DEATHS DOG STUN GUN MAKER

For exec­u­tives as Taser International, this should be the best day, ever. The com­pany just signed a $1.8 mil­lion deal with the Pentagon the largest in Taser’s his­tory.
But the stun-​​gun maker can’t shake alle­ga­tions that their sup­pos­edly “non-​​lethal” weapons have killed more than a few of their tar­gets.
“In the past nine months, five peo­ple in Georgia, includ­ing three in metro Atlanta, have died after being shocked with Tasers by law enforce­ment offi­cers. Nationally, 26 peo­ple who were shocked with Tasers while in cus­tody died dur­ing that period as many as had died in the pre­vi­ous 4 1/​2 years the guns had been in use,” the Atlanta Journal-​​Constitution notes.
“Las Vegas police will re-​​evaluate Taser gun train­ing after a coroner’s jury blamed the death of a hand­cuffed man on repeated shocks with the stun gun,” KRNV-​​TV adds.
No death has ever been suc­cess­fully pinned on the Taser in court, the com­pany asserts. According to the AJC, “Tom Smith, pres­i­dent and co-​​founder of Taser International, says the guns have been used safely by law enforce­ment offi­cers in the field more than 45,000 times since 1999 and used safely more than 100,000 times includ­ing demon­stra­tion fir­ings. The increase in the num­ber of deaths of peo­ple shocked by Tasers sim­ply reflects the increased use of the weapons, the com­pany says.“
American sol­diers in Iraq and Afghanistan have been turn­ing more and more to the elec­tric shock weapons, to con­trol crowds and keep pris­on­ers in line. An Army report, released last year, said the Tasers worked par­tic­u­larly well in Iraq, because Saddam had tor­tured so many with elec­tric­ity.

June 30th, 2004 | Less-lethal | Comments Off Both comments and pings are currently closed.