five seconds is more than enough to subdue someone.
And then there was this item in July which further added to the controversy:
When police taser-gunned a man in an aboriginal community in Western Australia who was charging them with a can of gasoline and a lighter, he suddenly burst into flames, the BBC reports. The man, Ronald Mitchell, 36, is a known offender and his sister told The Australian that he had actually been sniffing the gasoline, the BBC notes. Police arrived at Mitchell’s home in response to a complaint and are saying the immolation was spurred by the lighter/gasoline combination, as opposed to the taser. Mitchell was charged with assault, but according to the BBC, some are speaking out in his defense and against the use of taser guns…
Then, last month, The Australian ran this:
The controversial Taser stun guns may be scrapped in Queensland after a review warned that the weapons could kill and could not be modified to prevent a repeat of the death of a man this year when he was shot 28 times with the 50,000-volt device.
The joint Crime and Misconduct Commission-police review, launched after the June heart-attack death of north Queensland man Antonio Galeano, has ordered an overhaul of police training and operational policy, requiring the stun guns to be used only when there is a “risk of serious injury”.
The review, to be released today and obtained exclusively by The Australian, marks the first time an Australian authority has recognised the possibility the stun guns can injure or kill, especially when fired repeatedly at a person.
“The possibility of Taser use causing or contributing to death is possible and cannot be ruled out,” the review warns.
The Arizona-based manufacturers have repeatedly denied the weapons can kill.
The ongoing controveries involving tasers usually boil down to an argument over usage: if officials use them as designed, the manufacters usually argue, they should not be lethal weapons. This latest twist now gives ammunition to those who argue that they are in fact dangerous and that, at the very least, many things could go wrong in their usage that could end in death. So the question becomes: do the benefits of their usage outweight the risks?
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.