Taser maker issues new guidelines

This diagram from Taser International's website shows the new target area for Taser use.

October 7, 2009
CTV Calgary

A company that makes Tasers has issued new guidelines to police who use their product.

Taser International maintains its devices are safe but is telling police to avoid aiming the weapon at a suspect's chest.

On Wednesday those new rules were passed onto Calgary police.

"We have released a new directive, relative to Taser targeting, to our members and this follows a training bulletin that Taser International released," says SSgt. Chris Butler from the Calgary Police Service.

The bulletin, which is posted on Taser International's website, includes a diagram showing the new target areas on a suspect's body.

The bulletin instructs police: "when possible, avoiding chest shots with ECDS avoids the controversy about whether ECD's do, or do not, affect the human heart."

"The rationale from Taser in their training bulletin is that the new medical research that is coming out is showing that the closer probe to heart distances have a likelihood, or a possibility, that they may affect the rhythm of the heart," says SSgt. Butler.

CTV Calgary tried to contact Taser International for an interview but, so far, it has not responded.

Taser advises police not to aim at chest

October 21, 2009
Robert Anglen, Arizona Republic

The maker of Taser stun guns is advising police officers to avoid shooting suspects in the chest with the 50,000-volt weapon, saying that it could pose an extremely low risk of an "adverse cardiac event."

The advisory, issued in an Oct. 12 training bulletin, is the first time that Taser International has suggested there is any risk of a cardiac arrest related to the discharge of its stun gun.

But Taser officials said Tuesday that the bulletin does not state that Tasers can cause cardiac arrest. They said the advisory means only that law-enforcement agencies can avoid controversy over the subject if their officers aim at areas other than the chest.

The recommendation could raise questions about whether police officers will find it more difficult to accurately direct the probes emitted by a Taser gun at a recommended body area in order to subdue a suspect. Taser officials say the change won't hinder officers' ability to use Tasers.

In a memo accompanying the bulletin, Taser officials point out that officers can still shoot the guns at a suspect's chest, if needed.

Police departments across the United States and in Canada and Australia reacted immediately to the bulletin, with some ordering officers to follow Taser's instructions and begin aiming at the abdomen, legs or back of a suspect.

Officials with the Phoenix Police Department, one of the first in the country to arm all its officers with Tasers, said Tuesday that the new guidelines are being adopted by trainers who are reviewing departmental policy for possible changes.

Critics, including civil-rights lawyers and human-rights advocates, called the training bulletin an admission by Taser that its guns could cause cardiac arrest. They called it a stunning reversal for the company, which for years has maintained that the gun was incapable of inducing a cardiac arrest.

Scottsdale-based Taser insisted that the revision admitted no risk of cardiac arrest and served only as risk-management advice for law enforcement.

In the past, Taser has cautioned that use of its stun gun involves risk inherent in police-suspect conflicts, including the risk that suspects fall after being struck by a Taser.

"Taser has long stood by the fact that our technology is not risk-free and is often used during violent and dangerous confrontations," Taser Vice President Steve Tuttle said in an e-mail.

"We have not stated that the Taser causes (cardiac) events in this bulletin, only that the refined target zones avoid any potential controversy on this topic."

Taser's training bulletin states that "the risk of an adverse cardiac event related to a Taser . . . discharge is deemed to be extremely low." However, the bulletin says, it is impossible to predict human reactions when a combination of drug use or underlying cardiac or other medical conditions are involved.

"Should sudden cardiac arrest occur in a scenario involving a Taser discharge to the chest area, it would place the law-enforcement agency, the officer and Taser International in the difficult situation of trying to ascertain what role, if any, the Taser . . . could have played," the bulletin says.

The bulletin recommends that when aiming at the front of a suspect, the best target for officers is the major muscles of the pelvic area or thigh region. "Back shots remain the preferred area when practical," it says.

For years, Taser officials have said in interviews, court cases and government hearings that the stun gun is incapable of inducing ventricular fibrillation, the chaotic heart rhythm characteristic of a heart attack.

The guns are used by more than 12,000 police agencies across the country, including every major law-enforcement agency in the Valley. Many authorities credit the weapon with preventing deaths and injuries to officers and suspects.

Mark Spencer, president of the Phoenix Law Enforcement Association, said Tuesday that line officers had not been told of the new guidelines. But he had only praise for Tasers.

"It really minimizes harm, not only to officers but to suspects," he said.

Advocacy groups such as Amnesty International allege that Taser guns are often used by police as a compliance tool on unarmed individuals who pose no deadly threat, who are drunk or on drugs and simply quarrel with officers.

Mark Silverstein, legal director of the Colorado American Civil Liberties Union, who has tracked Taser issues for years, said the bulletin means that police departments should now be asking questions about liability and reconsider how the stun gun is used.

"This is further evidence that law-enforcement agencies need to stop and ask if they have been sold a bill of goods," he said. "This (training) bulletin confirms what critics have said for years: that Taser has overstated its safety claims. . . . (It) has to be read as if Tasers can cause cardiac arrest."

Since 2001, there have been more than 400 deaths following police Taser strikes in the United States and 26 in Canada. Medical examiners have ruled that a Taser was a cause, contributing factor or could not be ruled out in more than 30 of those deaths.

The training bulletin is drawing significant attention in Canada, where controversy erupted after the 2007 death of a Polish immigrant at Vancouver International Airport. The man stopped breathing after being shocked five times by Royal Canadian Mounted Police officers.

A Canadian government investigation in July concluded that Taser stun guns can cause death, spurring law-enforcement agencies across the country to put severe new restrictions on how and when police there can use the weapons.

In view of Taser's bulletin, the Mounties revised policies to urge officers to avoid firing at suspects' chests.

Police ethics adviser quits over sponsors

April 8, 2009
CHRISTIE BLATCHFORD, Globe and Mail

The technical adviser to the ethics committee of the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police has resigned over corporate sponsorship - including that of Taser International - of the group's annual conference.

John Jones, an expert on police ethics who has advised the committee for three years, quit Thursday after the committee's efforts to stop the practice was rebuffed by the board of directors.

"I said in that case, I can't remain a member," a saddened Dr. Jones, the author of Reputable Conduct: Ethical Issues in Policing and Corrections, told The Globe and Mail in a phone interview yesterday from his Ottawa home. "[Such sponsorship] doesn't pass the smell test."

The CACP is composed of police chiefs and senior police executives from across Canada and represents most of the country's 220-plus forces.

Dr. Jones and the members of the ethics committee were in Montreal in August for two days of meetings around the CACP's annual conference when they learned about Taser's sponsorship and that of others, including a joint Bell Mobility-CGI-Group Techna donation of $115,000, which went toward the purchase of 1,000 tickets at $215 each to a Celine Dion concert on Aug. 25.

Each registered CACP delegate received one ticket as part of his $595 registration package; if his spouse was also registered for the spouses' program, she or he received another. Virtually all meals were also sponsored.

The ethics members raised the sponsorship issue with the CACP executive committee in mid-conference - "expressed our surprise and dismay" is how the genteel Dr. Jones put it - but later followed up with a formal request for the committee co-chairs to speak to the full board of directors.

That meeting happened in November, and by December the CACP's executive director, Peter Cuthbert, replied by memo on behalf of the board, basically thanking the committee members for their concerns, but repeating that the board was satisfied the association was abiding by its sponsorship guidelines.

It was at the committee's first meeting of the new year last week in Ottawa that Mr. Cuthbert's memo was read aloud, prompting Dr. Jones to walk away from his voluntary position.

While he said he was told by senior members of the committee that Taser gave $200,000 to the 2008 conference, Mr. Cuthbert is adamant the manufacturers of the controversial "conducted energy weapons," as the CACP prefers to call them, contributed only $25,000.

But he also said that over the past three years, Taser has kicked in a total of $75,000 for conference sponsorship.

Mr. Cuthbert was insistent there is nothing wrong with the sponsorship practice, and said that part of the association's job is to bring to the attention of the chiefs "the products and tools that are available to a police service." He then suggested that Taser was only one maker of "conducted energy weapons," but, when pressed, admitted he knew of no other and said, "I guess Taser is the only name out there."

According to Mr. Cuthbert, the total corporate sponsorship of last year's conference - by, among others, Power Corporation, the Canadian Bankers Association, Loto-Québec, Microsoft, Motorola and the RCMP, ironic given that it means the Mounties shared the platform with the very product whose use has brought the force into such disrepute in the Robert Dziekanski incident - topped $500,000.

The RCMP sponsors only the professional development part of the conference program.

One of Mr. Cuthbert's defences for the association accepting sponsorships is the CACP does "no buying, no endorsement, no promotion" of any products, including sponsors', and makes no "binding recommendations."

But in fact, just six weeks ago the CACP held a press conference in Ottawa with the Canadian Police Association to announce what they called "the police position on Conducted Energy Weapons (CEWs)" and issued both a position document and a press release.

The groups said they were acting out of concern that "inaccurate and incomplete" media reporting about the weapons may have led to public misunderstanding and in effect gave CEWs their blessing.

In January, Ontario Provincial Police Commissioner Julian Fantino, a CACP member, spoke at an association workshop on CEWs and gave the weapon an even more ringing endorsement, and denounced the "irresponsible journalism" surrounding the issue.

Mr. Fantino was at least more direct: he called a spade a spade and used both terms, CEWs and tasers, to describe the weapon.

When Mr. Cuthbert was asked if it wouldn't have been better for the CACP to have publicly praised tasers with clean hands, he disagreed, and said, "Other than that, I tell you, with the board, it was not an issue ... the board was very, very comfortable with this."

But Dr. Jones told The Globe that most of the ethics committee members had concerns about the sponsorships, not just Taser's, which is why it sent committee co-chairs, RCMP Assistant Commissioner Sandra Conlin, her force's ethics adviser, and Edmonton Deputy Chief Norm Lipinski, to the board meeting. That, he said, was a measure of the committee's concern.

Mr. Conlin referred The Globe to Mr. Lipinski, saying he was the ethics committee spokesman. He was out of town and didn't return The Globe's call.

Dr. Jones, who at 66 has spent several decades of his career lecturing and consulting about ethical conduct, particularly in policing, also recently resigned as an adviser to the International Association of Chiefs of Police.

He rued how the CACP conferences have become increasingly "gaudy" affairs, with each host city trying to outdo the other, with members expecting bigger and better freebies. Indeed, Mr. Cuthbert's own figures - he said it now costs between $800,000 and $1-million to hold such conferences - back up Dr. Jones' perception.

Asked why the chiefs and senior police executives don't just finance their own conferences, Dr. Jones replied, "That's what we'd like."

He said there was "a shocking disconnect" between the lavish conferences for senior police and their increasing demands upon their rank-and-file that they refuse even a free coffee from the local doughnut store. "People now want their leaders to walk the talk," he said.

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See also the 2009 Sponsor and Exhibitor Prospectus, which promises sponsors "prominent recognition during the conference and unmatched opportunity to reach out to conference delegates from the outset of the conference and inform them of your commitment to CACP."

Taser International has been a Platinum Level Sponsor for at least the past two years. Here's what they get:

PLATINUMLEVEL - $25,000+

Conference Banner and Signage
• Your company name and logo on a banner and signs prominently displayed at the conference.
Promotional Opportunities
• Providing one promotional item to be included in the delegates’ registration kit.
Marketing Profile
• Your company name and logo will appear prominently in the Conference Program and the Exhibitor Show Guide;
• Your company logo and level of sponsorship will be included on the conference website’s front page and sponsor page (www.cacpconference.ca);
• Sponsor recognition on name badges;
• Opening and Closing Plenary acknowledgement with logo;
• A complimentary 1/4 page black and white advertisement (premium location) in the Program (must be received by July 17, 2009);
• Daily on-site newsletter recognition.

Other Benefits
• Three (3) complimentary conference registrations for selected members of your staff;
• Reserved seating at the Gala Evening;
• Invitation to the VIP Reception, Sunday August 9, 2009;
• Two (2) complimentary booth personnel with the purchase of a booth;NEW!
• One-time access to the early bird Delegate List in advance of the conference.

See also: August 15, 2008 Globe and Mail Editorial - More than a perception

See also: August 12, 2008 - Taser International a major sponsor of the 2008 Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police Conference

See also: November 2, 2007 - Taser International a major sponsor of the 2007 Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police conference

Study urges police to be cautious with stun guns

May 27, 2011
Dave Collins, Associated Press

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — Police officers using stun guns should avoid shooting suspects multiple times or for prolonged periods to reduce the risk of potential injury or death, according to a new U.S. Justice Department study prompted by hundreds of police-involved deaths across the country.

Coroners and other medical experts on the study panel concluded that while the effects of prolonged and repeated stun gun use on the body are not fully understood, most deaths officially attributed to Tasers and similar devices are from multiple or lengthy discharges of the weapons.

The panel reviewed nearly 300 cases in which people died from 1999 to 2005 after police shot them with stun guns, but found that most of the deaths were caused by underlying health problems and other issues. Of those cases, the experts examined 22 in which the use of stun guns was listed as an official cause of death.

The study released Tuesday by the department's research arm, the National Institute of Justice, concludes that it's appropriate for officers to use stun guns to subdue unruly or uncooperative suspects, as long as police adhere to "accepted national guidelines and appropriate use-of-force policy." It also makes several recommendations, including medical screenings for all people shot with stun guns.

The experts also noted that evidence shows the risk of death from a stun gun related incident is less than 0.25 percent, and there's no conclusive evidence that stun guns cause permanent health problems.

"What this study suggests is, indeed, less-than-lethal technologies ... can be effectively used by law enforcement," said John Laub, director of the National Institute of Justice.

Justice Department officials said the study began more than six years ago after Amnesty International and other groups blamed many death of suspects in police custody on stun gun. Both Amnesty International and the United Nations Committee Against Torture have called the use of stuns guns a form of torture in some cases.

More than 12,000 law enforcement agencies nationwide had issued about 260,000 stun guns to officers as of spring of last year, the study said. Of the more than 600 arrest-related deaths in the U.S. each year, there are very few cases in which stun guns are cited the cause or contributory factor, the report said.

Officials at Taser International, the maker of the leading stun guns, said Thursday that there are no peer-reviewed medical studies that have found that prolonged or repeated use of Tasers cause death. In 2009, however, the company advised Taser users to try to avoid shooting people in the chest, because of a very low risk of a health problem.

Alvaro Garzon, a 46-year-old drug and alcohol addiction counselor from New Haven, said the study's cautions about firing stun guns multiple times make sense. Garzon has filed a brutality complaint with New Haven police saying a city officer shot him with a stun gun four times last year during a domestic disturbance call.

"After two times it should be enough," Garzon said in Spanish on Thursday while his daughter, Lina, interpreted for him. "You don't feel good after the second shot. I felt like I was burning inside."

Garzon, who was accepted into a probation program on a charge of assault on a police officer, said he was treated at a hospital for lung problems, and he continues to suffer from the trauma. The status of Garzon's police complaint wasn't immediately clear Thursday night.

Police across the country have faced heated criticism for stun gun deaths.

Connecticut state police are investigating the May 1 death of 26-year-old Marcus Brown, who authorities say was shot with a stun gun by Waterbury police while he was in the back of a police cruiser and handcuffed. Brown's family is calling for federal authorities to investigate; the official cause of death is still pending.

Waterbury police say Brown, who was about 5 feet 6 inches tall and 125 pounds, became combative. The officer who shot Brown, Adrian Sanchez, had been placed on administrative duty under normal procedures.

Earlier this month, Connecticut state police released an investigation report that showed how Middletown police last year shot 35-year-old Efrain Carrion 34 times with stun guns to subdue him while responding to a report that he was despondent and violent. Carrion died later that day.

The medical examiner concluded Carrion died of "excited delirium," a cause of death not recognized by many medical groups but one the Justice Department says is well documented. Several officers were cleared of wrongdoing in the incident.

Last year, a jury in Louisiana acquitted former Winnfield officer Scott Nugent, who was accused of shooting handcuffed suspect Baron Pikes eight times with a Taser gun and charged with manslaughter. Pikes later died.

In 2006, police in Green Cove Springs, Fla., shot a 56-year-old woman in a wheelchair 10 times with a stun gun and she died. Police say Emily Marie Delafield was swinging knives and a hammer at relative and police, and officers had tried to talk her into dropping the weapons before they were forced to subdue her. The officers' actions were found to be justified.

Lt. J. Paul Vance, a spokesman for Connecticut state police, said police officers never want to get into a situation where they're forced to fire Tasers or other weapons.

"Certainly you're looking for voluntary compliance from a suspect ... but unfortunately that's not always achievable," Vance said.