Guelph Union of Tenants and Supporters calls for ban of police tasers in Guelph (Ontario)

September 6, 2007
Guelph, Ontario

The Guelph Union of Tenants and Supporters is calling for an immediate ban on Tasers being issued to city Police.

Currently only Supervisors and the Tactical Squad are issued Tasers. The Police Chief has called for Tasers to be issued to every front-line officer. There are several recent reports of inappropriate and excessive use of Tasers in Guelph.

GUTS supports the recent findings of Amnesty International. The group has recently published a report titled "Canada, Inappropriate and Excessive use of tasers."

Amnesty states that the Taser is supposed to be an alternative to deadly force yet is consistently used too early in the use of force model. Also Amnesty states "None of the studies carried out in Canada into the use of tasers meet Amnesty International's criteria for an independent, impartial and comprehensive inquiry into their use and effects.."

On July 25, 2007 a Guelph man was tasered by police, because he was suspected of being intoxicated and acting irrationally. The General Warnings put out by Taser, states that “... drug intoxication or chronic drug abuse, and/or over-exertion from physical struggle may result in serious injury or death.” Despite the lack of an immediate risk of death being posed to the officers involved, they chose to taser this man. The Guelph Police are in contravention of both International Law and the General Warnings put out by the manufacturer.

On the night of April 15, 2005 the Guelph Police arrested a woman for public intoxication. Following a strip search, she was placed in an interrogation room. When she refused to stand up, she was tasered by the Guelph Police. Tasers in combination with the influence of alcohol can be fatal. Moreover, since she was sitting down, the woman clearly was no physical threat to the officers.

These two cases highlight that the manner in which the Taser is being used in Guelph, and more broadly Canada, is in contravention of the UN Code of Conduct for Law Enforcement Officials and the Basic Principles on the Use of Force and Firearms by law Enforcement Officials. GUTS believes that under international law, the manner in which Tasers are being used in our community would fall into the category of torture and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment.

It is GUTS' position that the leadership and highly trained units in the Guelph Police do not have the training nor inclination to correctly use tasers. Clearly the culture of policing in Guelph is not conducive to proper use of tasers and they should be banned until proper training is given, proper research is conducted, and proper accountability measures are in place.