Taser Troubles

 I have watched countless videos of officers ‘Tasing’ a subject.  Some good and some bad in reference to the objectively reasonableness standard set forth by our U.S. Supreme Court in Graham v. Connor {1989}.  But I have some thoughts, so bear with me for a minute.

Using a Taser is a high-level use of force.  An officer is injecting a piece of metal into a human body, (without their consent). And it just so happens that this piece of metal is now  considered ‘police equipment’ due to it being administered by an officer.

Recently, I am seeing more and more tasers being deployed on a low-level resister or a low-level resistance to an arrest.  There is rarely an attempt to go hands on or even attempt to use a lower level of force (NOT in a force continuum sense but in a reasonable sense).  Further it seems that any ‘use of force factors’ are not being considered at all!

Why is this?  My thoughts are officers not receiving adequate training (repetitions AND scenarios) with ‘open hand’ skills.  Officers are not receiving updated and continuous training in ‘use of force’, case laws and are not being held to academic standards after their academy. Officers seemingly having issues in recognizing that low-level resistance (higher than passive, lower than active resistance) is more on a scale than a pin-point.

Is it just for these reasons that officers have become ‘taser dependent’?  Or is it something else?  Has the Taser company AXON started something?  I believe it has. 

I’ve been a Taser instructor for a long time now.  I have taught Taser at various Colorado POST academies and countless in-service training courses.  It took a long time to get to this level and in this process, I have seen AXON and heard AXON demonstrate and talk about reducing police shootings, officer and public safety, public trust, reduced use of force via their idea of de-escalation and so on.  The sales pitch is awesome.

Now, who do you think bites on this right away?  Command staff.  Look how much better our department will be with all this AXON stuff.  Then department policies are drafted and signed into act.

So, you may be asking, ‘What’s the problem, Matt?  Well, here is the problem(s) as I see it.  When you have a multimillion dollar company, which in AXONs case are really the ‘only show in town’, with proclamations (dictations?) of how they are going to make the world better, departments better and communities safer and the answer to the future of policing. Followed by a level of influence that starts to over-ride what the application of reasonable force BY LAW truly is.  Now, add command staffs that will do seemingly almost anything to keep their cities from burning and ‘Voila!’- AXON is now almost looked at as a stand-alone use of force, outside of any reasonableness standard or not really a use of force at all.  Just a couple of lil ol darts and electricity, no biggie.  Very clever…

No.  Taser use is a big deal.  It is a high-level of force which should only be used on high level resistance.  Yes, Tasers are a good tool and should be used IF used in the manner that the U.S. Supreme Court has given us in objectively reasonableness.  Should departments and academies up their game in training use of force, yes.

Don’t be fooled by a powerful company that has made Taser use common place.  It’s our freedom documents and those of us that hold those documents sacred that guide police action and use of force and ultimately hold those with that authority accountable.

Open for discussion….