This is deep stuff....

[MikeyPI]

Enjoy your vacation We have one somewhere around here, want to be a smartass we can treat you as such.

[Hoppah]

Don't forget to send us a card! 

 

[TACRfan]

i think the best thing to do here in the uk is to mainly have unarmed officers but have more armed response units and equip most officers with taser, and maybe make it so more of the traffic police and special sections of the police force are also armed response police

[theocd]

i think the best thing to do here in the uk is to mainly have unarmed officers but have more armed response units and equip most officers with taser, and maybe make it so more of the traffic police and special sections of the police force are also armed response police

 

More Armed Response Units cost money, and compared to their amount of deployment, we don't need any more. Equipping most officers with TASER is again a massive expense for something that officers won't use on a day-to-day- basis. The Police Foundation estimate equipping all officers with TASER would cost £160 million*; call that half, its still £80 million of money we don't have. 

As for equipping more Traffic Police or other 'Specialist Units', you don't need me to tell you guns are dangerous and not exactly desirable at RTC's or in a Riot. Most other 'Specialist Units' aren't armed because we deemed they shouldn't be armed - Dog Handlers and Mounted Officers have an animal to control; Public Order officers** would struggle to keep hold of a weapon when wrestling with offenders, who else do we have - marine policing?

 

The OC-D

* Source is here but can't be dead sure of the maths as their reference can't be followed: http://www.police-foundation.org.uk/uploads/catalogerfiles/tasers/tasers_briefing.pdf

** I am aware of the exception that is Level 1 trained TSG Officers - hey, that's the Met.

[MikeyPI]

The problem with tasers are that they are assumed by the class they are assigned "less than lethal" that they are a response that is not quite as bad as a true firearm.  Depending on the subject's health conditions (most the time you can't tell someone has these issues outwardly).  For example equip them with EKG's to check a suspect before they taze em, not likely.  Tasers can be just as deadly to someone as a firearm.  In the usa they have a tendency of over-using the taser for non-compliant subjects.  Their idea of non-compliant can vary greatly from someone who actually poses a physical threat, to someone who is just non-compliant and argumentative.  Excessive force with tasers tends to be a relatively common thing in agencies which are outfitted with them.  Because most people do not suffer long-term effects it is accepted far more frequently than if you were to shoot them.  However, in some of the population out there, there are many conditions that can be extremely dangerous to hit them with 50,000 volts, leading to cardiac arrest/and or death.  Age does not play into this populace, it can be a 15 year old kid, or a 70 year old grandmother that suffers adverse reaction all because they opted to be "non compliant" by asking an officer questions when the officer feels they should not.

 

Training for any weapon is required, but IMO any weapon that can be activated within the blink of an eye is a dangerous thing to give to people without proper training on not only HOW to use them, but also WHEN their use is appropriate.  The billy club for example takes a good deal of effort to actively use to inflict serious trauma into a subject, therefore it is less likely to occur, a firearm/taser on the other hand simply draw and squeeze a trigger and you're done.  Makes for a far easier go of it when it comes to inflicting trauma.  Most people don't think of a taser as a potentially fatal weapon when in some people they unfortunately are very much so, in a small select of the population you're nearly 90% on cardiac arrest as result of the use of them.

 

Beanbag rounds and rubber bullets suffer the same issue, they are classed as less than lethal but if you strike a subject in the wrong place they'll kill em dead just the same as a real round.

[met police999]

You just need to look at the troubles in northern Ireland to understand why plastic bullets are problematic

[Fred03]

You will find however that incidents of death from the use of a taser are pretty rare, especially considering how "over used" tasers are.

[MikeyPI]

Imagine if every officer around the world had them, the lucky stroke of fate is that not everyone has rubber/plastic bullets, bean bags, or tasers/stun guns.  They don't issue a ton of tasers out there, probrably because of cost, so that lowers the number of incidents involving them alot more than say the baton which most officers/security carry.  The only less than lethal that has an ungodly rare risk of fatality is the pepper spray/pepper guns.

[Fred03]

Unfortunately the only sure way of avoiding injury is to not apprehend criminals at all. Some risks are associated with that particular occupation (criminal) and yes people get hurt and occasionally people die, that's what happens when you break the law. All humanitarian stuff aside they are criminals, not law abiding citizens, they can be treated more roughly.

[MikeyPI]

I could pull up several incidents where the taser has been used on people for minor traffic violations and things of that nature, filming law enforcement (not interfering, just filming them).  Believe it or not, not every interaction with law enforcement involves hardened criminals.  A good deal of incidents involving law enforcement are emotionally charged, but not the type of incident that requires heavy force to address.  Each offense is not created equal, and likewise the response to an offense should be judged by the incident, not by what you have available to use at your disposal alone.  Domestic issues (fighting between a couple) for example are rather emotionally charged incident, but rather common incident.  As a LEO you must have the ability to address people with diplomacy as well as force when appropriate, such is why alot of law enforcement agencies are looking into psychology degrees along with conventional LEO degrees now.  To assume that oh a criminal, we have a right to use whatever force we deem necessary is a great way for a lawsuit to occur, or in mother russia to do the job.

[Fred03]

I was (and am) operating under the assumption that the officers use the least amount of force needed to gain compliance.

[MikeyPI]

I operate under the reality that unfortunately not everyone complies with the best of judgement, even LEOs are unfortunately guilty of it sometimes.  Human beings are prone to mistakes and errors in judgement.