My brother is a member of the NYPD and Tasers are only given to the supervisors, Sgt’s and above. He has told me that after 12 years on the force, he has never used his pepper spray. But I think it is a good idea that police have a non-leathal form of defense.
Pepper Spray

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It seems to me that police have enough tools in their arsenals that there should seldom be need to use a taser. There is no disputing its effectiveness, but the risks are substantial. Is an occasional death an acceptable trade off for the convenience and effectiveness of the taser?

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fwog, fwog,, i rather an eye irritation than a bullet,

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It’s about time the Greens got behind our police force – please present a balanced argument and show the statistics for assault on police. I can assure you that’s only the tip of the iceburg as minor assualts often aren’t recorded. Unfortunately you get people who abuse their position in all walks of life and the police are no different – what is different is that it will be investigated and that officer, if found guilty, will lose his job, unlike alot of people in many walks of life – rugby players who beat their pregnant wives and politicians who drink and drive as minor examples. I too have a family member who is a police officer – try explaing to kids why Dad’s in hospital again or why he’s quite tonight (oh, he’s just been piecing some body parts back together). Police don’t support police brutality any more than the general public and if the Greens are going to start sensationalising this sort of thing, they’ll lose my vote.

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Tazers are a useful tool when used as intended, ie as an alternative to lethal force, in other words as an alternative to a firearm. There are risks to the tazed person, but those risks are generally lower than that of being shot.

Unfortunately, experience shows that tazers are not used as an alternative to firearms, but as a general purpose quelling tool. Under these usage patterns, people die who shouldn’t. Thats wrong.

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Thanks for your comment Joy. It must be very scary having a son who is a police officer when he is often at risk like that. Pepper spray may well be a useful tool for police who, of course, do need to protect themselves from violence at times. The problem the Greens see is that it was clearly used inappropriately in this case – the handcuffed man was obviously no threat to the officer concerned. I think the request for a broader inquiry is to make sure that this is not happening regularly.

As for Tasers, I think there are serious concerns about the health risks they pose that would suggest that they are an inappropriate form of protection at any time.

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Frog.

As a mother with a policeman son I will point out that the police do NEED something in their defence. Would you prefer all police persons be armed with pistols/rifles? No? Then be reasonable and allow some self defence weapons, to be used under strict guidlines.

A ‘P’ fueled criminal came with in an inch of battering my son to death. Of course I shall support a proposal that police on the beat, especially those that work alone in rural areas, should have spray or tasers. Joy.

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