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When should police use tasers?
Story By: Mark Hanrahan
Source: KOAA
A local man captured on video a Colorado Springs Police officer using a taser to subdue a suspect; he posted the video online in hopes of starting a dialogue on taser use.
Mark Lewis with the local anti-war group csaction.org captured the incident on home video. He says, “It's not that they shouldn’t use the tasers, it’s just that they have to have a policy.”
The taser incident happened Saturday at Acacia Park in downtown Colorado Springs. The home video shows a man struggling with police. After a few seconds police resort to shooting the man with a taser after it appears that he refuses to comply with the officers.
Lewis agrees that the man was resisting arrest, he also says he not against taser use. He just thinks people should know about their police’s policy when it comes to using them. To make his point, Lewis posted the video on Youtube.com. News First asked Lewis what he hoped to gain by posting the video online.
He says, “Well, because I think people need to understand that in their community, and there’s a lot of communities that have banned tasers, in their community they need to understand…to address this issue in terms of what is going to be departmental policy in terms of their use.”
Colorado Springs Police spokesman, Sgt. Creighton Brandt, says the department’s policy has always been clear. He says, “Our policy is that if an officer is in contact with someone and resists arrest or detention and other alternatives to control have failed, then our officers are allowed to use tasers.”
Sgt. Brandt went on to say that they officers in the video appeared to have taken appropriate action. He also says that since the department started using tasers in 2004 they’ve had excellent results.
Sgt. Brandt says, “During that time period, the injury to police officers has gone down, the injury to suspects has gone down and also civil liability claims have also gone down.”
