North Adams buys six nonlethal PepperBall guns
By Noah Hoffenberg, The Berkshire Eagle (Mass.)
| North Adams Police Sgt. Jim Burdick shows off one of the latest department acquisitions Thursday, a nonlethal PepperBall gun that’s used to stun an assailant. Photo: Noah Hoffenberg, Berkshire Eagle Staff |
North Adams, Mass. -- City police officers may not need to use deadly force against an armed attacker now that they’re equipped with paintball-style guns that shoot projectiles filled with pepper spray.
Last year, the Police Department bought six PepperBall guns. These guns shoot three types of PepperBall projectiles, which either contain Capsaicin II, an eye, nose and throat irritant, or are filled with dye to mark suspects, or are made from ceramics and are used to break out windows.
Police say the use of a PepperBall gun could have averted the death of Robert A. Woodward, 37, who was shot and killed by Brattleboro (Vt.) Police in December 2001 after Woodward entered a church there with a knife, and started acting in a deranged state.
That’s the reasoning behind the North Adams Police Department owning a set of the nonlethal weapons, said Sgt. Jim Burdick.
“If they had this up in Vermont with that church incident, I daresay it would’ve gone a lot differently,” said Burdick.
The gun, which is just like its paintball counterparts, protects both officers and the public from serious, permanent harm. “You’re going from practical to tactical,” he said.
Burdick said that if the department gets a 911 call of someone with a gun or a knife, at least two officers will respond. One will be armed with a police issue Glock .40 caliber, and the other will have the PepperBall gun.
Officers then would order the suspect to cease and desist.
“If you fail to comply with that, then we light you up with this,” said Burdick, gesturing to the PepperBall gun. Once hit and stunned with the PepperBall gun, the suspect can safely be taken into custody.
The gun has a 150-foot range, and can fire about six projectiles per second, as fast as the operator can pull the trigger, Burdick said. The projectiles burst on impact, creating a cloud of irritant. The gun also weighs only 3.5 pounds, a fraction of the weight of the old tear gas guns.
Once hit with the PepperBalls, the eyes, nose and throat get a burning sensation, and there’s an overflow of saliva, tears and mucus, he said.
“This is very effective,” he said. “The mucus is unbelievable. You’ll have more snot coming out of your nose than you ever imagined.”
Burdick knows how it feels, because he was shot with a PepperBall gun when the department first received them.
“I was one of the officers who volunteered to get hit by this. It took three to four days for the welt to go away,” he said.
Burdick said the PepperBall gun is ideal for subduing a knife- or gun-wielding person, or someone who is deranged or drugged up.
The gun is equipped with a laser sight, something that regular paintball guns don’t have.
In fact, Burdick said, there was a case within the last year in which a city man tried to “commit suicide by police,” Burdick said. Once the suspect had the laser sight on his chest, he gave up immediately, Burdick said.
“He saw the light, so to speak,” he said.
The gun also works well for crowd control, riots and situations when someone is holed up in a residence.
“I can shoot enough of this into your house, and you’re going to want to come out,” said Burdick. Or in a crowd situation, the projectiles need only burst along the ground or a wall to disperse a mob, he said.
All officers have a PepperBall gun available to them on each shift, said Burdick.
The choice for offenders is simple: “What do you want to be shot by? A Glock, or this?” Burdick said.