Gannett papers shocked by taser’s claims

December 5, 2008
By Shahien Nasiripour, Centre for Investigative Reporting

Taser International Inc., the world’s largest stun-gun manufacturer, allegedly made false statements to the Securities and Exchange Commission concerning an agreement with two of the nation’s largest newspapers, according to the newspapers’ representatives and documents obtained by the Center for Investigative Reporting.

The statements stem from the 2006 settlement of Taser’s libel suit against Gannett Co., Inc, the parent corporation of the two newspapers—USA Today and the Arizona Republic. Taser claimed in two SEC filings that the newspapers “would review articles regarding the Taser device with us prior to publication”—an extraordinary breach of journalistic standards. Taser’s general counsel initially stated the claim to Wall Street analysts in an earnings conference call, adding that it was “in order to ensure accuracy.”

The newspapers, which were unaware of Taser's claim until their lawyer was contacted recently by CIR, deny ever making such an agreement, and have demanded that Taser formally correct the record. Initially, Taser was reluctant to amend its statements and the newspapers were considering further action, according to interviews with parties on both sides. Representatives of Taser and Gannett are currently in discussions to settle the dispute. The SEC declined to comment on the allegations.

The Scottsdale, Ariz.-based stun-gun maker and its hometown paper have had a contentious history, resulting from the Republic’s detailed reporting, from 2004-2006, about the company and the safety concerns of its flagship product, which is used by more than 13,000 law enforcement, correctional, and military agencies around the world.

Its sister Gannett paper, USA Today, has also angered Taser, particularly after publishing a June 2005 story and graphic that significantly overstated the electrical output of Taser’s X26-model stun gun. Taser contacted the newspaper and the story was corrected the next day of publication.

But a few weeks later Taser sued, claiming that the Republic and USA Today “engaged in the ongoing publication of misleading articles related to the safety of Taser products, resulting in substantial economic damages to us, our customers and our shareholders.” Taser claimed the newspapers’ stories cost company shareholders more than one billion dollars in lost value.

Maricopa County (Ariz.) Superior Court Judge Paul J. McMurdie rejected Taser’s claims in granting Gannett’s motion for summary judgment. In his Jan. 25, 2006 ruling, he awarded McLean, Va.-based Gannett attorneys’ fees after finding one of the claims “clearly unjustified.” About three weeks later, the two sides asked the court to formally dismiss Taser’s claims—and with it Taser’s right to an appeal—while Gannett withdrew its claim to attorneys’ fees, court records show.

“It was a total victory,” said David Bodney, Gannett’s attorney in the case. But that’s not how Taser reported it to the SEC, or to Wall Street analysts who covered the company.

In a Feb. 22, 2006 conference call with financial analysts, Douglas Klint, Taser’s general counsel and executive vice president, said: “Our lawsuit against Gannett Company Incorporated was dismissed with the understanding that, in the future, the USA Today and the Arizona Republic newspapers would review their Taser stories with the company prior to publishing in order to ensure accuracy,” according to a transcript of the call.

The next month, in its Form 10-K filing, Taser wrote: “the parties entered into a stipulation for dismissal with the understanding that the USA Today and the Arizona Republic would review articles regarding the Taser device with us prior to publication.” That statement was repeated in the company’s May 18, 2006 quarterly report to the SEC.

Only one Wall Street analyst who was a participant in the February conference call, Matthew McKay, formerly of Jefferies & Co., responded to an interview request. McKay said the statement in question influenced his coverage. He concluded that the settlement terms appeared to benefit Taser and represented “a big-time opportunity” for investors.

Current San Francisco Chronicle editor Ward Bushee, the Republic’s editor at the time of the settlement, and Randy Lovely, the Republic’s current editor, said they were unaware of Taser’s statements until asked about them recently by CIR, and denied that any such agreement ever existed.

“Taser's assertion in the SEC filing is completely false,” Lovely said. “The Arizona Republic would never allow a source to review a story prior to publication. To do so would completely violate our journalist principles and standards of independence. The Republic has aggressively reported on Taser during the past few years, and we stand behind the full scope and accuracy of our stories.”

Taser counsel Klint initially defended the statements in an interview with CIR, pointing to a letter about the settlement from Bodney which states that the newspapers and Taser agreed to “endeavor to communicate and interact with one another in a professional manner…In turn, Taser will make its executives or public relations personnel available for comment.”

Klint said the word “comment” implies that the company would review stories prior to publication. “How in the world can we comment on a story without them reviewing the story with us?” he reasons. “We can’t comment on something we can’t review.”

“That’s preposterous,” countered Bodney:

His interpretation of that statement is inaccurate. There’s a vast difference between a reporter calling the subject of an allegation for comment … and giving the subject of the allegation a right to review the story prior to publication. Unfortunately, Taser’s statement to the SEC gives the impression that USA Today and the Arizona Republic gave Taser the right to review stories about them prior to publication. It’s inaccurate and misleading…. What [Taser] promised to investors and the SEC—that’s the last thing we would have promised them, especially since we settled the lawsuit with the expectation that we’d hear nothing further from them about it.

Bodney said he pushed for a quick dismissal of the case in part to stop Taser’s attempt to get access to “all documents referring or relating to Taser” used by Republic reporters during the newspaper’s investigation of the company.

Klint said Taser has not been pre-reviewing the newspapers’ articles prior to publication. But he defended Taser’s interpretation of the settlement, saying the company accurately paraphrased the language spelling out the settlement terms:

[For the newspapers] to characterize it as a total fabrication is really a misstatement… We probably should have said we were going to have the opportunity to review [the stories] and provide comment … Could we have gone into more detail? Absolutely. Did we have to? No, we didn’t.

Taser had been the subject of numerous articles published from 2004 to 2006 in newspapers around the country that questioned the company's safety claims about its stun guns and the independence and thoroughness of its medical and scientific testing. Taser claimed its weapons were nonlethal, but newspapers—particularly the Republic—were reporting that medical examiners were increasingly linking police in-custody deaths with shocks from Taser stun guns. Taser denounced the news media coverage.

In July 2004 the Republic published an article that reported medical examiners had linked Tasers with at least five deaths. In March 2005 the newspaper reported that a forensic engineer was warning police departments that Tasers could kill, and that several law enforcement agencies had halted Taser deployments, citing safety concerns.

Taser denounced the news media coverage.

In a September 2005 news release challenging an impending Republic report that Taser gave stock options to police officers who then promoted Taser stun guns, Taser CEO Rick Smith referred to a "history of biased and misleading reporting" by the newspaper. He said, "I am personally incensed that the Arizona Republic plans to target Taser International with yet another biased report, alleging misconduct where none exists."

In announcing the lawsuit against the newspapers, Taser CEO Rick Smith said in a news release: "Over the course of this biased campaign, more than one billion dollars of shareholder value has been erased. Further, we have reason to believe that some law enforcement agencies delayed deploying Taser devices based on this false and misleading information. These delays or cancelled deployments may have resulted in officers resorting to other, potentially more dangerous force options, thereby causing unnecessary injuries or even loss of life due to these irresponsible reports."

Indeed, Taser's stock price nosedived during the period of the Republic's most critical reports. From July 16, 2004—the Friday before the paper's first critical investigative feature—to July 1, 2005—the day the lawsuit was announced—Taser's stock price dropped 50 percent. By comparison, the Standard & Poor's 500-stock index was up more than seven percent during the same period, and the Nasdaq—the market Taser shares trade on—was up nearly six percent.

Taser’s statements to the SEC have been called into question in the past. In January 2005, the SEC began an informal inquiry into Taser’s safety claims; that same week, the Arizona Attorney General’s office said it, too, was looking into those claims. The SEC inquiry expanded into an official investigation, but no action was taken. The attorney general’s inquiry ended after Taser agreed to modify its marketing language.

In January 2005, Taser shareholders, citing numerous news reports from around the country, launched a class-action suit against the company, alleging they had been misled about the safety of Taser’s products. The suit eventually was settled for nearly $22 million, of which Taser’s portion was about $18 million, with the company’s insurance carrier covering the rest.

In August 2007, Bloomberg News reported that the company had settled at least ten product-liability lawsuits alleging personal injury—lawsuits that Taser had claimed, in news releases and in its SEC filings, to have won through a court dismissal or judgment in its favor. The company now acknowledges these settlements clearly in its filings.

False statements to the SEC about material facts which are likely to influence investors could result in sanctions, civil lawsuits by shareholders who suffered losses due to the alleged misrepresentation, or criminal action if regulators determine that the misstatements were intended to mislead investors, according to Jesse M. Fried, a law professor at the University of California, Berkeley, and co-director of the Berkeley Center for Law, Business and the Economy.

“When you’re dealing with SEC issues, the standard is material misstatement,” Klint notes. “There’s absolutely no way this is a material misstatement.”

Fried says it’s unlikely any formal action by regulators would result in this instance. He said a reasonable investor wouldn’t base his decision to buy or sell Taser stock on the company’s right to review newspaper articles prior to publication, and, in any case, reviewing articles doesn’t necessarily guarantee the right to veto publication.

But former Jeffries & Co. analyst McKay, whose coverage of Taser from 2005 until earlier this year helped investors decide whether to buy or sell Taser International stock, said news of the purported settlement presented an “opportunity” for investors.

McKay, who participated in the 2006 conference call with Klint, acknowledged that the critical news media coverage of Taser and its products had hurt company sales and its stock price, and that with news of the settlement, the critical coverage “…was an issue that was going to come off the table. One less negative thing you'd have to deal with regarding the company.”

“I thought, all right, you’ve got some bad news out there that has impacted the share price in a negative way,” McKay said in a recent interview. “As a stock analyst, here was an opportunity to jump in and make my clients money. [USA Today and the Republic] didn’t have the facts right, and as a result the valuation of the company was off,” he said. “To me, it was a big-time opportunity.”

McKay, who believed “there was good being done by Taser” in saving lives, said Taser felt “that USA Today and the Arizona Republic just wanted to write negative stories about Taser, that they wanted to make it as sensational as they possibly could. It’s why they were so defensive with the media,” he said.

Bob Steele, a journalism values scholar at the Poynter Institute and journalism ethics professor at DePauw University, explained why pre-publication review of stories could violate the trust readers have that coverage is credible:

If a news organization were to have such a formal legal agreement with a company it’s covering, then that news organization’s past, present and future coverage of that company would be suspect. The readers would have every right to wonder if the newspaper had pulled punches when it came to reporting truthful, meaningful information. There would be questions of whether the newspaper bowed to the wishes or pressures of the subject of the story to back off a certain element or change the tone. One could easily wonder if the story could be tainted.

McKay applied the concept to his work as an analyst covering Taser, noting, “For me, I knew there was no way in hell they'd review anything I wrote prior to it being published. I really don’t want [USA Today and the Republic] reviewing articles with the company because the news gets tainted. It becomes biased. I don’t want that either. I just want the media reviewing with Taser how the device works and making sure they get those facts correct.”

A version of this story initially ran at cjr.org, the Web site of the Columbia Journalism Review. Shahien Nasiripour is a reporting fellow at the Center for Investigative Reporting.

ACLU - "Non lethal" force can kill

August 18, 2006
ACLU - Guest commentary for the Denver Post

With at least 211 deaths linked to this supposedly nonlethal weapon, however, the taser proponents must bear the burden of proof in any battle of experts. It is a burden they have not met. There are no reputable independent studies that confirm the manufacturer's assurances of safety, especially in the real-world conditions in which tasers are actually used and in which suspects actually die.

S.E.C. decides not to act against taser on safety statements

December 14, 2005
By ALEX BERENSON, New York Times

The Securities and Exchange Commission has decided not to take action against Taser International in connection with statements about the safety of its electric stun pistols, the company said yesterday.

Taser's shares jumped 15 percent on the news, though they remain far below the highs they set a year ago. They closed at $7.04, up 92 cents. They closed at $32.59 on Dec. 30 last year.

The company's pistols, called Tasers, which are widely used by police to subdue suspects, have been associated with more than 140 deaths. The weapons fire electrified barbs up to 25 feet, delivering a painful 50,000-volt shock.

Taser's sales and profits soared in 2004, but the company's profits have plunged this year as controversy over the safety of its weapons has grown. In November, an influential police research group recommended new restrictions on the use of the weapons, suggesting that officers be allowed to use them only on people who are actively resisting arrest.

Last month, Taser said it would have to restate its profits for the first half of 2005 because it had failed to properly record its legal and professional expenses during that period. The company also failed to file its third-quarter financial statements within the Nasdaq's deadline for filing, leading the Nasdaq to warn that Taser stock would be delisted. Taser has appealed the delisting requirement.

In January, Taser announced that the S.E.C. had begun an investigation into the company's statements about the safety of its stun guns and a sales order that it announced in late December 2004. Taser said in a statement yesterday that S.E.C. enforcement officials had told the company that they had completed the investigation and had decided against taking action against the company.

Taser also said that the S.E.C. was ''continuing to investigate issues relating to trading in the company's stock.''

As a matter of policy, the S.E.C. does not comment on its investigations.

Taser changes marketing language

October 1, 2005
Beth DeFalco, Associated Press

Taser International Inc. has voluntarily changed some of its broad safety claims and limited its use of the word "non-lethal" in an effort to appease Arizona officials concerned about possibly misleading marketing, officials said Wednesday.

The move by the nation's largest maker of stun guns comes as the Securities and Exchange Commission investigates the company and as the Arizona Attorney General's Office conducts its own inquiry into safety claims.

On Tuesday, Taser said the SEC had stepped up an informal inquiry and was conducting an expanded official investigation of claims Taser has made about safety studies; an end-of-year sale analysts have questioned because it appeared to inflate sales to meet annual projections; and the possibility that outsiders acquired internal company information to manipulate the stock price.

In January, Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard said his office was probing claims Taser has made about safety studies on its products.

Taser President Tom Smith said company officials met with the Attorney General's Office several times since January and have made changes to the way they characterize the weapon's safety to consumers.

According to Taser and the Attorney General's Office, the stun gun maker submitted a list of language changes the company has already made, including an 18-point "product warning."

Among the changes, Taser explains that it uses the term non-lethal as defined by the Department of Defense - which doesn't mean the weapon can't cause death, but that it's not intended to be fatal.

Other changes include substituting the phrase "leave no lasting after effects" to "are more effective and safer than other use-of-force options."

Taser began marketing police stun guns in 1998 as a way to subdue combative people in high-risk situations. Now, more than 8,000 law enforcement agencies and military installations use them worldwide.

But critics say the stun guns have been used too liberally by police and have contributed to scores of deaths. Amnesty International has compiled a list of more than 100 people the group says have died after being shocked in scuffles with lawmen.

Taser maintains that no deaths have been directly caused by the weapon alone.

Company shares fell 47 cents, or 7.4 percent, to close at $5.88 Wednesday on the Nasdaq Stock Market, a new 52-week low.

Taser set to change marketing, state says

Robert Anglen
The Arizona Republic
Sept. 28, 2005 12:00 AM

On the same day Taser International confirmed federal regulators are investigating the company, Arizona's attorney general said the stun gun manufacturer has agreed to change the way it markets its gun.

Attorney General Terry Goddard's office said Tuesday that Taser has offered to increase product warnings, change some of its broad claims of safety and limit the use of the word "non-lethal."

"Our primary concern has been Taser's safety claims that we felt may have understated the risks of serious harm," Goddard said in a statement to The Arizona Republic. "We are encouraged that the company has agreed to make many changes that reduce or qualify these claims. We are now reviewing these proposed changes."

Scottsdale-based Taser has armed nearly a fifth of America's law enforcement agencies with the electric stun guns. Company officials contacted Tuesday said they did not wish to comment on the marketing changes or on any meetings with Goddard's office.

His office has been looking into Taser's safety claims since January, when the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission said it was launching an informal inquiry into Taser's safety claims and into a sale last year that bolstered company earnings at the end of the quarter.

On Tuesday, Taser disclosed that the SEC had turned its informal inquiry into an investigation that will give federal regulators subpoena powers.

Taser has known about the investigation for a least a week. It disclosed the probe in a news release after being questioned Monday by The Republic. Taser's disclosure had an immediate impact on Taser stocks, sending the price of shares to their lowest level since November 2003.

Taser Chief Executive Officer Rick Smith said Tuesday that the company will cooperate with federal regulators.

"We recognize that this has been a difficult process for our employees and shareholders," Smith said in a prepared statement. "We continue to make all efforts to assist the SEC in completing their investigation as expeditiously as possible."

Smith also said the SEC is expanding its investigation, examining the possibility that internal documents have been leaked to unspecified parties in an attempt to manipulate Taser's stock price.

"We are hopeful that the expanded SEC investigation will address all pertinent issues," Smith said.

For months, Taser officials have maintained that they did nothing wrong. In January, Smith predicted the federal inquiry would come out in the company's favor.

The SEC's action is the latest challenge for the company, which has seen sales of its popular stun gun slow this year after a number of deaths that left police agencies across the country rethinking Taser purchases and, in some cases, taking the gun off the street.

Goddard's office said Taser's proposed marketing changes include an 18-point "product warning" that stresses the Taser should be used only by trained individuals and acknowledges the gun's potential danger.

In a memo to Goddard's office, Taser agreed to change the ways it promotes its gun in both training materials and on its Web site. Among those changes:

• Minimizing the use of the term "non-lethal" to describe the weapon. As part of its proposal, Taser also has agreed to include a disclaimer that the company is taking the term "non-lethal" from the Department of Defense and does not mean the weapon can't be fatal.

• Acknowledging much more prominently that the stun gun can be dangerous.

• Changing the way it uses the term "safe." A description that describes the stun gun as a "safer, effective device" will be changed to "safer use-of-force alternative."

• Limiting medical claims. Materials that say "medical experts confirm Taser is safe" will be changed to "medical experts confirming the lifesaving value of Taser technology."

• Changing descriptions that suggest Taser is harmless. Materials that say Tasers "leave no lasting after-affects" will be changed to "are more effective and safer than other use-of-force options."

One of Taser's chief critics, Amnesty International, said the changes suggest more scrutiny is being given to the firm.

"Amnesty has long held that there have been a number of very serious questions about the safety of this product that remain unanswered," Amnesty spokesman Edward Jackson said. "Now, it seems like the tide is turning and more and more credible bodies are weighing in on the issue."

Jackson said he is concerned that changes to Taser's marketing should have been made long before the weapon was put into the hands of police officers.

A Taser, which resembles a plastic gun, uses electricity to override the nervous system and incapacitate a suspect.

It normally works by firing two darts from distances of up to 21 feet.

Although the company has repeatedly said its stun guns have never caused a death or serious injury, The Republic has linked them to 18 deaths and to the injuries of several police officers. The officers say the injuries occurred when they were shocked during mandatory training exercises.

Since 1999, there have been at least 144 deaths following police Taser strikes in the United States and Canada.

Of those, medical examiners cited Tasers as a cause of death in four cases and a contributing factor in 10 others. In four other cases, medical examiners said Taser could not be ruled out as a cause of death.

Taser has gone from a family business to the nation's largest supplier of stun guns. It has armed nearly 8,000 U.S. police agencies with Tasers and has made millions for investors.

But news of the initial SEC inquiry caused stock prices to drop in January and resulted in a flurry of shareholder lawsuits.

Last year, Taser stock rose 361 percent and split three times, peaking in November at more than $30 a share.

On Tuesday, stock prices fell to $6.35.

When the SEC inquiry was first announced, Taser President Tom Smith said regulators questioned the release of a statement in 2004 touting an independent Defense Department study that purportedly found Tasers were safe.

Taser's statement seemed to increase stock prices just before executives and directors sold $68 million in shares in November.

When the full Defense Department study was released this year, it was revealed that Taser was involved in nearly every aspect of the study, raising questions about its independence. In addition, government researchers involved in the study said they never looked at safety.

Smith said the SEC was also looking into the sale of 1,000 consumer model stun guns to a Prescott firearms company. Taser announced the sale on Dec. 20, just 11 days before the end of Taser's quarter. The sale appeared to help the company meet its projected earnings.

Special Report: stun gun fallacy - how the lack of taser regulation endangers lives

September 2005
ACLU of Northern California

Police officers from five states sue Taser International for serious injuries suffered during stun gun training classes

August 25, 2005
infowars.com

While the Canadian Police Research Institute has now stated that Tasers and other “conducted energy devices” are acceptable because the advantages they provide outweigh the risks they pose.

In reaching this conclusion in its report to Canadian police chiefs, the Institute was apparently not overly troubled by the enormous number of deaths that have occurred in cases where a Taser has been used. The specific finding by the Coroner of Cook County, Illinois, that a Taser was, in fact, the cause of death of a man arrested in Chicago also appears to have been ignored in the report as the type of definitive evidence it was seeking to support the claim that the devices can cause death.

This report comes at the same time that police officers in five states have filed lawsuits against Taser International claiming they suffered serious injuries after being shocked with the device during training classes.

One officer, a Missouri police chief, alleges that he suffered heart damage and two strokes after he volunteered to be shocked with a Taser in April 2004, while hooked up to a cardiac monitor that was supposed to show the Taser was safe. The officer also claims he suffered hearing and vision loss as well as neurological damage.

Other injuries claimed by the officers involved include spinal fractures, burns, a dislocated shoulder, and soft-tissue damage. A previous lawsuit file in February 2004 alleged a sheriff's deputy suffered a fractured back in 2002.

The lawsuits challenge Taser International's central marketing claim that its device is safe and charge the manufacturer of misleading its customers concerning the potential risks posed by the stun guns. Taser is also accused of minimizing and misrepresenting the 2002 fractured back case even after its own doctor found a one-second shock from a Taser caused the injury.

The lawsuits also allege Taser International withheld reports of injuries to at least 12 other police officers and that the company has ignored credible research suggesting the device can be extremely dangerous, if not fatal.

As with all previous allegations against it, Taser International has stated that it intends to vigorously defend the claims. The company has denied any of the 144 deaths which have occurred following the use of a Taser was caused by its product.

Clearly, both sides cannot be right in this matter. As we reported on August 7, Taser International has now issued a training bulletin warning that repeated blasts of the Taser can "impair breathing and respiration."

According to a posting on Taser's website, for subjects in a state known as excited delirium, repeated or prolonged stuns with the Taser can contribute to "significant and potentially fatal health risks."

The three-page bulletin appears to counter instructions in a training manual Taser International issued only last year. It also departs from Taser's previous dismissals of safety concerns raised by groups such as Amnesty International, which has documented 129 U.S. and Canadian deaths of people stunned by Tasers.

The Houston Police Department (HPD), Taser's biggest U.S. customer, has formed a review committee of police officials and community leaders, including representatives from the NAACP and League of United Latin American Citizens, to study the use of Tasers in the city of Houston.

The committee started by reviewing the HPD use-of-force policy, training sessions that officers receive, and the first 200 incidents in which Tasers were used in Houston.

Houston will also be involved in a study of Taser use conducted by a national police-research organization according to a report in the Houston Chronicle.

Obviously, a non-lethal weapon becomes a problem when it starts killing people. Many experts and critics of the Taser stun gun believe that time has long since passed.

For example, using a number of sources, The Arizona Republic has now compiled a list of 144 cases in the United States and Canada since 1999 where a death followed the use of a Taser stun gun. http://www.azcentral.com/specials/taser/#

The sources used included autopsy reports, computer searches, police reports, media accounts, and Taser International's own records. To date, the research indicates that medical examiners have cited the Taser to some extent in 18 deaths. In four cases it was a cause of death, in 10 it was a contributing factor, and in four it could not be ruled out as a cause of death.

This, however, seems to be just the “tip of the iceberg” when it comes to Taser International's mounting problems with respect to its approximately 100,000 stun guns now being used by some 7,000 U.S. law-enforcement agencies.

Despite the company's spirited defense of its product, Taser International's stock has continued to fall from $33.45 in December 2004 to $9.72 on July 30, a decline of over 70%.

From the very beginning, many experts questioned the safety of the 50,000 volt “non-lethal” weapon. A lack of adequate testing and independent medical evidence supporting the company's bold marketing claims have been cited by such diverse critics as Amnesty International, the American Civil Liberties Union, and a consulting electrical engineer as reasons for removing the stun guns from the market until more extensive testing is done especially with respect to how the device affects pregnant women, people on drugs, or those with heart conditions.

Even the International Association of Chiefs of Police have suggested that further testing is needed. The organization advocates using the device only to subdue violent suspects; not to use it on handcuffed persons unless they are “overly assaultive;” to use it the least number of times; and to seek medical attention for anyone who has been shocked.

In addition, all types of Taser-related lawsuits abound. Personal injury and death claims have been commenced in a number of states. In March of this year, Mesa, Arizona, settled a claim by a 43-year-old man who fell out of a tree after being shocked twice with a Taser by a city police officer. The City paid $2.2 million to the man who became a quadriplegic and another $200,000 to the hospital where he was treated.

A class-action lawsuit was commenced only last week in U.S. District Court in Chicago by the city of Dolton, Illinois, on behalf of police departments across the country for being misled about the safety of the Taser and for leaving the police with weapons that are too dangerous to use on the street.

The law firm representing the city of Dolton claims to have already been retained by other police departments in four states. Paul Geller, an attorney from that firm, states that the law suit would be dropped if Taser would agree to take back the stun guns.

The potential for huge personal injury and death claims have left many municipalities rethinking their purchase of Tasers. Some police forces like those in Birmingham and Lucas County ( Ohio) have either stopped issuing the weapons or have pulled them of the street altogether. Other cities like Chicago have backed off making additional purchases.

The mayor of Birmingham ordered police to stop using Tasers after the death of an inmate who had been shocked with a Taser several hours before he died.

The mayor of Dolton, which suspended their use, calls his city's purchase of Tasers “a mistake” because “they need far more testing.” He went on to say that losing the money his city paid for the Tasers was far less than the financial risk posed by even one wrongful-death lawsuit.

On January 6, 2005 Taser officials disclosed that federal authorities had launched an inquiry into claims made by the company with respect to its safety studies. The Securities and Exchange Commission was also probing an end-of-year sale which appeared to inflate sales in order to meet annual projections.

In May, The Arizona Republic also reported that “Taser International was deeply involved in a Department of Defense study that company officials touted to police departments and investors as ‘independent' proof of the stun gun's safety...This information is surfacing at a time when the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the Arizona attorney general are pursuing inquiries into safety claims that the Scottsdale firm has made.”

On July 17, the Associated Press reported a Texas man died after being shocked between three and six times with a Taser by an off-duty police officer who was acting as a security guard. The man's wife said she was suing Taser International because her husband “didn't deserve the death penalty.” It appears the men had done little more than trespass on private property and confront the officer who had chased him.

The report went on to state: “In the past nine months, at least six people in Texas – including three in Fort Worth – have died after authorities shocked them with a Taser gun.”

On July 27, a prisoner being held in a Queens, New York, police station died after being shocked with a Taser.

Finally, on July 30, several news sources reported that (for the first time) the Cook County ( Chicago, Illinois) Medical Examiner had ruled the February 10 death of an agitated 54-year-old man was caused by being shocked excessively with a Taser.

The finding indicated that the 57-second shock was sufficient, in and of itself, to have killed the man. Why such a long shock (ten times the usual amount) was administered has not been explained.

Although the Chicago police force will continue to use the Tasers they already have, an order for additional units was suspended.

Taser has vigorously defended its stun guns in every situation where it has been linked to an injury or death. The company continues to maintain that Tasers are non-lethal and that all of the reports regarding deaths and injuries associated with the device are baseless and can be explained away on the basis of other causes.

A recent training bulletin issued by Taser, however, advised police that “repeated, prolonged, and/or continuous exposures to the Taser may cause strong muscle contractions that may impair breathing and respiration, particularly when the probes are placed across the chest or diaphragm.”

Given all of this information, it is difficult to image how the Canadian Police Research Institute reached its conclusion that the benefits of the Taser and similar devices outweigh the risks they pose to anyone who is shocked with any of them. It now appears that the courts will be the forum in which the final verdict on the Taser will be rendered.

Taser tied to 'independent' study that backs stun gun

May 21, 2005
Robert Anglen, The Arizona Republic

Taser International was deeply involved in a Department of Defense study that company officials touted to police departments and investors as "independent" proof of the stun gun's safety, according to government documents and e-mails obtained by The Arizona Republic and interviews with military officials.

This information is surfacing at a time when the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the Arizona attorney general are pursuing inquiries into safety claims that the Scottsdale firm has made.

The stun guns are being used by more than 7,000 law enforcement agencies in the United States, but a series of deaths and injuries associated with the devices have raised safety concerns.

E-mails that military officials exchanged also reveal for the first time that they asked Taser to tone down public statements about the study. In addition, they urged the company to commission an independent study rather than rely on the Defense study.

The Air Force conducted the study for the Defense Department to assess the risks and effectiveness of Tasers so the military could decide whether to buy them.

Since October, Taser officials have contended that the company had no involvement in the Defense study, which helped fuel a sharp rise in the company's stock price last year.

Bulk of research

But information obtained by The Republic shows that Taser officials not only participated in three panels to determine the scope of the study, analyze data and review findings, it also provided the bulk of research material used in the study.

"Were they (Taser) totally disconnected (from the study)? The answer is no. They were not disconnected," said Larry Farlow, a spokesman for the Air Force Research Laboratory in Texas that oversaw the study.

Taser critics - civil rights lawyers, human rights activists and government officials - contend that there is insufficient evidence to support the company's assertions that the stun gun is safe. They have called for independent research.

Taser has repeatedly characterized research that its own employees or consultants helped conduct or write as independent. The company has also paid training fees and given valuable stock options to police officers involved in decisions to purchase the stun guns.

In an interview earlier this month, Steve Tuttle, Taser's vice president of communications, maintained the company's position that the Defense Department study was independent. He acknowledged that Taser employees had some involvement in the study but insisted that that did not influence the findings.

Taser officials have described the Defense research as "a major independent safety study." But Air Force researchers said the study was not meant to be a comprehensive review of stun-gun science or safety, and they made no findings on the device's safety.

Touting findings early on

Taser trumpeted results of the study long before the actual report came out on April 1. In an October news release, Taser Chief Executive Officer Rick Smith said, "This comprehensive independent study further supports the safety of Taser" and "reaffirms the lifesaving value of Taser technology."

That announcement had an immediate impact on Taser stock: It shot up 60 percent during the next month. Taser executives and board members sold 1.28 million shares for $68 million in November.

Since then, the stock has dropped dramatically as a series of deaths caused cities nationwide to reconsider purchases of Tasers and to delay deployments.

An ongoing investigation by The Republic has found that medical examiners have cited Tasers in 15 deaths across the country. They called it a cause of death in three cases, a contributing factor in nine cases and said the stun gun couldn't be ruled out as a cause of death in three cases.

Taser maintains that its stun guns have never caused a death.

Taser involvement

When the Defense Department first released its study, it made no mention of who was involved in the study.

Another version obtained by The Republic shows that Taser's CEO, director of technical services, general counsel, medical director, chief instructor, electrical engineer and vice president of communications were involved in various panels over five months.

The report also shows that companies doing business with Taser, including General Dynamics, were heavily involved in the study and, along with Taser executives, sat on a final "Independent External Review Panel" to examine all the findings.

Farlow, the spokesman for the Air Force Research Laboratory, said his office, not Taser, made the decision to strike the names from the final report in order to protect the privacy of researchers and scientists.

A separate panel of medical and scientific experts that did not include Taser employees wrote the final report.

Tuttle, the Taser spokesman, said the company's involvement does not minimize the report's significance or its independence.

"This was all pre-planning stuff," he said. "We didn't do the study itself." He added that government rules require manufacturers to be involved in such reviews of their products. "If you are going to do a study of Milk Duds . . . you are going to have to talk to the (makers) of Milk Duds."

But, according to the Air Force, Taser provided most of the data used in the study, which was supposed to look at the "effectiveness" of Tasers in order to provide guidance for officials in charge of purchasing non-lethal weapons.

Information gaps

Although researchers determined the stun guns were "generally effective for their intended use," researchers found significant "data gaps" in the information Taser provided, Farlow said.

Chief among those gaps: enough information to determine whether Tasers can cause seizures or induce ventricular fibrillation, the sudden irregular heartbeat characterized by a heart attack.

In addition, Taser apparently did not provide some information about injuries involving the stun gun. For example, researchers said in the study that "no reports were identified that describe bone fractures resulting from the rapid induction of strong muscle contraction" caused by the stun gun.

At the time that Taser officials were sitting on the panel, they had already been served legal notice that a Maricopa County sheriff's deputy was going to sue the company over a fractured back that he reportedly suffered when shocked with a Taser during a training exercise.

Former Deputy Samuel Powers was the first to file a product liability lawsuit against Taser; his case is scheduled to go to trial in June. A doctor hired by Taser last year concluded that a one-second burst from a Taser was responsible for Powers' injury.

Since then, several police officers from departments across the country have come forward with allegations of bone fractures that they blame on Taser shocks.

The study concluded that Tasers may cause several unintended side effects, "albeit with estimated low probabilities of occurrence." It also said the need to "rely on a database of case reports compiled by manufacturers also generates uncertainty in the results."

Farlow pointed out that the Defense study made no conclusions about the stun gun's safety.

When asked about Taser's characterization of the research as a "major, independent safety study," Farlow said: "The simple answer is consider the source. . . . The press and public relations folks are doing their jobs."

E-mail correspondence

Despite the fact that the Air Force lab's study made no findings on safety, the government officials who commissioned the study allowed Taser to issue a news release saying that the Defense Department considered "Tasers generally safe and effective."

E-mails show that although these officials were concerned about Taser's characterization of the study, their desire to support Taser prevailed.

"I've expressed my personal view to (Taser) that the company might want to take a different approach to their (public affairs) efforts" and "i.e., tone it down," wrote Capt. Daniel McSweeney, spokesman for the Joint Non-Lethal Weapons Directorate, a Pentagon office that recommended purchasing Tasers for the armed services.

"My opinion is that they probably want to commission an independent (human effects) study, in which a variety of stakeholders participate," McSweeney said in a January e-mail from his office in Quantico, Va. "To settle this issue once and for all."

Dave DuBay, a Taser vice president, confirmed that McSweeney asked the company to temper its statements. He said McSweeney felt Taser is sometimes "too passionate in defense" of its stun guns. DuBay also confirmed that McSweeney asked Taser to commission its own independent study.

But DuBay said the government's study was independent and questioned whether the public would perceive a Taser-sponsored study to be independent.

Despite McSweeney's concerns, he still recommended backing Taser.

McSweeney's rationale

"My rationale is that Taser is, in effect, some kind of partner to us, since we purchase and field their systems," he wrote in the same e-mail. "Not supporting them can hurt us in the public's eye."

At issue in the e-mails were requests from Taser asking the government to put out a news release declaring the stun guns safe.

The e-mails were written after reports in the New York Times and other media raised questions over Taser's claims about the Defense study and if researchers actually found the stun guns safe.

In an interview this week, McSweeney confirmed that he told Taser officials they should "tone it down" and conduct their own independent study.

"I was referencing not just to the (study) but other things I have been privy to," he said, adding that Taser has been at the center of several controversial issues. "Given the ongoing questions regarding the health effects of Taser, it would behoove Taser to do an independent study."

McSweeney acknowledged that the Defense study was not comprehensive but called it an "excellent first step" and said that more studies are under way. He said that non-lethal weapons are needed in military zones and that the study served "an urgent need" by providing a foundation for the Defense Department.

SEC begins 'informal' investigation of Taser

January 7, 2005
The Business Journal of Phoenix

"The company said it is now putting information together for federal regulators regarding company statements about the safety of its products, and a $1.5 million order received from Davidson's Inc., a Prescott firearms dealer, to determine if it was made in late 2004 in order to meet fourth quarter revenue guidance. Taser says it is cooperating fully with the SEC and is confident the issue will end up in their favor. "We are confident our statements are supported by the safety studies of our products," said Rick Smith, Taser's chief executive.