Company: Taser can be lethal

July 31, 2005
Lateef Mungin, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Multiple shocks with a Taser could impair breathing and even lead to death, the stun gun's manufacturer says in a new warning to law enforcement agencies. The three-page bulletin, posted on the Taser International Inc. Web site and e-mailed to the company's 19,500 certified trainers, contradicts past statements the company has made to the public and law enforcement, as well as its own training manual, last issued in November 2004.

In fact, the 239-page training manual issued by the Arizona-based company contained its own contradictions, both urging officers to use multiple shocks to subdue unruly suspects and warning against it.

"This is a much stronger emphasis than they had before," Duluth police Maj. Don Woodruff, a certified Taser instructor, said of the new bulletin. "In the past they just told us that if you have a guy who is not compliant, just stun him again. There wasn't that much talk about the health effects."

The company's warning stops short of linking the Taser to the more than 100 people who have died since 2001 after being shocked. Multiple shocks were administered in many of these deaths, including those of two men in Gwinnett County, each of whom died after being shocked at least three times with a Taser.

The Taser, marketed as a nonlethal weapon, is used by about 7,000 domestic law enforcement agencies, including 217 in Georgia, according to Taser International.

The company's president and founder, Tom Smith, said the warning, posted on the Web site June 28, was nothing new. He described it as updating statements the company had made in its training manuals.

"We are just being more specific than we were before," Smith said.

The 2004 Taser training manual did warn police against multiple blasts of the Taser — once, on page 158. But that warning is contradicted at least three times in the same manual, including on page 157, where Taser users are instructed to use multiple shocks on subjects.

"The students should anticipate using additional cycles to subdue suspects," it reads. "[The first] cycle changes the behavior, and the subsequent cycles allow for apprehension in most cases."

The training manual also stated that multiple blasts of the Taser occurred in 32 percent of the incidents police had reported to Taser International.

The new bulletin, beyond warning officers three times that repeated Taser shocks can impair breathing and lead to death, also describes specific injuries that could result from multiple or prolonged use of the 50,000-volt stun gun.

It said multiple shocks could also cause strong muscle contractions that could cause injuries to "tissues, organs, bones, muscles, tendons, ligaments, nerves, joints and stress/compression fractures to bones." It also contained various other recommended safety measures, such as not aiming the weapon at a suspect's eyes.

The company has been buffeted by more than 20 lawsuits, including some filed by police officers who say they were hurt while training with Tasers. Taser sales and the company's stock have declined steadily as the death toll, now at 103 according to Amnesty International, has risen.

A major part of Taser's defense for years has been that a medical examiner has never named the weapon as a cause of death. That changed last week when a Chicago coroner named the Taser as the primary cause of a jailed prisoner's death.

In the Chicago case, police Tasered a suspect two times and one of the blasts was prolonged — 57 seconds. The company counsels against both multiple and prolonged shocks in the new bulletin.

Too late?

The new warning will undoubtedly prompt some police agencies to question the safety of Tasers, said Illinois attorney Paul Geller, who recently filed a class action against the company alleging Taser overstated the guns' safety.

"It seems that Taser is finally attempting to change its position on the safety of the weapons," said Geller, who represents the Dolton, Ill., Police Department. "But they should have made these statements earlier. We still have a situation where police departments were misled to believe that this weapon is safe when it is not."

Taser International has staunchly defended its weapons, stating that the guns have been used safely by law enforcement officers in the field more than 45,000 times since 1999.

Overall, they have been used safely more than 100,000 times, including demonstration firings, the company said.

The company's medical research finds that the weapons "generally" do not cause death, according to the new warning. But the document advises police to seek to control an unruly suspect immediately after the first blast rather than using the weapon again.

Some police departments are heeding the new warning.

"When our next class begins, our training will be modified," said Gwinnett police spokesman Darren Moloney, who said the department would make an effort to minimize multiple shocks.

"One of the changes in policy is that when an officer is deploying the Taser, and there are other officers present to assist, the subject will be restrained and handcuffed during the Tasing process."

No quick reaction

At least one metro Atlanta police department said it was not aware of the warning.

"We are unfamiliar with this warning and will have to research it," said Henry County police Lt. Jason Bolton.

Several other agencies, including the Gwinnett County Sheriff's Department, either declined to comment or did not respond to inquiries. The Gwinnett Sheriff's Department changed its Taser policy after the latest death of a suspect subdued at the county jail — its second such case.

The new policy forbids Gwinnett deputies from placing the stun gun directly on the body of a handcuffed inmate and shocking him if there are enough deputies to restrain the prisoner.

The Georgia State Patrol is aware of the new warning bulletin and may change its Taser policy, said Gordy Wright, a spokesman for the agency, which has 200 Tasers.

"But it is really not an issue with us," Wright said. "Most of the time in our cases, the subject is compliant right after the first Tasing."

Police should avoid multiple blasts of the Taser "to minimize the potential for overexertion of the subject," according to the new warning. In addition, extended Taser shocks can harm people who are suffering from "excited delirium," the bulletin states.

"Excited delirium is a potentially fatal condition caused by a complex set of physiological conditions," according to the warning. "These subjects are at significant and potentially fatal health risks from further prolonged exertion and/or impaired breathing."

Excited delirium was named as the cause of death in 18 Taser-related cases, according to Amnesty International. Sometimes seen in drug abusers, those experiencing excited delirium often display erratic behavior and almost superhuman strength, medical experts say.

Less force better

Smith, the Taser president, said he did not think the new training bulletin called into question past medical examiners' rulings in which a Taser was ruled out as a contributing factor in a death.

"We were just basically trying to remind police to use the minimal amount of applications needed to control the situation," Smith said.