According to the lawyer, Doug Klint:
Use of the Taser on Heston didn’t cause his death, Klint said. Heston [the victim] fit “the well established symptom pattern for methamphetamine intoxication and associated excited delirium,” a condition linked to sudden death in custody, Klint said.
A couple of stories about Tasers, one good, one not so good.
In New York, Rand Corp has recommended that the NYPD outfit cops with Tasers. I’m sure the price of Taser Intl went through the roof after this reco.
That’s the not so good news.
The good news is that in Canada, a review of Taser use in the RCMP has been released and the recommendations call for massive restrictions on the use of Tasers. In fact, officers with less than 5 years experience should be prohibited from using Taser stun guns at all. Good call, Paul Kennedy!
In the ‘not often reported’ department, we have this story.
What’s interesting in this story is the connection with potential conflict of interest:
He also raised a possible conflict of interest, pointing out that two officers who do police training have a website for their private company, Defensive Tactics Inc. of Vancouver, which says the officers — Vancouver police Insp. John McKay and Sgt. Joel Johnston — are trainers certified by Taser International.
Johnston made an earlier presentation at the inquiry, where he said he had approval from the police chief to run a private company. He is in favour of Taser use in B.C. and is the province’s use-of-force coordinator for police services, a division of the Solicitor-General’s Ministry.
Murray Mollard, executive director of the B.C. Civil Liberties Association, said in an interview he has concerns about Johnston being a possible Taser instructor to other police forces through his private company. He said Johnston is also in charge of a review of Taser use in B.C. for the B.C. Association of Municipal Chiefs of Police.
In the US, Taser International has won a court order in Ohio that forces a medical examiner to change autopsy reports.
Dr. Matthew Stanbrook of the Canadian Medical Association (CMA) says the decision doesn’t take into account the difficulty of determining an exact cause of death in almost every case.
“If we were required to have at the level of scientific and medical certainty that something was the cause of death, before we were permitted to declare it, most of the people who died in North America would have died of unknown causes,” Stanbrook said.
“It is a physician making their best judgment given all the facts available.”
Stanbrook is deputy editor of the CMA Journal, which last week carried an editorial that expressed discontent with the current research into the effects of Taser use on suspects. The editorial said most of that work was done at the behest of Taser International and needed to be verified by independent researchers.
Quote:
The opinion piece released on Thursday argues that Taser use is a public health issue, and Canadian officials should not be relying on the manufacturer, Taser International, or its paid research to determine if stun guns are safe.
It also questions the assertion by Taser International that the weapon does not adversely affect the heart, and its explanation that people who die after being shocked by a Taser were killed by excited delirium rather than the effects of the stun gun.
“Taser International recently started a legal campaign against medical examiners who claimed tasers contributed to the cause of death for several people. On Friday, an Ohio judge ruled in favor of the stun gun manufacturer (free registration may be required). While they do have a number of scientific studies on which they establish their claims, it’s interesting that the alternate cause of death they champion — excited delirium — appears only in police reports on the deaths of difficult or drug-addled inmates, not in medical textbooks. Of course, that may change soon — Taser is funding and promoting research on the subject. Coroner reports such as the ones in this case contributed to the UN’s opinion that taser use is torture.”
“This situation is so alarming, so disturbing and so troubling,” Piper said. “I don’t think the police officer ever anticipated causing any significant injury to this young man. I know Oxford police are deeply troubled.”
Of course they are. And of course, a 6-figure study is being commissioned before hand. If you pay me $100,000, I’ll give you my answer (hint: it’s the reverse of ‘on’).