The policeman’s actions were way over the top, but it might be instructive to identify where the precise point of failure was operationally in this scenario. Possibly some SDMB LEO can help.
Remember the context that there is huge push via various laws that the police must follow in scenarios where the might even be a hint of domestic violence to identify and separate the participants. This legislation was drafted to prevent domestic violence and the police are responsible for enforcing these laws which they take very seriously.
Policeman thinks he’s going to what is a probably a domestic dispute of some kind. He gets there and sees there is no evidence of physical violence, and is greeted by what he thinks is a typical “I was angry when I called you, but we’ve made up, please go away” response from the woman.
What are his duties as a policeman charged with enforcing the aforesaid laws at this point? If the woman tells him to MYOB re the identity of someone he thinks might be the person she was trying to eject from the premises, does he have any duty to go further in acquiring that identity? How far should he go in getting that information. Should he be able to arrest her if she refuses that information?
Let’s recap: you threw in the strawman of high-speed chases (which, of course, had not a damn thing at all to do with this conversation). I then pointed out the glaring difference between a tasing and a high-speed pursuit. You then offered up the pointless dung-nugget above.
Now, since you’re in the bottom 1% of this board when it comes to both reading comprehension and brain function, let me try and get this to sink in for you: A girl I cared very deeply for has been in the ground for 20 years now, the result of an overzealous cop pursuing someone who decided not to pull over…because of a broken turn signal. Anyone who thinks I’m always on the side of police is a fucking moron. And anyone who thinks I’m in favor of high-speed chases makes a fucking moron look like a Mensa candidate.
Radio waves travel faster than cars. Pursuit should be used in only the most extreme cases.
Subduing by pain is a form of incapacitation. I’d venture to guess that the reason there is such a setting on stun guns is because otherwise they’re a one-shot deal. If you miss, then you’re out of luck. But you can’t use the full incapacitation setting unless you shoot the barbs into someone. (Again, that’s just a guess.)
The goal and intent is still to get the person to submit and allow himself to be restrained. So long as the weapon is used only for that purpose, that’s still better than breaking the person’s arm.
I don’t believe that I’ve seen a single post in this thread which said anything like that the cops in question are undoubtedly innocent of wrong-doing.
Say, for example, that Roger uses a salt lick to lure a cow in to be slaughtered. Billy gets up and complains that Roger is a murderer and salt licks are murderous weapons and should be banned. If, at this point, I tell Billy that he has his head up his ass so far calling a salt lick a murderous weapon goes, that’s not a defense of Roger. Roger is undoubtedly guilty of killing a cow and, if that’s a crime, he should be punished for it. I’m not defending Roger, I’m pointing out that Billy is saying something that is simply divorced from reality and from the issue at hand.
Why go through the effort of correcting Billy if it’s not to defend Roger? Because it’s a forum devoted to fighting ignorance.
I daresay there’s a middle being excluded, here
Or did cops make it a habit of breaking suspects’ arms (for pain compliance, you see) before the taser came along to solve this outstanding law-enforcement issue ?
I’d venture to guess that the answer is yes. Subduing a person physically is liable to end up in broken arms, missing eyes, bruises, cuts, and even gun shots. Before the taser they had the billy club, their fists, and a gun. Of those four options, which do you want the police to use on you if, for whatever reason, you have decided to fight with them? Sure, the cop might be skilled enough to win 90% of his fights without having to do major damage, but why should he endanger himself like that? Police officer has a wife and kids. He might be in a job where he’s going to risk himself on a day-to-day basis, but that doesn’t mean that we should make him come home bruised every day rather than tase people who were committing a crime by resisting arrest. And why add that extra 10% of people who suffer major damage rather than using a taser? Between harmless pain and broken arms, pain is better.
Which number is equivalent to the percentage of people who died by being told to lie down flat on the ground, to raise their hands over their head, by being sprayed with pepper spray, or by being left alone. Acting as the catalyst to a death and being the cause of a death are very different things. Some people are just on the verge of death and you’re pretty well screwed no matter what you do.
That’s an oxymoron.
But I’ve already elaborated enough on the problem with tasers in the recent GD thread, so let’s leave it at that and agree to [del]call the other an idiot behind his back[/del] disagree.
Don’t quote the police about them. They use them and are defending them. They can manufacture data as they see fit and they will.
If you want to discuss your data find a neutral source.
That’s where the cops’ story falls apart, IMO. If they honestly believed that this was a domestic violence situation: Why did they allow the presumptive* suspect* (the male friend) to leave the scene? Even if they had his address (or what he said was his address, clearly they didn’t ask for ID of any sort) if they honestly believed for a moment that there was a chance in hell that there was domestic violence or some sort of a threat, or trespassing or anything else, whether he was the husband, the secret lover or the paperboy, then he should not have been allowed to just get into his car and drive off. I firmly doubt that they believed him guilty of anything.
That they did let him leave without getting his name puts paid to the entire story that they thought he might’ve perpetrated any crime, and basically, it seems pretty clear that they were using the threat of arrest to cover up their blunder in not getting the man’s name.
But her unwillingness to *fix their error for them *did not and could not justify an arrest to begin with. You have to identify yourself when police have a lawful reason to be interacting with you. But there is no law compelling anyone to give the police the name of another person. There’s no law compelling anyone to give a witness statement, whether they’re a bystander or the alleged/potential victim. Police can order you to do things, they cannot order you to talk.
So justify tasering her because she ran/resisted arrest until you’re blue in the face, but there was no reason for an arrest to start with.
So the fact that they’ve received less complaints of brutality and the number of law suits for police brutality have dropped off is just further lies? You know that cries of conspiracy make you immediately in the wrong?
And note, here, that I’ve simply listed every relevant item shown in Google Scholar. There was no paper saying anything other than that lives are saved and injuries are diminished when tasers are introduced into policing.
The people who support cops having a different set of rules for themselves think there is. I don’t think cops should have a different set of rules; I think cops should get tickets when they break traffic rules when driving (not in pursuit) or when caught drunk-driving off-duty; I think cops should rat on each other all the time, as often as necessary. I don’t believe in the blue code of silence, or whatever it’s called. I think cops need to hold themselves to the possible highest standards, so that when questionable things happen, our first response isn’t; “Dammit, the cops are out of control again!” but, “That’s unusual; cops don’t usually do that.”
[/QUOTE]
Once again, Cat Whisperer, you’ve crystallized my thoughts quite eloquently.
Conspiracy? What are you talking about? Police brutality cases are not on a steady rise. I made no such claim. You should not make up your own arguments and then claim victory for defeating them.
Like the idea that the option is taser or broken arms. That is dumb.
That’s crying conspiracy. It’s the same argument used by denialists against the Holocaust, Global Warming, etc. “They’re liars and make up data, man.”
Given that the data supports that fewer criminals are shot to death when tasers are introduced, I’d have to question how you think that the possibility of there being fewer broken arms wouldn’t be reasonable to assume as well. Certainly a broken arm isn’t going to be a significant percentage of injuries when an officer and suspect get into a tussle, nor is it that one of them will get shot. The point though is that simply all potential damage is reduced when tasers are used. Fewer people are shot to death. Fewer people are bruised, have their eye jabbed out, cut, punched, hit with a flashlight, etc. That’s what the data says. How is that not a good outcome? You would rather that more people are shot or beaten with a flashlight?
Even if you accept all of the above is true - what, at all, does that have to do with the women in the OP who was unarmed, had committed no crime, and was trying to retrieve her hand bag to return to her home?
The answer is jack shit - 'cus even if tasers are appropriate in some cases if a trained police officer can’t subdue a 57 year old unarmed grade 3 teacher without using one, he’s a shitty officer and deserved to be fired. Apparently his superiors agree with me, 'cus he no longer works there.
