Fascinating. Did this clown plead or go to trial? Did he have an excuse for being an asshole?
I agree that it’s likely the officer would not have used the restraint technique that can lead to positional asphyxia.
And this is where I’m somewhat tossed up on the issue. I think we can’t disregard the safety concerns of law enforcement officers, who are already subject to a wide variety of occupational risks beyond those associated with physical arrest. I feel that policy should aim to reduce those occupational hazards to the extent that it can.
However, to the extent that such policy harms the general public, I don’t support. Given that there are independent studies that contradict AI’s position that Taser use is a more lethal option than physical restraint techniques, it’s not clear to me that the argument against Tasers is cut and dried. The fact that arrestees have died after being subjected to Tasers does not mean it was the Taser that killed them. There’s a website that attributes a long list of deaths to Taser to the contradiction of actual death certificates attributing causation to something completely unrelated. It’s a fact that numbers generally attributed are massaged. Before Tasers, people were all bent out of shape over pepper spray. I remember growing up in LA county and there being a lot of discussion and controversy over both pepper spray and excessive physical force. Personally, I find nightsticks a whole lot more brutal, but I guess that’s just me.
I can’t agree with you more on this point, and it is imperative that officer take drawing their Tasers as seriously as they do drawing their service weapons. I also agree that better training in negotiation would likely reduce the reliance on Tasers. Using them for the sole purpose of inflicting pain when compliance has already been achieved is wrong, wrong, wrong and should be dealt with harshly.
I’m not sure how this officer did anything wrong seeing that he followed the law and presumably his training to a T. Couldn’t it be possible that we’re seeing acts of defiance much more often with the increased use and publicity of videotaped encounters? It seems to me that a great deal of these issues would be resolved if people like the old gal in this video simply did what reasonable are expected to do in this case? There’s a fair amount of consequence resulting from misadventure than officer misconduct.
I don’t really see what the problem is here. There was no misconduct on the officer’s part, there were no injuries sustained by either party, and the officer carried out his duty.
By all means, quote yourself when you’re in Ohio refusing a ticket. Please make sure to say “don’t tase me bro” at the appropriate time.
Awww, now everyone’s getting all reasonable and everything!
Good points Brown Eyed Girl!
I am very interesting in seeing these independent studies - I have done a bit of searching, but cannot find them. To me, this is the crux of the issue. What is the safest technique to subdue a suspect for the officer’s and their own safety.
And about increased video capture of acts of defiance - Yes, 100% agree. There used to be a whole lot going on that we never knew about.
Yeah, I thought you had to be at least 72 to get a pass on that shit.
Dropping ticket into window and wishing Grandma a nice day=not an option under the Texas statute. Why are you failing to see that? It’s the law, genius, and like it or not, you have to obey it if you live there.
Don’t like it? Change it!
Jeebus!
Well, there’s the 2007 Wake Forest University School of Medicine study that was published in the Annals of Emergency Medicine. Here’s a synopsis of the findings:
It should be noted that these were not controlled tests of the Taser on LEOs, but rather they represented LEO usage on suspects in real world conditions. As of this past January, WFU reported that the study is in its third year and have data on 1,201 incidences with 99.75% safe rate of application.
There’s a 2005 study by the Potomac Institute (warning: PDF) that raises questions about the cases that Amnesty International cited as deaths after Taser usage. Their findings:
I’ll see what else I can find.
Don’t trust the internet. It’s also the law in California. Section (b).
I see it. I acknowledged pages ago that I see it. I just think it’s stupid and in this case it was used to escalate a very minor situation to ridiculous heights. I doubt there’s a person alive who agrees with every single law on the books in this country, but god forbid you express that disagreement around here. You’re slow, hyperbolic, “just don’t get” things, etc.
I’m late to the party, but in the video I saw the woman agrees to sign the ticket, albeit with vulgarity. The cop chooses this moment to shove her out of traffic and yell instead of saying ‘Good, let’s step back from traffic’. That was poor technique, to say the least. She was wrong to resist arrest from that point on, but I see culpability and escalation from both sides. Also, I didn’t see the cop ‘drag her into the street’. He opened the door, and she came out.
M2.01$s
Questions: Is a traffic stop the same as an arrest? If that’s the case, why aren’t we Mirandized at every stop? Is it a mere ‘detainment’? I didn’t hear the cop explain to the woman that if she didn’t sign, she’d be arrested. I saw a badge heavy cop and a cantankerous old woman butting heads unnecessarily with unfortunate results.
But you expressed your discontent with the law in a way that affords the breaking of the very same law, not simply acknowledging it’s stupid or making any references to actually doing something about it. You’re making excuses when there aren’t any. The law MUST apply to us all, or to none.
I for one don’t have a problem with it. Why can’t a normal person just sign a fucking ticket and be on their way? She was speeding after all. If that’s the law in that state, she should have taken her “I’m a 72 year old Grandma” excuse before a judge and plead her case. Refusing to comply with an officer enforcing the law, as dramatic as it may seem because she’s an old lady (and eager to use that excuse to her advantage) serves no purpose other than to inflame an otherwise normal traffic stop.
She’s in the wrong in this case. Besides the unlawful “dropping the ticket into the window” solution, do you have another one that could have pre-empted the use of a taser in this particular situation?
I haven’t thought of any, but again, I don’t think “drop the ticket into the window” is invalid just because it doesn’t conform to a stupid, outdated law. Lots of laws have been overturned in this country, including this very law, in Washington. Am I saying she shouldn’t have followed the law? NO. I follow all sorts of laws I don’t want to follow. I’m saying the cop made a series of extremely poor judgement calls and turned a small situation into something traumatic that could’ve been deadly. I wonder if a calm explanation of the consequences would’ve persuaded her to sign the ticket? We’ll never know because it doesn’t look like he tried. I am not being hyperbolic when I say, it honestly looked to me like the cop just wanted to swing his metaphorical dick around. The situation just looked so suprememly avoidable.
Thanks for the cites so far.
I can agree with that. Perhaps an offer of tea and warm apple pie was in order to get her to calm down.
Seriously though, yeah, I can see maybe the officer trying to “talk her down” more in this situation rather than yelling at her. But people need to learn that compliance with a police order (if lawful) is the highest order of the day, and if you disagree with the law or the way you were treated by the officer, the time to voice that dissent is not during an arrest. You will not win.
Yes.
Because it’s a minor offence that doesn’t require mirandizing.
You could hear her say “go ahead and arrest a 72 year old woman”. When the officer was closer to the car you could clearly hear him warn her twice that she would be tased.
HOOO-EEEE! This is the biggest hornets’ nest I’ve ever stirred up here. Popped in a little taser story before I signed off yesterday, come back a day later, and it’s almost to page 5 and been moved to Great Debates.
I did receive the odd traffic ticket or two in Texas myself back in my day. Although I did not keep any for souvenirs, and it’s been a long, long time, so I may not be remembering correctly, I seem to recall it says something on the ticket itself about signing it NOT being an admission of guilt, but rather a promise to appear in court should you choose to fight it rather than pay the fine. But even if not, it was always understood that not signing = being arrested. I cannot imagine anyplace where you would not get run in for not signing a ticket. Otherwise, why even bother trying to hand out tickets?
I don’t feel simply dropping the unsigned ticket in her car would have been a valid option. The perp could always deny it. Even if it were caught on camera, the perp could say he never saw a ticket in the car afterward. A slick lawyer could press home that maybe some sleight of hand or video trickery was involved. And anyway, I doubt Granny here would have meekly showed up in court. Maybe she would have appeared, but it seems likely someone would have had to go track her down and make her appear, and she would probably have had to be tasered at some point along the line anyway, so best to get it over and be done with ( :D).
In the BBC interview, the lady, Kathryn Winkfein, looked like a normal person, not the shadowy old crone in the police video. (I suspect she popped into the beauty parlor before the news crews showed up at her home.) I don’t think she was aware at that point there was a video. She tried to portray herself as a saintly citizen who became ensnared in some evil trap. She was shown a written report of the incident and after reading it declared on camera that everything in the report was a lie. I would love to see her face as she watches the video for the first time.
So should the cop have tasered her? Well, as I’ve said, I’ve known some cantankerous old Texas biddies. You all know my anti-Texas bent, so I’ll admit perhaps it’s not quite fair to single them out in that state, but I swear they really DO seem much more ornery there. I have known so many who let you know in no uncertain terms their shit did NOT stink and you’re a worm and that’s that and if you don’t like it then GIT! Somehow I’m seeing in my mind this one’s neighbors saying: “Yep! h knew this was goin’ ta happen to old Kathy one o’ these days.” I’m going to come down on the cop’s side in this one.
Looks like the cop wasn’t the only one.
Do you have a point, or is this the drive-by variety of non sequitur?
It seems obvious to me, though I could be wrong, that Guinastasia is pointing out that the “granny” was also in a metaphorical dick-swinging mood, and could easily have avoided the situation simply by signing the ticket, and driving away.
It means granny was acting like a dick.