Expert testifies in Winnfield trial that Taser killed Pikes

... a day full of testimony and sometimes testy back and forth between one of Nugent's attorneys, Jerry Glas, who also represents Taser International, and one of the state's expert witnesses -- renowned medical examiner Michael Baden from New York City ... "He was healthy. He was Tasered. He died," Baden said. "There was no other reason for his death."

October 24, 2010
By Billy Gunn, The Town Talk

WINNFIELD -- Barron "Scooter" Pikes lay incoherent on the floor of the police station, eyes wide, mumbling, "I wanna go home," and "Somebody help me," with froth on his lips.

Winnfield Police officers, whom Pikes reportedly told he'd done crack cocaine and PCP, offered bad suggestions: "I wish we had a cart, we could put him in the hole," and "Somebody get a wheelbarrow."

Among the voices heard on a video of the scene talking to Pikes as he lay on the floor was Scott Nugent, who at the time was a police officer. Nugent is now a former police officer on trial for manslaughter in connection with Pikes' death.

"Get up, Barron, the ambulance is on the way. Come on, get up," said Nugent, who later drove the ambulance to Winn Medical Center while two paramedics tried to revive Pikes.

The suspect who officers thought was a drug addict too high for conversation and standing upright turned out to be a young man dying in front of their eyes.
What the trial of Nugent, 24, is about is whether Nugent's eight or nine shocks to Pikes with a Taser led to the 21-year-old felon's heart stopping.

Friday was the second day of testimony in Nugent's manslaughter trial in the death of Pikes, whom some in Winnfield called Barron Collins, the name of Pikes' father.
Pikes was wanted on a felony warrant when Nugent and other officers saw him just after lunch on Jan. 17, 2008, chased him and then handcuffed him. Nugent, in 14 to 15 minutes, used a Tasing technique called a "drive stun" eight or nine times as a way to get Pikes off the ground and into a police car.

Witnesses and lawyers said Pikes was afraid of going to jail.

The video, which defense attorneys wanted kept out of the trial, came almost at the end of a day full of testimony and sometimes testy back and forth between one of Nugent's attorneys, Jerry Glas, who also represents Taser International, and one of the state's expert witnesses -- renowned medical examiner Michael Baden from New York City.

Baden, who was featured in the HBO series "Autopsy," said there was no other way to explain a healthy young man dying of cardiac arrest than to rule it came from a Taser stun gun.

"He was healthy. He was Tasered. He died," Baden said. "There was no other reason for his death."

Glas tried to poke holes in Baden's reasoning -- and thereby try to set up reasonable doubt in the minds of 12 jurors and two alternates -- by saying the way the Taser works is administering pain with electricity in a localized area of the body not near the heart.

He said Baden's theory of Pikes' cardiac arrest about 15 minutes after the last Taser shock was unfounded. Baden at one point noted that Glas didn't have a medical degree.

Baden said that just because the stuns were not administered near the heart -- most of the shocks were on Pikes' back -- electricity can course through blood vessels to the heart, damaging it.

At one point, Judge John Joyce had to reprimand both men for a back-and-forth dialogue that was becoming uncivil.

Also testifying Friday was Alexandria cardiologist Harry Hawthorne, who said Pikes could have died from sickle cell disease. In an autopsy report, Youngsville forensics pathologist Joel Carney said Pikes had the sickle cell trait.

The trial resumes Monday in the Winn Parish Courthouse.

If convicted of manslaughter, Nugent could face up to 40 years in prison.