By David Simpson
Atlanta Journal-Constitution
ATLANTA — Before DeKalb County puts more than 1,000 police Tasers on the street, a lot of attention will be given to how officers will use the controversial stun guns.
Will they shock and immobilize only dangerous suspects who otherwise might be shot? Or will they zap people who just don’t follow orders?
The axiom in police circles is that officers under stress will follow their training --- or will suffer for their lack of training.
So Taser training often is the focus of current debate over the devices, possibly even supplanting years of disputes over whether Tasers are inherently too dangerous.
DeKalb Police Chief Terrell Bolton has promised “world-class” Taser training and a system to provide immediate medical care to anyone who is shocked. He will ask the DeKalb commission Tuesday to use $1 million in seized drug assets to buy Tasers for 1,011 officers, detectives and sergeants.
“My goal is to protect life,” Bolton said.
But some people stunned by Tasers in other jurisdictions have died, and experts caution that officers can put themselves at risk if they rely on a Taser in the wrong situation. Whether Tasers do more good than harm can depend on training.
Gray areas remain
Aside from fatal cases, the biggest public relations damage for police using Tasers probably has been done by videos showing officers shocking people who didn’t seem to put up much of a fight.
One famous example: The “don’t Tase me, bro” video of a 2007 altercation in which police shocked a student who already had been wrestled to the ground after refusing to give up a microphone while questioning Sen. John Kerry. Critics cite that as misuse of the weapon on people who just don’t follow orders.
The issue is often framed as “passive resistance.” It was studied by leading police oversight expert Merrick Bobb after University of California at Los Angeles police shocked a student three times after he would not show his identification in a library. Students took video of officers shocking him twice for refusing to get to his feet.
Bobb found a large majority of police departments prohibit using a Taser on a passively resisting subject.
DeKalb Assistant Chief Jim Helms said the department will expect officers to be able to control a person who isn’t actively resisting without resorting to a Taser.
“Whenever our officers have an opportunity to detain somebody with a minimal amount of force, then this is what we preach,” Helms said.
Gray areas will remain in any department’s policy. One would be for suspects who pose less than lethal danger but still are violent. Before it suspended use of Tasers in 2005, the DeKalb department’s Taser policy called for first considering “verbal compliance tactics and the use of physical strengths and skills.”
A Gwinnett County officer last year shocked a 14-year-old girl who already had been handcuffed because she continued to resist. Bobb’s report said many departments “impose strict restrictions” on shocking handcuffed suspects.
Helms said DeKalb will prohibit using a Taser against a juvenile.
Officers also will not be allowed to shock a fleeing suspect unless there is an additional reason to do so, Helms said.
DeKalb has pulled together model policies from police groups and guidelines from federal civil rights officials to update the department’s Taser policy, Helms said.
Compared to policies across the country, “ours is probably going to be extremely restrictive,” he said.
Some keep resisting
Policies and training aren’t enough to sway some critics, like Georgia NAACP president Edward DuBose, who states his chief objection flatly: “A lot of deaths related to the Tasers,” DuBose said.
News account of deaths --- including two Gwinnett County inmates shocked by jailers --- brought the safety issue to a boil in 2005, when manufacturer Taser International issued a statement saying repeated shocks could be fatal.
DeKalb Chief Executive Officer Vernon Jones responded by suspending DeKalb’s limited use of Tasers.
The manufacturer, backed by some studies, has argued that the Taser’s electric shock alone cannot stop a heart. Disputes often have involved whether the dead suspects were at additional risk, often because of high levels of drug intoxication.
It is those suspects who may resist even after being shocked. Bobb’s 2007 report for UCLA recommends officers stop after each five-second shock to assess whether another shock is really necessary, and some trainers argue that it doesn’t make sense anyway to continue shocking someone who has demonstrated that the Taser won’t bring him under control.
Meanwhile, trainers caution officers can put themselves at risk if they use the weapon in the wrong situation.
Tasers are not designed for the most dangerous situation an officer faces: a suspect with a gun.
And experts say a lone officer never should try a Taser on a person with a knife or an overwhelming physical advantage. If the Taser doesn’t stop him, he may be on top of the officer and possibly grabbing the officer’s gun.
Copyright 2008 Atlanta Journal-Constitution