These statistics might get a little confusing," warned Chief Stan Knee, as he began his analysis of the Austin Police Department's use of TASERs at last Thursday's City Council Meeting.

The statistics were not the only thing. Equally confusing were the way the statistics were interpreted; the manner in which other facts and data were selectively ommitted from what little medical data was actually reviewed; and finally, APD's overall message about the use of force and the appropriate role of TASERs within it.

This report by Stan Knee, with supporting remarks by two medical doctors, was given in response to a request made by City Council six weeks prior. After increasing community outcry over the APD's use of TASERs, sparked by the public TASERing of a 19-year old anti-war protester Rene Perez on Congress Avenue bridge, January 20, the City Council agreed to indefinitely suspend a planned purchase of 90 new TASERs. This would have cost $75,000 in taxpayer dollars.

TASER is the brand name for an electo-shock device produced by Scottsdale, AZ-based TASER International. The device delivers 50,000 volts of electricity to the victim, delivered through projected barbs that embed themselves into the skin, from a distance of up to 25 feet away. TASERs have been attributed to over 100 deaths across North America, since they were first introduced in 2002, although TASER International's deeply entrenched medical director Robert A Stratbucker continues to deny any connection.

TASERs and "Use of Force"

Currently, TASERs are the single most commonly used method of force by APD, according to a City Memo released in November 2004. In the period between January-Septemer 2004, TASERs were used in 33% of use of force incidents, followed by OC Spray (25%) and soft-hand control (23%). This represents a major shift from the previous year, in which soft-hand control represented 51% of use of force incidents, followed by hard hand control (20%.) In 2003, OC Spray was used only 17% of the time, and TASERs only 3%.

Stan Knee reviewed this data at last Thursday's City Council meeting, and proudly concluded: "TASER use has increased, but we also have seen in their use of force during those same comparison periods decreases in soft hand control, hard hand control, the use of pepper spray and impact weapons."

But are TASERs really an appropriate alternative to methods of force such as soft hand control, which experienced the greatest drop since TASERs were introduced into the department? As a point of comparison, "soft hand control" is defined as "techniques that have minimal possibility of injury, such as joint locks, pressure points and escort holds."

To answer this question, the expert witnesses of two medical doctors, under the pay of the City, were introduced to provide a "medical perspective" on TASERs.

The "pertinent medical literature."

Doctors Edward Racht and Pat Crocker reviewed two pieces of "pertinent published clinical literature." The first was written by three British doctors (Bleetman, Steyn, & Lee) in an article describing the introduction of TASERs into British policing, medical implications and appropriate use. The second was a notoriously discredited work of pseudo-science. Funded by none other than TASER International, this report was authored by Dr. Robert A Stratbucker, whose deep financial ties with the corporation have been well documented.

The Bleetman report is essentially the only piece of "independent" literature reviewed by Doctors Racht and Crocker, though it still cites heavily from TASER International data. Even so, the report very clearly spells out the role of TASERs among the other use-of-force options available to police:

"Police have a limited number of use of force options when confronting dangerous or violent suspects. Police officers are legally and morally required to use the lowest level of force necessary to control a situation and to de-escalate at the earliest opportunity. Use of force options start with good communication skills, then escalate from unarmed physical skills (holds, restraints, strikes), deployment of incapacitant sprays, up to the use of batons. At present, when facing levels of threat that exceed the capacity of an officer deploying a baton, there remains only the use of a firearm. Police agencies have searched for "less lethal" weapons to fill the operational gap between the baton and the gun."

TASERs are offered as one possible "less lethal" option to fill this gap. Nowhere in this paper, however, is it suggested that police should use "less lethal" weapons as an alternative to the predominantly "nonlethal" options--which range from "good communication skills," to soft hand control, and even OC spray or the the baton.

In the conclusion of this paper, the point is made more explicit:

"It is worth remembering that the Advanced TASER is to be used only as an alternative to firearms and any outcome measures should be considered in this context."

Not surprising. This was, after all, the argument first used to sell TASERs to the people of Ausin. After increasing public outcry over civilian fatalities at the hands of police, TASERs were introduced as a high-tech solution for reducing the use of lethal force by APD.

Stan Knee, however, made it clear that "TASERs are not an alternative to lethal force," a statement his own statistics confirm. In the periods compared, there was no statistically significant reduction in the use of firearms or canines, both of which have been attributed to fatalities. The only reductions were in the types of force the Bleetman report considered lower on the scale of all available methods. Rather than reducing force, as Chief Knee asserts, the shifts in use of force to both TASERs and OC Spray represent a frighteningly dramatic, overall escalation of force by the department in recent years.

It is worth questioning why the medical doctors, who claimed to use the Bleetman report as half of their "medical literature" research, failed to mention that the way APD currently uses TASERs is in direct violation with the findings of that report.

Are TASERs violent?

Throughout Stan Knee's presentation, he continued to oppose TASER use with "violent confrontation," implying that the use of a TASER is "nonviolent." So what does it feel like to get shot with a TASER? A few police officers that volunteered themselves to be test subjects had this to say, according to a report by Amnesty International:

"It is the most profound pain I have ever felt. You get total compliance because they don't want that pain again." (firearms consultant, quoted in The Associated Press 12 August 2003)

"They call it the longest five seconds of their life � it's extreme pain, there's no question about it. No one would want to get hit by it a second time." (County Sheriff, quoted in The Kalazazoo Gazette, Michigan, 7 March 2004)

The following post was found on an online police discussion forum: "I've been hit with the tazer and it's not fun. I would go out on a limb and say I would rather be OC'd in the face again than to get tazed. OC is a burning sensation that friggin' hurts but at least my body can associate with the pain. Tazer is like an unexplainable pain that is just so foreign to my body that I can't cope. I still have 2 burn marks from where the darts were placed." (Glocktalk.com)

Are TASERs lethal?

The overwhelming consensus, in both the medical community as well as independent researchers, is yes--at least potentially so. The so-called "study" by TASER International, (cited extensively by Doctors Racht and Crocker) which claims a death rate of only 1 in every 10,000 volunteer and operational case studies, has been widely discredited. Dr. Robert A Stratbucker, the medical doctor that co-wrote the study, has been investigated by both the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Arizona Attorney General, for possible conflicts of interest in his research. (Not only was he paid by TASER International to conduct the study, but personally holds substantial stocks and options in the company.)

According to a New York Times report from last July: "The few independent studies that have examined the TASER have found that the weapon's safety is unproven at best. The most comprehensive report, made by the British government in 2002, concluded, "the high-power TASERs cannot be classed, in the vernacular, as `safe.' " Britain has not approved TASERs for general police use." Claims by Taser International that their product is �generally safe� are perpetually shadowed by calls for further studies on �potentially vulnerable populations� by the U.S. Department of Defense, the governments of Britain, Australia, and Canada, and the Potomac Policy Institute.

In any case, the more often TASERs are used by police across the country, the more deaths that occur shortly after their use. Recently, a man was killed by police in Houston after being shocked with a TASER three times in a row. (Although there is a five second time limit for the first shock, subsequent shocks may be administered for as long as the officer holds down the trigger.) Amnesty International recently released a report last week documenting 103 TASER fatalities in the period between June 2001 to March 2005. 65% of these deaths have occured in the last 14 months.

APD's New Policy

Despite the defensiveness demonstrated by Chief Stan Knee regarding APDs previous use of TASERs, he presented a new policy (adopted last month) which, if followed, should result in a dramatic drop in the use of TASERs by officers on duty.

Incidents such as the one portrayed in the Austin-American Statesman last November--where a young woman on Sixth Street is shown handcuffed while an officer points a TASER in her face--would no longer be permissible in the new policy, which prohibits the use of TASERs on handcuffed suspects.* Also outlawed would be the use of TASERs on nonviolent suspects displaying passive resistance, as was the case with Rene Perez on Congress Avenue bridge on January 20. In fact, suspects would need to either be armed (which was not the case in 97% of the TASERing incidents in Austin last year) or demonstrating a violent threat that would otherwise require lethal force. According to Stan Knee, we know only of five such incidents in which TASERs would have been appropriately used under the terms of this new policy.

While Stan Knee's stubborn defense of the way TASERs have been used in the past--in hundreds of incidents of verbal or passive noncompliance--certainly raises doubts about the degree to which this new policy will be followed, we can only hope real, responsible change will ensue. Just in case it does not, however, the coalition group Austin Spokescouncil (www.austinspokes.org) will be documenting incidents of TASER use by police, with a new hotline number for instant reporting: 512-573-6194. These reports will be used in comparisons with city data, as well as to evaluate APD compliance with the new policy.