scarshapedstar's blog

Today in Tasering: And The Beat Goes On

2008-07-29T20:05:29-04:00

Another day, another guy coincidentally dies after being Tased repeatedly.

A Statesville man died after being shocked multiple times by Tasers at the Iredell County jail over the weekend, sources say.

Anthony Davidson, 29, was unresponsive when he was taken to Iredell Memorial Hospital Saturday afternoon. He was put on life support and died late Sunday night, police said.

His death is the second Taser-related death this year in the Charlotte area. In March, 17-year-old Darryl Wayne Turner, died after Charlotte-Mecklenburg police used a Taser on him at a Food Lion store in Charlotte.

[…]

The incident began about 3 p.m. Saturday at a Statesville grocery store. Employees at the Food Lion on N.C. 115 told police they tried unsuccessfully to stop Davidson from leaving the store with a full cart of groceries after his debit card was declined. He left the parking lot without the groceries, police said.

When officers caught up with Davidson a short time later, he was carrying an Applebee’s gift card from the store that hadn’t been paid for, Anderson said.

Officers took Davidson to the Iredell County Jail where he appeared before a magistrate on a larceny charge. Davidson was behaving abnormally from the time officers first encountered him, Anderson said.

While being booked, Davidson became “physically aggressive and was communicating loudly,” Anderson said. That’s when officers used one or more Tasers to get him “back under control,” police said.

A nurse who screened Davidson afterward told officers he needed further medical screening because he appeared to be “under the influence of some type of impairing substance.”

Paramedics took Davidson to the hospital Saturday. His condition continued to decline and he was unresponsive when he arrived, Anderson said. He was admitted to intensive care and was taken off life support about 10:30 p.m. Sunday.

[…]

Davidson’s family said they weren’t aware of him using or having a problem with drugs or alcohol… They said police told them Davidson fell while being subdued and may have hit his head.

An autopsy is scheduled later this week, Moore said.

Last month, the officer involved in the Charlotte Taser incident was cleared of criminal charges [So much for the Milgram Dodge, eh?] but was suspended for five days [wow!] for violating the department’s policy when he continuously shocked Darryl Turner for 37 seconds, a factor that contributed to his death.

They tased him to “get him back under control”. Everything I’ve been told by Taser defenders leads me to believe - and I have no reason to doubt them - that they think Tasers are necessary to prevent the use of lethal force.

There is no discernible reason why lethal force should have been used to “control” an unarmed suspect who is “physically aggressive” (can we see the video?) and “communicating loudly”. I’m pretty sure everyone can agree on that. So why the hell did they Tase him? I am sympathetic to the argument that a Taser is less harmful than a billy club to the head, but the guy was in handcuffs, for christ’s sake.

As Atticus Finch said to Jem, “Never point a gun at a man unless you intend to shoot him, and never shoot a man unless you intend to kill him,” or something to that effect. A Taser may be less likely to kill than a gun but certain people will die from it and that fact seems to be ignored an awful lot in these discussions. Shooting someone with a Taser should be a direct, 1:1 substitute for shooting them with a bullet, without exception.

The naked guy standing in the shower with a towel did not require a bullet. Baron Pikes didn’t require a bullet. The guy who wouldn’t sign his speeding ticket didn’t require a bullet. The Polish guy in the Vancouver airport didn’t require a bullet. The kid with a broken back did not require a bullet. This guy did not require a bullet. I’m not convinced anyone who has died after being Tased has required a bullet. I’m sure that it makes the cops’ jobs easier and safer for themselves if they Tase more people instead of wrestling them to the ground; I don’t care. I’d like my job to be easier and safer, but I don’t get to make the rules. The police do not have a right to a completely submissive citizenry and they should be prevented from trying to create one.

And if you don’t think that’s an accurate description of this cavalier attitude:

Taser-related deaths across North Carolina prompted a coalition to study Taser use. The N.C. Taser Safety Project surveyed the state’s 100 sheriff’s offices and found that 70 issued Tasers to some or all of its deputies, but many agencies lack clear policies about when and how they should be used.

…then what is? Replace “Tasers” with “guns” and it sounds like a story from Baghdad, doesn’t it?

Today in Tasering: 16-year-old with a broken back edition

2008-07-27T23:40:34-04:00

[Bonjour, mon general! —lambert]

An imminent threat

So, yesterday morning, a 16-year-old boy in Ozark, Missouri fell off a 30-foot I-65 overpass for unknown reasons. When the police arrived on the scene, they ~~promptly administered first aid~~ Tased him 19 times because he wouldn’t “comply” with their orders to stand up. (Thank god for Tasers, otherwise they’d have had to put him down like a broken racehorse, eh?)

Mace ended up in intensive care at a hospital. His parents believe the actions of Ozark police officers contributed to his injuries and slowed doctors’ abilities to speed his recovery.

The official explanation:

“He refused to comply with the officers and so the officers had to deploy their Tasers in order to subdue him. He is making incoherent statements; he’s also making statements such as, ‘Shoot cops, kill cops,’ things like that. So there was cause for concern to the officers,” said Ozark Police Capt. Thomas Rousset.

Yeah, I’m sure that’s exactly what he said after falling off a fucking bridge. They must have felt very threatened indeed by a possibly-paraplegic child. No word on whether he announced to the world that he was high on crack and PCP yet.

I don’t even know what to say anymore. It really is a gaslight scenario. I wish I could at least attribute this to racism or something, but it appears these cops are bona fide sociopaths. _{Subliminal Stanley Milgram: No, they’re not! Subliminal me: Harumph…}

I can’t say I’ll be surprised with they start Tasing motorcycle crash victims. We Are All Violently High On Crack And PCP Now.

He refused to comply with the officers and so the officers had to deploy their Tasers in order to subdue him.

Anyone catch that curious bit of subordination there? “Refusal to comply” is now grounds for the use of force when there hasn’t been so much as a citation issued?

Can somebody explain to me how, logically, this doesn’t allow a cop to Tase someone for not stepping aside on a crowded sidewalk if he asks? In all honesty, I don’t see any difference. It will happen, sooner rather than later.

P.S. Is there a Guinness world record for consecutive Tasings yet?

So, were the bag designers given retroactive immunity?

2008-07-25T10:24:51-04:00

This is the actual bag that will be given to attendees at this year’s DNC.

Somebody call for the Bucket Brigade?

UPDATE And Kudos to TalkLeft for the Fourth Amendment tote. — Lambert

The Perfect Murder

2008-07-21T18:50:26-04:00

So it turns out that there’s a bit of history behind the latest Taser killing. Officer Nugent arrested (and Tased, natch) the late Baron Pikes’s own father in 2007; said father is currently imprisoned for a drug-related offense. I can’t find any more details than this, but it got me to thinking.

What happened to Baron Pikes was no less than cold-blooded murder:

After consulting about the case with Dr. Michael Baden, a nationally prominent forensic pathologist, Williams ruled last month that Pikes’ death was a homicide. On the death certificate, he listed the cause of death as “cardiac arrest following nine 50,000-volt electroshock applications from a conductive electrical weapon.”

“God did not just call this young man home,” said Williams, who has served as parish coroner for the past 33 years. “If somebody can tell me anything else that killed this otherwise perfectly healthy young man … I’d like to know it.” […]

“This case may be the most unnecessary death I have ever had to investigate,” Williams said. “[Pikes] put up no fuss, no fighting, no physical aggression. … He just didn’t respond quickly enough to the officer’s commands.”

What I’m wondering is, was it premeditated? A little background on the town where this took place, from the ChiTrib article:

No novelist could have invented Winnfield, a place so steeped in corruption that they built a local museum to try to sanitize it all.

Here in the birthplace of two of Louisiana’s most colorful and notorious governors—Huey and Earl Long—the police chief committed suicide three years ago after losing a close election marred by allegations of fraud and vote-buying.

Just four months later, the district attorney killed himself after allegedly skimming $200,000 from his office budget and extorting payments from criminal defendants to make their cases go away.

The current police chief is a convicted drug offender [Winnfield locals claim he was not merely an “offender” but a dealer - scar] who got a pardon from Edwin Edwards, the former Louisiana governor who is serving time in federal prison for corruption convictions.

All of that tangled history is now wrapped up in the Pikes case, because Scott Nugent, the officer who Tasered him, is the well-connected son of the former police chief who killed himself—and the protégé of the current chief, who hired him onto the force.

What if you had a crooked cop in a crooked town who decided to play judge, jury, and executioner? (Or, to get even more foily, drug cartel hitman?) This isn’t exactly hypothetical.

Joe Heard said his 15-year-old son was Tasered twice by Nugent last August, after Heard reported the youth as a runaway and asked the police to help find him.

“He snuck out of the house to be with a girl,” Heard said. “I asked the police to bring him home, and they did, but in pieces—he was all scraped up and bruised. They told me the next time he runs, ’You know we’re going to shoot him.’ “

Bear in mind, Nugent had beaten and was threatening to kill an innocent [black] child for running away from home. One can only wonder what he’d do to a [black] drug offender who tried to run away from him.

Now, picture this scene:

Only after Pikes was carried into the police station and slumped into a chair did police call for an ambulance. He was pronounced dead soon afterward at the local hospital.

The article doesn’t specifically state that Pikes was DOA, but I’m strongly inclined to believe that the reason he was “slumped in a chair” in the police station is because he was already dead. Anyone who’s worked in a hospital will back me up on this: no cop or EMT wants to pronounce anyone dead due to legal liabilities and mounds of paperwork.

This shit is pretty much straight out of the Sopranos. If Nugent had shot Pikes with a gun instead of a Taser, he would be in jail right now, and rightly so. But, conveniently, Tasers are different, because…

Nugent, 21, declined to be interviewed for this story. But his attorney, Phillip Terrell, said that Nugent “acted within the ambit of his training and Winnfield Police Department policies”—an opinion seconded by police spokesman Lt. Charles Curry.

That’s right, the Milgram connection. He was just following procedure. Well… maybe not.

Yet the official Winnfield Police Department Taser policy appears to prohibit the weapon’s use against a nonviolent suspect who has already been handcuffed.

“The Taser shall only be deployed in circumstances where it is deemed reasonably necessary to control a dangerous or violent subject,” the policy states. It also requires that a suspect who has been Tasered should immediately be checked out at a hospital, which did not happen in Pikes’ case.

I hope Nugent spends the rest of his life in Angola for this, because otherwise it gives any redneckkk cop with family connections and a chip on his soldier an easy 4-step solution to deal with anyone he doesn’t want plaguing his lovely white community (or anyone who may be cutting in on the profitability of the “family business”).

1) Tase the “suspect” until he loses consciousness, put him in the patrol car, and then tase him some more until he dies. (Unless, of course, several applications of 50,000 volts from the Acme Saf-T Electrocutor isn’t enough, in which case I guess you plant some drugs and book him.)

2) Call the ambulance.

3) Make up a story about how he was in a violent drug-fueled rage and had asthma and a heart condition and epilepsy and sickle cell.

4) Have the police chief back you up on what an awesome job you did.

Seriously, take a look at the players and the defenses involved in protecting white cops who killed black people during Jim Crow. Same damn thing, except with a Taser. This may stand as the most brazen Taser killing of all time, but everyone should be very suspicious of any cop who has someone die after a Tasering due to nebulous and unfounded “medical conditions”, especially in the Deep South. The good ol’ boys have found a new toy.

Today in Tasering: WTF Edition

2008-07-20T14:24:32-04:00

Via Booman, read the whole thing.

Back in the great state of Louisiana, Baron “Scooter” Pikes was spotted by the police while walking peacefully down the street. Given his outstanding warrant for possession, one Officer Nugent gave chase, and Pikes was cornered. Due to his failure to submit, Nugent tased him. Nine times. In 14 minutes. While Pikes surrendered and begged him to stop.

Pikes died shortly thereafter. He was a healthy man of 33 years. Nugent claimed that, in an apparent Bob Woodward-style near-death confession, he told them (in between the screams of pain and death rattles) that he was high on crack and PCP (never heard that one before!) and had asthma. The coroner found no evidence for any of these claims and ruled the death a homicide, but hey, what are you gonna believe, hearsay from a hardly-impartial participant or hard science from a 33-year veteran?

In an apparent goodwill gesture to shock Pikes back to life, Nugent admitted that he tased Pikes twice while he was unconscious and in custody.

I really wish I could link to the part of the Milgram experiment wherein the actor “dies” and the unwitting partipant shocks him again, and again, and again. Gee, I don’t know why. A person administering an electrical shock that they are told is, well, maybe-sorta-safe, but they definitely won’t be held responsible if things go awry… nah, never mind, there’s no similarity there whatsoever. I don’t know what I was thinking.

Safer than bungee jumping, y’all! Thank god the cops didn’t have to use lethal force. Things could have gotten ugly.

Fucked Fact (tm Maru): Officer Nugent is the department’s most “enthusiastic” taser user and once tased an innocent 15-year-old runaway. But hey, Nugent once got a 1-second shock from a taser, so he’s absolved of any responsibility.

With enemies like these...

2008-05-29T11:17:42-04:00

…who needs friends?

I’m by no means accusing anyone of Glennuendo, but in the spirit of CD’s last epic post, we should all keep our eyes out for shit like this, in which wingnuts parrot Holocaust denialists in order to tar Obama. Say what you want about how his presidency will be a boring tour around the Lekture circuit, but if this happened on our side there would be an immediate effort to tie these bloggers to McCain (campaign contributions?) and force him to issue a public apology. The ADL would jump down his throat and it would become an albatross that would go down in history as sinking McInsane’s campaign (well, one of many.)

We don’t have to go that exact route but this shouldn’t go unnoticed because, again, the wingnuts will be nastier than ever over the next 5 months. Don’t ever forget that.

Now, how are we gonna get this into gasbag-land?

Change You Can Parrot

2008-05-21T22:07:23-04:00

***BREAKING***

After extensive audio-visual analysis and comparisons to old films archived in the labyrinthine bowels of the Mighty Corrente Building, we’re going on the record to reveal that Barack Obama’s top campaign official, David Axelrod, has been quietly replaced by Smokey the Parrot.

Judge for yourself with this footage from today’s press conference in Montana:

The Obama camp has yet to issue an official explanation, but an anonymous source assured us that the crackers and newspaper will be funded entirely by small private donors.

UPDATE: The Obama camp has blamed the odd appearance and behavior of their spokesman on a “microphone malfunction”; apparently, unable to hear the questions from the assembled reporters, David Axelrod began reading from Senator Obama’s prepared remarks for tomorrow’s scheduled rally in South Dakota. To back up their claims, Obama ‘08 cites the voice of David Gregory saying “Hello? Hello?” at 13 seconds. The veteran reporter’s questions were, unfortunately, drowned out by the chorus of kissing noises from the rest of the Washington press corps.

Please feel free to add your own captions in the comments, dear readers!

Resistance is Futile!

2008-05-07T12:02:25-04:00

Sez Booman, it’s really not that bad once you learn to submit:

Barack Obama knew better than to rely on the existing infrastructure, created by the blogosphere, to fight back against the Bush administration and the media. We are too stridently partisan to be messengers of a new kind of politics. He had to step around the gatekeepers of the blogosphere, much to their chagrin. Barack Obama’s greatest accomplishment is the organization that he created. He used our tools and his own message. And he won. He could not have won any other way. And that makes him both our greatest representative, and someone who doesn’t really need us at all. All of you should go join up on his website and meet your neighbors that are supporting him, and get organized. For presidential stuff, there is no reason to use the blogosphere at all. Use Obama’s own tools.

Dear God. I’ve held back on the Obama cult accusations for a while now; many of my friends and family support him. But Booman… wtf? I don’t even know where to begin with this. It is the Borg. No, wait, it’s the Heaven’s Gate cultists leaving behind their earthly bodies to merge with the higher consciousness.

Actually, I’ve got it! It’s like in the Matrix, where the humans created the machines and then after they fought it out the machines kept the humans alive as tiny generators, feeding them the liquified remains of their brethren.

Not because they had to. Not because we even deserved it, as strident and partisan as we were. But because they’re merciful!

So, come on, everyone. Leave your individual thoughts behind. Take the blue pill and relax. Ignorance is bliss!

The McCain Impotence Meme

2008-04-27T12:09:41-04:00

Via TeddySanFran @ FDL, the question everyone should be asking right up to election day:

So, the question is: will the ad run on Monday?

…

Is John McCain powerless? Is he impotent?

Bwahaha. Yes, these are important questions. I hope that some of our more accessible talking heads *cough* Ezra *cough* will be able to raise them on the air. As in:

Really, what people are asking right now is, why hasn’t McCain been able to gain traction with Democrats? Are we looking at an impotent campaign here, you know, one that’s never going to get any stronger towards November?

Well, McCain’s been taking criticism lately, and he hasn’t shown that he’s really strong enough to deflect any of it… is this the emergence of an impotent candidate?

~~“Say, do you think McCain takes Cialis because he’s impotent?”~~

You get the picture. Simple yet devastating. Can we pull it off?

Bowl me over with a feather

2008-04-01T11:26:38-04:00

I’m sure this may come as a shock to you, but military is hiring bloggers to work as moles, “verbally attack[ing] specific person[s] or promot[ing] a specific message.”

Wait, sorry, wrong link.

Here’s the article.

The author has issued a non-denial denial (“I got some positive feedback from people who read the article, but I don’t know if it led to anything.”) so you can safely assume that there are indeed paid “psy-ops” / “mindwar” operatives, on ur internets, fucking with ur heads.

Then again, this isn’t exactly news. But it may lead to some interesting FOIA requests…

Caption it!

2008-03-26T01:06:28-04:00

In the red corner… Richard “Hillary Clinton Shot Vince Foster” Mellon Scaife.

In the blue corner… Hillary Clinton.

Oh, to be a fly on the wall…

via.

Führerprinzip Watch

2008-02-07T21:02:40-05:00

Via Digby:

Delahunt: You said if an opinion was rendered, that would insulate him from any consequences.

[Mike Mukasey, Attorney General of the United States, before the House Judiciary Committee today]: We could not investigate or prosecute somebody for acting in reliance on a justice department opinion.

…

Delahunt: If that opinion was inaccurate and in fact violated a section of US Criminal Code, that reliance is in effect an immunity from any criminal culpability.

MM: Immunity connoted culpability. [Well, is anyone culpable? -scar]

…

Delahunt: I find that a new legal doctrine. The law is the law.

MM: If it comes to pass that somebody at a later date that the opinion should have been different the person who relied on the opinion cannot be investigated.

Delahunt: Is there a legal precedent?

MM: There is practical consideration.

Read the whole thing. It just gets worse. They’re not even coy about it anymore.

Oh, but I’m sure they’ll peacefully hand over power after a free and fair election 8 months from now!

And now, your moment of zen

2008-02-07T11:46:46-05:00

According to the AJC, white males might just swing the primary election!

We shall overcome…

One of these things is not like the others

2008-02-06T00:20:44-05:00

Was just perusing CNN.com, and this particular set of candidate mugshots jumped out at me. How about you?

Notice anything curious?

Maybe Ron never smiles in public. Yeah, that must be it.

His shirt was genuinely wrinkled...

2008-01-08T10:32:28-05:00

…and she was holding an iron. That’s the only conclusion I can draw from this headline:

“Clinton responds to seemingly sexist shouts”

Hillary Rodham Clinton’s campaign stop was interrupted Monday when two men stood in the crowd and began screaming, “Iron my shirt!” during one of her final appearances before the New Hampshire primary.

Clinton, a former first lady running to become the nation’s first female president, laughed at the seemingly sexist protest that suggested a woman’s place is doing the laundry and not running the country.

Yes… That suggestion does seem awfully sexist… [strokes chin thoughtfully]

seeming[2,adjective]

Main Entry: seeming
Function: adjective
Date: circa 1557

: outwardly or superficially evident but not true or real

Good thing we know it’s not really sexist, because… well, it’s never explained. (Maybe the answer is hidden in this here bucket?) Hillary handled the situation with aplomb, but then the remaining two-thirds of the article are dedicated to - surprise! - a gratuitous trip to Hillary’s Waterpark, Now With Less Cackle!

Anyway, here’s what I’m wondering. If somebody shouts “Cram your Bible up your ass, you stupid shit! Fuck you and the dinosaur you and Jesus rode in on!” at Mike Huckabee, would that be billed as “seemingly anti-Christian speech?” There’s only one way to find out, folks…