The winner is...the criminals!
As local leaders of the New Black Panther Party near my home town call for a moratorium on the use of tasers by police, sighting that they are disproportionately employed on minority suspects, they are ALSO protesting the shooting of a 15yr old male when he pointed an
assault rifle at a sheriff's Deputy after high-speed chase. Their claim in the latter instance is that the subject was shot in the back and therefore running away. (Massad Ayoob could tell them a thing or two about how that works and I pray that he or someone like him is testifying on the Deputy's behalf as he awaits a Grand Jury decision on possible indictment.
The ACLU has jumped on the bandwagon in both cases and I have to ask...isn't this the same crowd to whom the words "assault rifle" bring about the kind of fear normally reserved for weapons of mass destruction?
Sorry guys, (and I use that term loosely,) but you have to pick one or the other! HPD has used tasers 982 times since they were introduced to the department. In more than 70 of those cases, the officers would have been
more than legally justified to use deadly force - but they didn't.
When someone points an assault rifle at you, as in the case of the Deputy, tasers just aren't going to cut it so what exactly would you have the man do??? And if you take the taser option away, what would have happened in those 70 plus cases???
Here are some links to the local news on this subject. I am still looking for the few I've read that at least TRY to give both sides of their stories but you know how the media is...
Local group calls for moratorium on taser gun usageSeeking justice in death of 15-year-old boyAngel Out!