This article is a fair use for educational purposes. It is one of dozens of law enforcement articles specifically about TASER GUNS and deaths caused by them. One state , Ilndiana, has stopped using TASER guns because the police there believe the TASER gun to be unsafe.
Yet, the UK police shot a man in hiding in a bathroom. The neighbours saud they heard three shots. A little terraced house in Birmingham,UK, hardly has more than five feet of space between the bathroom and the corrider in front of the bathroom; the TASER gun should be well away , at a distance of yards away from the target , before the police should have shouted "police. Please come out of there or we will shoot" or something of that natute.
We must be careful that we do not become a police state.
Yet, the UK police shot a man in hiding in a bathroom. The neighbours saud they heard three shots. A little terraced house in Birmingham,UK, hardly has more than five feet of space between the bathroom and the corrider in front of the bathroom; the TASER gun should be well away , at a distance of yards away from the target , before the police should have shouted "police. Please come out of there or we will shoot" or something of that natute.
We must be careful that we do not become a police state.
Deaths Spur Taser Debate; Police Embrace Stun Guns, but a Series of Fatalities Brings Calls for Halt to Their Use
Deaths Spur Taser Debate; Police Embrace Stun Guns, but a Series of Fatalities Brings Calls for Halt to Their Use
By Lateef Mungin and Rosalind Bentley, The Atlanta Journal Constitutional
The maximum-security inmate fought through six shots of pepper spray and sprinted toward Gwinnett sheriff's Capt. Carl Sims. Sims pulled his weapon, an electroshock gun called a Taser.
One shot, and the prisoner fell, immobilized.
"I thought that he had me, but the Taser dropped him instantly," Sims said. "We have never had a problem with that inmate again."
Results like that have convinced many metro Atlanta law enforcement officers that Tasers are the best way to control unruly prisoners or suspects without seriously injuring them. Fifteen metro Atlanta law enforcement agencies have added Tasers to their arsenals, and others are considering buying the weapons, which cost $400 to $800 apiece. The Georgia State Patrol purchased 200 this year for its 850 troopers. Forest Park police have issued them to all 57 of the city's patrol officers. Altogether, 4,500 law enforcement agencies in the United States and Canada use Tasers, says Taser International Inc., the gun's manufacturer.
But as use of Tasers rises, so do concerns about them.
On June 4, about 100 people rallied at the Gwinnett County Justice and Administration Center to protest the death of an inmate after he was shocked with a Taser. A legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union says Tasers have been involved in too many deaths and calls for more research if law enforcement officers intend to keep using them. Amnesty International says they can be used as torture devices and, after several Taser-related deaths in Georgia, called for a moratorium on their use.
In the past nine months, five people in Georgia, including three in metro Atlanta, have died after being shocked with Tasers by law enforcement officers. Nationally, 26 people who were shocked with Tasers while in custody died during that period --- as many as had died in the previous 4 1/2 years the guns had been in use.
The gun's manufacturer says that, based on autopsy results, none of the deaths has been directly caused by a Taser. Tom Smith, president and co-founder of Taser International, says the guns have been used safely by law enforcement officers in the field more than 45,000 times since 1999 and used safely more than 100,000 times including demonstration firings. The increase in the number of deaths of people shocked by Tasers simply reflects the increased use of the weapons, the company says.
"Tasers aren't dangerous," said Taser International spokesman Steve Tuttle. "They are just used in dangerous situations."
Officers with police departments that use Tasers agree. "I'm not familiar with any medical condition or physical impairment that would be adversely affected by use of a Taser," said Henry County police spokesman Lt. Ken Turner, who doesn't use a Taser himself but whose department has used them for about six months. "This is a perfectly safe weapon."
But those who question Taser use say that not enough independent research has been done on humans to prove that the weapons provide the less than lethal alternative to firearms that boosters say they do. And, although several doctors who have conducted research on Tasers say the 50,000 volts the gun packs shouldn't cause life-threatening injuries, they stop short of saying the weapons aren't strong enough to cause death.
'It hurts quite badly'
Fighting, drug use and psychotic behavior can increase the risk of heart failure, the doctors say. Some Taser critics wonder whether sweat produced by a person who is struggling may alter the effects of the electric shock.
"There's no 'smoking gun' on the Taser alone," said Dr. Alexander Isakov, an emergency medicine specialist at Grady Memorial Hospital and Emory University.
But because of the Georgia deaths, Macon police and the Forsyth County Sheriff's Department have shelved their Tasers, and College Park police decided to hold off on buying any. Taser International executives have scheduled a meeting Wednesday in Atlanta with representatives of 15 Georgia public safety agencies, where they'll discuss studies, done by the University of Missouri and paid for by Taser International, about the devices.
Many police officers who use Tasers call them an effective tool. When the trigger is pulled, the gun shoots out two wires that hook into a person's skin or clothing and deliver a jolt of 50,000 volts. Tasers allow officers to subdue combative suspects or prisoners with minimal risk to the target or the officer, say metro Atlanta law enforcement officers such as Coweta County sheriff's Maj. Jim Yarbrough, a Taser instructor. "It's a lot better than wrestling on concrete," Yarbrough said.
In confrontations, officers are taught to use varying degrees of force, in a scale escalating from oral commands to combat. Deadly force is the last option. Officers employing force not intended to kill rely mostly on pepper spray, batons or their own physical strength. But even when those methods work, police say, both officer and suspect can be injured during contact.
Officers say Tasers give them a measure of control that other forms of restraint don't because they're designed to deliver electrical current from a distance, as much as 21 feet. "It has cut down our physical altercations dramatically," said Sgt. Andy Briggs of the Coweta County Sheriff's Department.
Briggs, who was trained in Taser use by the weapon's manufacturer, wrote the Coweta department's training manual on Taser use based on the company's training program. As part of the training, each officer who will use a Taser must get shocked with one. Police say this shock treatment gives the officers a taste of what they're dishing out and so helps prevent abuse.
It was an experience Briggs said he'd rather not repeat. "My teeth gritted, I couldn't move, I had a grimace on my face, my jaws locked down and my lips pulled back," he said. "It hurts quite badly."
Others who have been on the receiving end of Tasers may consider that an understatement.
Walter Meeks, 40, of Dacula still has scars on his back from being shocked with a Taser at the Gwinnett County Jail during a scuffle with deputies last year. "I never felt that type of pain," said Meeks, who had been arrested for disorderly conduct. "It was unusual punishment."
And David Lee Anderson, 26, said he had an "out-of-body experience" when he was shocked three times with a Taser while in the Gwinnett jail on a disorderly conduct charge.
"I really felt like I left my body," Anderson said. "It was like I passed out. Then, when I woke up, I was being handcuffed."
Autopsy results
People respond differently to electric current, said Sakis Meliopoulos, a professor of electrical and computer engineering at Georgia Tech. Meliopoulos, who has testified as an expert witness in electrocution cases around the country, specializes in the safety of electrical systems.
"Some people can withstand the severe pain, some people may faint, or the pain could cause additional problems," Meliopoulos said. "In a person with pre-existing conditions, who knows how the body is going to respond?"
That has been an issue in the case of Frederick Williams, a 31-year-old computer technician from Lawrenceville. Williams died last month after being shocked with a Taser at the Gwinnett jail. Williams had epilepsy. He was acting erratically when police officers went to his house on what police say was a domestic violence call.
Williams' family has questioned whether a Taser should have been used. They believe it contributed to his death. The Gwinnett County medical examiner could not determine the cause of death in an initial autopsy. Williams' death is still being investigated.
"The Taser has never been named as the cause of any deaths," said Taser spokesman Tuttle, "and I fully expect the medical examiner will make the same finding in the case in Gwinnett."
Tuttle points to a study done on pigs, financed by Taser International, that found that the device had no fatal impact on the heart.
Noting that the study was done on animals, Amnesty International and the ACLU argue that more research is needed to determine how the guns affect humans.
The company released a summary of autopsy results from 42 deaths that occurred after a Taser was used. In the summary, heart disease or failure, a drug overdose and asphyxia were most often listed as the cause of death in the cases where a cause could be determined.
In its call for a moratorium on Taser use, Amnesty International said the medical examiners' rulings on the causes of deaths followed a "predictable pattern."
Some question the use of electric shock weapons on people who are often bathed in sweat. "Any time there is moisture on the skin, it acts as a conductor of electricity," said Dr. John Beshai, an Emory University cardiologist who specializes in electrophysiology.
Deaths Spur Taser Debate; Police Embrace Stun Guns, but a Series of Fatalities Brings Calls for Halt to Their Use
By Lateef Mungin and Rosalind Bentley, The Atlanta Journal Constitutional
The maximum-security inmate fought through six shots of pepper spray and sprinted toward Gwinnett sheriff's Capt. Carl Sims. Sims pulled his weapon, an electroshock gun called a Taser.
One shot, and the prisoner fell, immobilized.
"I thought that he had me, but the Taser dropped him instantly," Sims said. "We have never had a problem with that inmate again."
Results like that have convinced many metro Atlanta law enforcement officers that Tasers are the best way to control unruly prisoners or suspects without seriously injuring them. Fifteen metro Atlanta law enforcement agencies have added Tasers to their arsenals, and others are considering buying the weapons, which cost $400 to $800 apiece. The Georgia State Patrol purchased 200 this year for its 850 troopers. Forest Park police have issued them to all 57 of the city's patrol officers. Altogether, 4,500 law enforcement agencies in the United States and Canada use Tasers, says Taser International Inc., the gun's manufacturer.
But as use of Tasers rises, so do concerns about them.
On June 4, about 100 people rallied at the Gwinnett County Justice and Administration Center to protest the death of an inmate after he was shocked with a Taser. A legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union says Tasers have been involved in too many deaths and calls for more research if law enforcement officers intend to keep using them. Amnesty International says they can be used as torture devices and, after several Taser-related deaths in Georgia, called for a moratorium on their use.
In the past nine months, five people in Georgia, including three in metro Atlanta, have died after being shocked with Tasers by law enforcement officers. Nationally, 26 people who were shocked with Tasers while in custody died during that period --- as many as had died in the previous 4 1/2 years the guns had been in use.
The gun's manufacturer says that, based on autopsy results, none of the deaths has been directly caused by a Taser. Tom Smith, president and co-founder of Taser International, says the guns have been used safely by law enforcement officers in the field more than 45,000 times since 1999 and used safely more than 100,000 times including demonstration firings. The increase in the number of deaths of people shocked by Tasers simply reflects the increased use of the weapons, the company says.
"Tasers aren't dangerous," said Taser International spokesman Steve Tuttle. "They are just used in dangerous situations."
Officers with police departments that use Tasers agree. "I'm not familiar with any medical condition or physical impairment that would be adversely affected by use of a Taser," said Henry County police spokesman Lt. Ken Turner, who doesn't use a Taser himself but whose department has used them for about six months. "This is a perfectly safe weapon."
But those who question Taser use say that not enough independent research has been done on humans to prove that the weapons provide the less than lethal alternative to firearms that boosters say they do. And, although several doctors who have conducted research on Tasers say the 50,000 volts the gun packs shouldn't cause life-threatening injuries, they stop short of saying the weapons aren't strong enough to cause death.
'It hurts quite badly'
Fighting, drug use and psychotic behavior can increase the risk of heart failure, the doctors say. Some Taser critics wonder whether sweat produced by a person who is struggling may alter the effects of the electric shock.
"There's no 'smoking gun' on the Taser alone," said Dr. Alexander Isakov, an emergency medicine specialist at Grady Memorial Hospital and Emory University.
But because of the Georgia deaths, Macon police and the Forsyth County Sheriff's Department have shelved their Tasers, and College Park police decided to hold off on buying any. Taser International executives have scheduled a meeting Wednesday in Atlanta with representatives of 15 Georgia public safety agencies, where they'll discuss studies, done by the University of Missouri and paid for by Taser International, about the devices.
Many police officers who use Tasers call them an effective tool. When the trigger is pulled, the gun shoots out two wires that hook into a person's skin or clothing and deliver a jolt of 50,000 volts. Tasers allow officers to subdue combative suspects or prisoners with minimal risk to the target or the officer, say metro Atlanta law enforcement officers such as Coweta County sheriff's Maj. Jim Yarbrough, a Taser instructor. "It's a lot better than wrestling on concrete," Yarbrough said.
In confrontations, officers are taught to use varying degrees of force, in a scale escalating from oral commands to combat. Deadly force is the last option. Officers employing force not intended to kill rely mostly on pepper spray, batons or their own physical strength. But even when those methods work, police say, both officer and suspect can be injured during contact.
Officers say Tasers give them a measure of control that other forms of restraint don't because they're designed to deliver electrical current from a distance, as much as 21 feet. "It has cut down our physical altercations dramatically," said Sgt. Andy Briggs of the Coweta County Sheriff's Department.
Briggs, who was trained in Taser use by the weapon's manufacturer, wrote the Coweta department's training manual on Taser use based on the company's training program. As part of the training, each officer who will use a Taser must get shocked with one. Police say this shock treatment gives the officers a taste of what they're dishing out and so helps prevent abuse.
It was an experience Briggs said he'd rather not repeat. "My teeth gritted, I couldn't move, I had a grimace on my face, my jaws locked down and my lips pulled back," he said. "It hurts quite badly."
Others who have been on the receiving end of Tasers may consider that an understatement.
Walter Meeks, 40, of Dacula still has scars on his back from being shocked with a Taser at the Gwinnett County Jail during a scuffle with deputies last year. "I never felt that type of pain," said Meeks, who had been arrested for disorderly conduct. "It was unusual punishment."
And David Lee Anderson, 26, said he had an "out-of-body experience" when he was shocked three times with a Taser while in the Gwinnett jail on a disorderly conduct charge.
"I really felt like I left my body," Anderson said. "It was like I passed out. Then, when I woke up, I was being handcuffed."
Autopsy results
People respond differently to electric current, said Sakis Meliopoulos, a professor of electrical and computer engineering at Georgia Tech. Meliopoulos, who has testified as an expert witness in electrocution cases around the country, specializes in the safety of electrical systems.
"Some people can withstand the severe pain, some people may faint, or the pain could cause additional problems," Meliopoulos said. "In a person with pre-existing conditions, who knows how the body is going to respond?"
That has been an issue in the case of Frederick Williams, a 31-year-old computer technician from Lawrenceville. Williams died last month after being shocked with a Taser at the Gwinnett jail. Williams had epilepsy. He was acting erratically when police officers went to his house on what police say was a domestic violence call.
Williams' family has questioned whether a Taser should have been used. They believe it contributed to his death. The Gwinnett County medical examiner could not determine the cause of death in an initial autopsy. Williams' death is still being investigated.
"The Taser has never been named as the cause of any deaths," said Taser spokesman Tuttle, "and I fully expect the medical examiner will make the same finding in the case in Gwinnett."
Tuttle points to a study done on pigs, financed by Taser International, that found that the device had no fatal impact on the heart.
Noting that the study was done on animals, Amnesty International and the ACLU argue that more research is needed to determine how the guns affect humans.
The company released a summary of autopsy results from 42 deaths that occurred after a Taser was used. In the summary, heart disease or failure, a drug overdose and asphyxia were most often listed as the cause of death in the cases where a cause could be determined.
In its call for a moratorium on Taser use, Amnesty International said the medical examiners' rulings on the causes of deaths followed a "predictable pattern."
Some question the use of electric shock weapons on people who are often bathed in sweat. "Any time there is moisture on the skin, it acts as a conductor of electricity," said Dr. John Beshai, an Emory University cardiologist who specializes in electrophysiology.
Comments
Hide the following 33 comments
"Please do not detonate your bomb. Thank you."
28.07.2005 09:15
Yesterday, police entered a house to arrest a positively-identified man suspected of being a potential suicide bomber. There was every chance that he was armed and dangerous and being within a building would make it very difficult for the police to observe him before entering the property.
I can understand people's concern about widespread use of Tasers. In some situations there is certainly a possibility that they can be harmful. On the other hand, they have also been used thousands of times without causing significant harm. In a situation like this, it likely comes down to a choice to use a Taser or a gun and I'm quite sure we all understand which is the more dangerous.
So the next time there's a suspected suicide bomber that needs arresting, please volunteer yourself to go in with your "please don't detonate your bomb and be a good boy" approach. Personally, I'd prefer the police to take a minor risk to the suspect by Tasering them than run the major risk of an explosion that would be likely to kill the suspect and kill or injure both the police and even the neighbours.
If you're really concerned about a potential police state, the first thing you need to do is put aside your prejudice against the police in principle and understand that while sometimes the police do unpleasant things, they might actually be necessary and less harmful than the alternatives. The alternatives include, of course, murderous criminals killing as many innocent people as they can manage. Only by understanding the context of the police's actions can you usefully discriminate between the police having an excess of legitimised power, exceeding their legitimate powers, or acting quite reasonably to protect us from criminals who have no regard whatsoever for their own safety or anyone else's rights.
If you are too prejudiced to be willing to make these distinctions or too ignorant to be able to do so, your arguments will simply be ridiculous as here and you will be unable to make a credible contribution to the very important debate on police powers.
Zorro
Very Important Debate indeed
28.07.2005 09:42
Only one right view though according to Zorro -
Innocent lives must be taken to protect many more innocent lives - trust the cops - end of debate!
What should happen to officers who taser innocent people in Zorro's brave new world?
Pity its already closed.
Ever heard of a straw man argument?
28.07.2005 11:55
I didn't say "trust the cops - end of debate". To trust the police blindly in the face of the evidence is as big a mistake as to do what you seem to be suggesting, which is to distrust the police blindly.
Nor did I say that innocent lives must be taken to protect other innocent lives. That would imply that the police are running amok killing indiscriminately without any accountability. The police have killed one man clearly wrongly since terrorists killed 52 and injured 700 on 7/7. Given that they very quickly admitted their mistake and that the situation is being investigated by an independent body who will publish their report and call for prosecutions if necessary, I don't think you can reasonably say that there's been a cover-up or impunity over this matter.
What should happen to police that Taser innocent people? That's not the relevant question. The question is what powers do we give the police under which circumstances and how do we hold them to account when they break the rules. It makes no difference whether suspects turn out after the event to be innocent or guilty. The police are in the business of catching criminal suspects, not determining people's guilt or innocence. They are empowered to use "necessary force" to catch suspects and to prevent crime, up to and including killing people where they judge, rightly or wrongly in retrospect, that such a course of action is more reasonable than not using lethal or any other kind of force.
Please tick the following statements if you agree with them:
- The police should never use force under any circumstances.
- Using a weapon against a suspected suicide bomber that's non-lethal in 99.9% of circumstances is unreasonable. A stout trucheon and a pair of cuffs is always good enough.
- The police always lie.
- We don't need police, or government, or law.
- If we're nice to people, they'll always be nice in return.
- When I turn 16 I'm doing to do politics A-level, even though I already know far more than my stupid tutor.
Zorro
Sheer genius
28.07.2005 12:22
HA HA HA HA HA BONK
Man laughing his head off
ok
28.07.2005 12:43
.
And your alternative is?
28.07.2005 13:10
HA HA HA HA HA BONK "
So what's it to be, then?
- It should be investigated by the police, as was the case before the IPCC was set up in 2002.
- The report should be given straight to the Home Secretary and not published, so that he can decide for himself what needs to be done and whether we need to read it.
- All coppers are bastards so the officers responsible should just be thrown to the mob or tried in a kangaroo court of people who hate them in principle, regardless of the facts or circumstances.
- We can police ourselves. If we had anarchy, this would never have happened. (Entirely true, of course. No police, so no police killings. Won't stop anyone else though, and they're likely to be much less accountable than the Met currently are.)
- Cynicism and taking sides is so much more fun than dealing with the harsh realities of an imperfect world.
You might also want to take a look at who runs the IPCC:
In particular, the chair, Nick Hardwick, who's spent most of his career working for the rights of refugees and the homeless. And his deputy, John Wadham, who is probably this country's most successful civil rights lawyer who has spent most of his career suing or prosecuting the government and police.
You could be really cynical and say that these people (and the other commissioners) have now sold out and taken the King's Shilling. But accountability of the police seems to be what you want, and I'd much rather have this lot than the police investigating themselves, or a board of corporate directors and Daily Mail readers.
Zorro
Dem Strawmen, keep coming back again
28.07.2005 13:59
Interesting idea that people "hate them in principle" ...... wonder why that might be.
If I kill an innocent man in my job, I get tried by a jury of peers.
Why should this cop get an extra layer of protection from his peers?
Didn't you have a shift change at 2?
One law for us and none for them
I can only suppose...
28.07.2005 14:32
The procedures for complaining against the police and prosecuting them are different because the police have different powers and responsibilities under the law. Some of them in some circumstances are empowered to carry firearms and use them and this may be quite legitimate. I don't see anything wrong with that. You, on the other hand, are presumably not empowered because your job is different.
The law makes important distinctions between murder, manslaughter and justifiable homicide. We do not assume that every time a police officer kills someone it's necessarily unlawful. However, because it's always a very serious matter and of course always potentially unlawful, it's always investigated by an independent body.
Every other case of homicide is investigated by the police themselves. If you're arguing for the "same law for everyone", then that must be what you want unless you think that every killing by police should automatically be prosecuted regardless of the circumstances. I don't think that'd be a good use of public money or the police and courts' time and it wouldn't do anything either to make the police genuinely more accountable or indeed to make our streets safer.
At the risk of stating what I hope should be obvious, if there's a case to answer I'm happy to see the officers in court being tried by a jury. If they convict, I'm happy for them to be jailed. But I think that should be decided on the facts of the case, most of which we don't currently know, and doesn't affect the wider policy issue of whether "shoot to kill" is necessary and proportionate. If the facts were more widely known, they would prejudice the chance of a fair trial, which I think may be necessary but you probably don't.
Zorro
As short sighted as magoo ......
28.07.2005 15:23
What about a third option, ie that people living in the real world, have had the dubious pleasure of seeing the cops at work? That they have seen cops ignoring the law themselves, throwing round authority like a bunch of nursery school teachers, and stitching up working class people like kippers?
Now I bet you theres loads of people out there who have had those sort of experiences, but who have never got do far as developing a theory about the very nature of policing itself, nor have they contemplated how power will inevitably be abused. All they know is that whenever theres coppers on the scene, they don't behave very well? Hows that one for size?
You still haven't given any worthwhile explanation of why the normal route - CPS and courts aren't dealing with the matter. Cops get special treatment because they are special is a tautology - nothing more and nothing less.
Nick Hardwick's statement suggests that the IPCC has already decided that the copper killed de Menezes as part of the "urgent police priority of tracking down and bringing to justice those responsible for the recent London bombings and their vital work to prevent further outrages.”
He apparently doesn't think that putting 8 bullets into a man on a tube platform counts as a "further outrage" nor does he appear to remember that the whole thinking behind the setting up of the IPCC was to create a veneer of accountability .........
Anyone else who pumped an innocent man full of bullets, and apparently then lied about it.... (vaulting over turnstyles indeed) would be put in paid accommodation with extremely limited freedom of movement, not a hotel with his family at the taxpayers expense.
Sadly, right now, it appears that you'll still be here supporting the institutional cover-up to the hilt, unless IMC gets its comments section working to support their mission statement.
Aren't they missing you at Little Green Footballs yet?
Zorro kisses the arse of authority
You still haven't made your case
28.07.2005 15:57
I don't know where all this "stitching up the working class" stuff comes from. Working class people have just as much need of the help of police, and broadly speaking get it, as everyone else.
I thought I had given a good explanation of why the officers shouldn't go straight to court. And that's because the "normal CPS and courts" route that you describe isn't how it works. Complaints about offences are first investigated by the police who gather evidence and apprehend suspects. The public don't complain directly to the CPS and the CPS don't gather evidence. The CPS assess the evidence the police have gathered and decide whether it's sufficient to prosecute. In the case of complaints about the police, the IPCC does the investigation rather than the police themselves, and they forward it to the CPS if they think it merits it, just as the police do for every other case.
However, that's not good enough for you, because you don't like the IPCC either. So how would you devise a body to investigate complaints against the police and gather evidence? Or do you think every complaint against the police should go straight to the CPS and they take on an investigating/evidence gathering role? Or could everyone complain directly to the court without bothering to gather evidence or put a coherent brief before a prosecutor?
"Anyone else who pumped an innocent man full of bullets, and apparently then lied about it...."
I think we've already established that the police operate under different rules when it comes to shooting people, and that this is necessary unless you don't think the police should ever use firearms or by extension, any other kind of force.
"Sadly, right now, it appears that you'll still be here supporting the institutional cover-up to the hilt, unless IMC gets its comments section working to support their mission statement."
Or should it be:
"Sadly, right now, it's impossible for me to censor dissenting voices from the IMC norm which is based on (my) prejudice rather than fact. But hopefully a plaintive appeal to authority (IMC moderators) will prevent me from having any more of these difficult conversations."
You think that the police shooting an innocent man, quickly admitting it, and referring it to be investigated by an independent body with the power to recommend prosecutions is an "institutional cover-up". I can't imagine any system that tried to fairly balance the rights of people who complain against the police with the rights of the police themselves would satisfy you.
As for the IMC Mission Statement:
"The content of the Indymedia UK website is created through a system of open publishing: anyone can upload a written, audio and video report or a picture directly to the site through an openly accessible web interface. Through this system of 'Direct Media', Indymedia erodes the dividing line between reporters and reported, between active producers and passive audience: people are enabled to speak for themselves."
That's exactly what I'm doing. Speaking for myself, using open publishing. I don't represent any organisation, just myself. For the record, I'm not connected with the corporate media, the government, or law enforcement.
I don't see anything in the Mission Statement that says that people must oppose the government and all forms of authority regardless of the facts or circumstances. Perhaps you should suggest that they write it in, and I'll go somewhere else to debate with people that want to think critically about British society rather than simply have my prejudices reinforced by groupies who think that "dissent" is only cool when it's against the State.
Zorro
IMC MIssion statement
28.07.2005 16:18
That'd be the paragraph you had to disregard in order to find the "neutral bit" that you thought made your case.
What are you fighting for with your endless cop-lovin' comments Zorro? - Freedom from patriachy? - Justice? - Solidarity?
I think not.
However, you did try extra-hard with that reply, didn't you?
But, it doesn't change anything - your mission in spamming as many threads as possible with your pro-cop message is a distraction, a waste of time and effort - we know what you think - we can remind ourselves by buying the corporate newspapers if we think we're getting a bit shaky on the thoughts of unthinking cop lovers.
" Perhaps you should suggest that they write it in, and I'll go somewhere else to debate with people that want to think critically about British society rather than simply have my prejudices reinforced by groupies who think that "dissent" is only cool when it's against the State."
Heres some more from the editorial guidelines:
"Inherent in the mainstream corporate media is a strong bias towards Capitalism's power structures, and it is an important tool in propagating these structures around the globe. While the mainstream media conceal their manifold biases and alignments, we clearly state our position. Indymedia UK does not attempt to take an objective and impartial standpoint: Indymedia UK clearly states its subjectivity."
If you want a bulletin board - go find a bulletin board - theres enough of them around.
Selective readership
Justice
28.07.2005 17:15
"What are you fighting for with your endless cop-lovin' comments Zorro? - Freedom from patriachy? - Justice? - Solidarity?"
I didn't disregard any of the Mission Statement. I agree with it all and quoted the part that seemed to be most relevant. Everyone can read the whole thing and make up their own minds.
This debate is about freedom and justice. You ask what I'm fighting for and there's your answer.
Freedom encompasses many things but freedom from violence has to be pretty much at the top of the scale. This includes many things including war, but this particular debate is I hope about the violence of the bombers and the violence of the police.
At the risk of stating the obvious, we live in a democracy where people elect the government, the government make the laws, the police investigate lawbreaking and the courts decide culpability and punish offenders. This system is far from perfect - and I'm all for improving it in many ways - but it seems to be the least bad way of governing society. Some people, including no doubt many here, think other systems may work better. But I've yet to see one that's actually worked in practice on a large scale for any period of time better than the one we currently have.
The rule of law encompasses everyone. It's there to protect everyone and someone has to be charged with policing and some other people with judging. If we are to have freedom from violence - in other words, peace, then we need to have justice. Justice applies to everyone and everyone should be equal under the law. We don't have justice just for the police, or justice for everyone except the police, or more justice for one group rather than another.
I didn't want De Menezes to be shot. I wouldn't want anyone innocent to be shot. But I accept that there will be times when police will need to shoot and that they may not be able to be 100% certain (or 100% accurate) when they do. I'm happy (if you know what I mean) for suicide bombers to be shot in a situation where there seems no other alternative to protect innocent lives. I'd prefer them to be caught alive and unharmed. If you think the police should never shoot, then that means accepting that sometimes they may not be able to protect us from suicide bombers who quite clearly are intent to kill as many as possible and have done so very recently.
I'm posting here because I want justice for De Menezes and his family but I also want justice for the police. I won't apologise any more for the latter than for the former. I don't see a conflict between the two. I can see no more justice, or for that matter, logic, in proposing either that the police here are definitely murderers and must be punished, any more than saying that the police are within their rights to shoot and kill anyone under any circumstances. I haven't suggested either of these. I've simply said that it must depend on the facts of the situation and we don't currently know all of them.
Nothing would be served by having a society in which police are automatically prosecuted for killing, any more than one in which they had complete impunity. In the first, we might as well just take away their guns and leave ourselves entirely at the mercy of the bombers. In the second, we'd quite rightly be at the mercy of the whim of the police, which many here seem to think we are already, but I don't. If we are to have justice and freedom from violence, we have to balance the facts of each case, not automatically favour one group over another. I don't see how this makes me a "cop lover".
De Menezes and his family can't have justice at the expense of the police, nor can the reverse be true. We need someone as independent as possible to establish the facts and prosecute and convict as necessary. That is the system we currently have. It's not infallible, but it's as good as it currently gets.
Do not assume that I think we have traded the freedom of De Menezes to live for our freedom not to be bombed. Whatever the police's thoughts and motives, this clearly isn't the case. The guy wasn't a bomber, so killing him made no material difference to our safety from bombers. But it was, however, a consequence of a broad operation to protect us from bombers. That's an important distinction. We absolutely need to do everything possible to protect us from police malice or mistakes in these situations, but we also need to find a way of meeting lethal threats with force where necessary.
I'm really concerned about the increase of police powers. I can see how the current situation is likely to increase the scope of the state into many areas that are not justified or necessary to protect us from the various threats we face. But we can't start to have that debate and oppose unnecessary authoritarianism until we accept that some form of authority is necessary. Sometimes that authority takes the form of imperfect police making difficult judgements and getting it wrong. If it's a justifiable mistake, we can't criticise them for honestly trying to do a job where they don't make the rules. If it's a culpable mistake, we punish them accordingly. I can assure you I'll be the first person to complain if the outcome of this matter doesn't fit the facts that emerge, whether it's the police getting away with murder or the police officers being scapegoated for trying to do an honest job protecting us.
I welcome the debate about what the rules for police use of force should be. We need to understand that it's not the police that make them, but broadly speaking, us.
Let's have all the evidence first, then the verdict. Let's have all the arguments and then the conclusions. I don't see how anything I've said in this comment or elsewhere is contrary to IMC's stated policy: "for a world based on freedom, cooperation, justice and solidarity, and against environmental degradation, neoliberal exploitation, racism and patriarchy." I support that fully. Let's not assume that democracy isn't as good a way to achieve these as any other.
Zorro
Indymedia = Daily Mail online
29.07.2005 07:08
The reaction of certain posters here when they have their opinion challenged is frightening. A bunch of people who like to think of themselves as open-minded and free-thinking, but who in actual fact hurl abuse, childish insults and thinly-veiled threats at at anyone who disagrees with them. The level of censorship exercised by the Powers That Be is also far worse than anything you'll find on the message boards of the hated corporate media.
Though I have to say the irony can be quite entertaining, and the strongly held conviction that someone at MI5 has nothing better to do with their day than come and try to disrupt the inane ramblings of a bunch of wannabe revolutionaries always brings a smile to my face.
A
it's a matter of criminal pleadings, evidence and procedure...
14.07.2006 11:36
A MATTER OF EVIDENCE-
‘An officer’s statement after a police shooting.’
BY SALLY RAMAGE
How should a police officer be treated after he has shot dead a criminal suspect?
[A]
Per United Kingdom’s Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984-
[1] Like a suspect or a civilian witness;
[2] Required to give a statement as soon as possible;
[3] Isolated to prohibit collusion with other;
[4] Interrogated rather than interviewed, with every discrepancy and hole in his version of events regarded as possibly contradictory evidence?
Or
[B]
[1]Like a survivor of a critical incident-given time to de-escalate and mentally process the high-stress encounter before being extensively questioned,
[2] Such a police officer must be allowed to ‘walk back’ through the confrontation to clarify what took place.
[3] He/she should be interviewed using techniques that enhance and effectively" mine" memory
[4] His statement acquired in this manner should be regarded as truthful and well-intentioned until reliable evidence suggests otherwise?
According to the recommendations of a non-profit research organisation on police oversight and consulting, dedicated to influencing law enforcement policies and
practices in the United States of America and internationally, "A" is the preferred approach.
The foothold this group [A] is gaining has alarmed some prominent police psychologists and other knowledgeable observers who have spent much of their careers trying to make Approach "B" the standard after traumatic events such as officer-involved shooting. With terrorism being the main worry of most of the world’s countries today, this issue is vitally important. There is a need for uniformity of approach. As organised crime and terrorist groups have globalise and diversified their operations, they have based their activity on countries offering conditions most favourable to survival and expansion and as they continue to forum shop, police around the world must give them no chance to create havoc by way of diversified and contradicting criminal procedural laws – it is not only the shooting of criminal suspects that is the issue here, but the pursuit of criminals for the protection of the public, a broader issue. In the United Kingdom, no longer is a nation whose police forces carry no guns, the need for clarity in criminal evidence paramount and we must pay keen attention to other nations’ efforts in this field. How can we forget such cases as Director of Public Prosecutions v Smith ? Yet the submissions made that Anti-terrorism laws have flown in the face of Human Rights, due to the different meaning put to ‘self-defence’ and to the definition of the word ‘terrorism’ in the Anti-terrorism Statutes .
To this end, we can observe the oversight group, launched with money from the Ford Foundation and based in Los Angeles, known as PARC (Police Assessment Resource Centre) . Aiming to help police departments, especially in the United States of America "advance effective, respectful and publicly accountable policing," PARC now has research briefs of investigating, monitoring, advising and proposing "reform" recommendations for agencies and police oversight entities in California, New York, Oregon, New Mexico, Louisiana, Michigan, Idaho, and for other countries, including Greece.
According to its website the organization, PARC, also works with journalists to "improve" the "critical analysis" of law enforcement issues in the media. In addition, some plaintiffs' attorneys have been citing policy principles advanced by PARC in police-related lawsuits.
"PARC and its philosophy are surfacing in a wide variety of venues," declares Dr. Bill Lewinski, one behavioural scientist who strongly takes issue with the group's post-shooting proposals.
PARC offers a wide range of suggestions for changing police practices. After analyzing 32 officer-involved shootings and 2 in-custody deaths in Portland (Oregon, USA), for example, the group made 89 recommendations regarding Portland Police Bureau's training, tactics, policies and procedures. PARC's 266-page report of its findings, as well as other of its departmental analyses, can be downloaded from its website. The propelling force behind PARC is its founding director and president, an attorney. Bobb, who claims to be the world's "first police monitor," served as deputy general counsel to the Christopher Commission, which investigated Los Angeles Police Department after the Rodney King incident, and on the Kolts Commission, which investigated LASD. He currently "reviews and monitors" LASD on an on-going basis as special counsel to the Los Angeles Board of Supervisors.
The board of trustees at PARC has among the board,
a lawyer who has worked for the NAACP,
a representative of the Urban League,
the executive director of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights,
a former U.S. Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights,
an executive with the Los Angeles Times newspaper,
the former U.S. Attorney whose office prosecuted NYC officers in the Abner Louima case,
and 2 former law enforcement administrators.
In its Portland Report , PARC explains what it considers "best practices"
for dealing with an officer who has been involved in a shooting or an
in-custody death.
Among the PARC observations/recommendations are the following:-
*Just as it is "beyond dispute that witnesses should be interviewed as
soon as possible" after an occurrence, "best practice likewise dictates
that officers" should be questioned promptly, certainly no later than
several hours after a shooting”.
* "Contemporaneous interviews enhance the integrity of the process by reducing the likelihood that the officers' account of events will be deliberately contaminated (by deceit) or accidentally contaminated (i.e., where an officer's memory of the incident is subconsciously affected by what he or she hears from others)."
* "As a general rule, Homicide investigators interview civilians involved
in, or witnessing, a shooting...as soon as possible, regardless of their
emotional state. Often these civilians are taken from the scene...to
headquarters and persuaded to stay--often for many hours--until Homicide
has an opportunity to fully interview them. Police Officers should be treated no differently”.
* "There is no empirical support for the view that conducting an interview soon after a high-stress event necessarily produces unreliable testimony. It is not a persuasive argument that a waiting period of up to 3 days before extensive questioning is fairer for the involved officer and produces more accurate accounts because of reduction of stress and enhancement of memory”.
* PARC’s Report also objects to "informal, untaped 'pre-interviews' with officers."
* PARC does not see these ‘pre-interviews’ as contributing to more complete and better quality recall, and records its concern that they "might corrupt the integrity of
statements eventually made for the record."
* As to significant research indicating that officers' perceptions can be
distorted during a deadly force incident, PARC asserts, "waiting to
interview the officer will not affect these phenomena."
PARC asserts that delaying interviews "increases the possibility of officer collusion or inadvertent contamination of memory. Once the involved officers leave the crime scene, there is no one to prevent them from getting their stories straight."
PARC's recommendations as noted above find favour among some investigators and administrators. However Force Science News, an organisation familiar with police shootings’ cases, expressed serious concerns about the conclusions reached in the PARC Report.
"The conclusions and recommendations reached in this PARC Report are not based on scientific foundation," says Bill Lewinski, FSRC's executive director, who has nearly thirty years’ experience of law enforcement psychology. "This attitude reflects a belief that police officers are devious, that they engage in shootings out of their own will, and that they should be handled with the same degree of suspicion as any suspected criminal held in a shooting. In theory PARC's approach will lessen distrust of the police by the public but in reality it could lead to the opposite result because in many cases immediate and aggressive questioning of the involved officer is guaranteed to produce discrepancies, unwarranted suspicion, and problems in court.
Then, ultimately, when an unfounded prosecution of an officer fails, the public will not trust either its police officers or the court system. Every officer-involved shooting needs to be investigated thoroughly, but in a way that produces more factual disclosures and, in the end, the best possible representation of the truth. Lewinski notes: "There have been tens of thousands of experiments and
articles related to emotional intensity and its effect on perception and
memory. These help we understand about the true 'best practices' for
working with officers who have been involved in deadly force encounters.
They inform us of the types of information officer’s capture and do not
capture during a critical incident and the best ways to mine the memories
of an officer who has been in a life-threatening confrontation.
John Hoag, an attorney for multiple public safety labour organizations in Oregon said of the PARC Report, “Investigation of an officer-involved shooting needs to be approached with the understanding that when officers use deadly force, it's not just
another homicide," Mr. Hoag estimates he has personally responded to
some forty law enforcement shootings in the State of Oregon. “The overwhelming majority of homicide investigations are for murders, killings that are unquestionably not justified and for which guilty persons need to be arrested. In contrast, society employs officers to use deadly force when necessary. It is an essential job requirement and they are trained to use it only when it is appropriate and legal to do so. In virtually every police shooting, officers did what they had to do and what we hire them to do. They are not criminals nor are they civilians, and they should not be treated as such. Protecting their legitimate interests will actually yield more accurate statements. Even longer delays may be best. In most cases, the first night the officer won't sleep well, if at all and when the adrenalin peak runs out he may be so tired that he won't give the best statement either. A two-day delay allows for at least one good night's sleep. Rested, the officer can sort out better what actually happened as opposed
to what may be his mistaken impressions. This delay does not impede an investigation. An involved officer while still at the scene can advise as to injuries, location of offenders, evidence that needs protection and witnesses who should be questioned. I strongly favour the officer informally revisiting the scene with his
attorney, but without an investigator or video camera present, before submitting a statement. Walking through the scene under the same lighting conditions and seeing
how the physical evidence jibes with what the officer recalls helps identify how much perceptual distortion has occurred and helps the officer remember more accurately and fully exactly what happened. I've had many tell me that without a walk-through, there would have been many errors in what they said. Any statement given before rest and a walk-through should be recognized as having a high potential for inaccuracies.
Officers who have had to use deadly force want to give the most accurate statement possible explaining what they did and why they did it. The investigative approach used by the department should be one that encourages the officer to cooperate fully, as that is in everyone's best interest. Distrust is implicit in the PARC recommendation. If the officer is approached like a criminal by the very agency that employs him, he will be encouraged to exercise his right to remain silent. Society
will not benefit from that. The agency will not benefit, and the involved
officer will pay a horribly high price as well. You want the officer to come out of a shooting and a shooting investigation at peace with what happened, a stronger, better officer, not an embittered one. How he's treated is huge in the results you get, said Mr.Hoag.
It can be argued that such a procedure, of an involved officer advising as to evidence that needs protecting, etc. is NOT the same as a full interview as no transcript is made when such information is simply verbally related to investigators.
Dr. Alexis Artwohl said of the PARC Report, "PARC seems to think that after shooting officers are basically going to be liars, trying to cover up and elude" investigators seeking a truthful reconstruction. In the 21 pages of this PARC
report relating to post-shooting handling of officers, the need to prevent officers from colluding to ‘get their story straight’ is mentioned five times. I am not so naive as to believe that there are no police officers who lie. A small percentage of police officers may be unethical, immoral and corrupt.
However, in a democracy, we are not allowed to accuse everyone in a group of being dishonest just because a small percentage of the group may be. It is usually desirable to interview potential suspects and civilian witnesses as soon as possible after a violent event because they may disappear during a delay. I am not aware of a single case where that has happened with a police officer most officers will reliably comply with a directive not to discuss a shooting with anyone other than an attorney prior to giving a statement. Thus, the realistic risks of waiting to question an officer seem small compared to considerable benefits. It is well established that a significant percentage of officers experience perceptual distortions during the mental and physical hyper-stress of a shooting, ranging from auditory exclusion to frustrating memory gaps.
Concern about what will happen afterward--the media scrutiny, the investigations, potential disciplinary action, legal proceedings and job loss, the possibility of becoming a political scapegoat--only aggravate the alarm arousal. Any time you are at a high level of stress and anxiety it can temporarily impair your ability to remember things accurately and completely. Some officers can calm down very quickly and may feel in satisfactory condition to give a coherent statement promptly. However, most will benefit from ‘recovery time.’
Some researchers have concluded that nearly 40 per cent of officers experience a return of ‘lost’ details to their memories just by waiting, not only after shootings but after physical-force altercations as well. It is common after a critical incident for all survivors, including officers, to second -guess themselves and/or others. This second-guessing is emotionally based and almost invariably irrational. Insisting on immediate statements from officers who are still experiencing high levels of emotional arousal
increases the risk that they will make emotionally based statements fraught with second guessing and perceptual distortions that are not an accurate reflection of what really happened."
Officer Levi Bolton , a 31-year police veteran, a former report-writing instructor, a trustee with the Phoenix Law Enforcement Association, said of the Report, “The model should be designed to fit the rule, not the exception. Common practices shouldn't be built around deviancy. It is well established that a significant percentage of officers experience perceptual distortions during the mental and physical hyper-stress of a shooting, ranging from auditory exclusion to frustrating memory gaps.
Concern about what will happen afterward--the media scrutiny, the
investigations, potential disciplinary action, legal proceedings and job
loss, the possibility of becoming a political scapegoat--only aggravate the
alarm arousal. Delaying an officer's questioning, even through a complete sleep cycle, has been endorsed by the Psychological Services Section of the IACP , which reflects the collective wisdom of the most experienced police psychologists”.
These professionals have concluded that this delay will yield more coherent and accurate statements.
FSRC will be conducting a study in the summer of 2006, funded by 40,000 pounds sterling from the Board of the London Metropolitan Police which will consolidate this research. The object of this study will be to examine and effects of stress on psychomotor skills, perception and memory and then to investigate a variety of methods for their effectiveness in tapping memories, in short, exploring what science has to say rather than relying on attitude and opinion.
ENDS
References
Inquiry into Legislation against Terrorism, Vol 2, Lord Lloyd of Berwick (1996)
Third Report for the session 2005-2006 of the Joint Committee on Human Rights - Counter-
Terrorism Policy and Human Rights: Terrorism Bill and related matters, Volume I (HL Paper 75-I, HC 561) and Volume 2 (HL 75-II/HC 561-II); 5 December 2005 -
Amnesty International; United Kingdom Human Rights: A Broken Promise; 23 February 2006
The International Association of Chiefs of Police. SEE website
Islamic Human Rights Commission; Submission to the Home Office in response to Discussion Paper, “Counter-terrorism powers: Reconciling Security and Liberty in an Open Society”; August 2004 -
London Metropolitan Police. Website
PARC, whose website is
Police Community website
Resolution 42/149 of the General Assembly of the United Nations, of 7 December 1987 -
Portland newspaper, The Portland and Mercury.
List of statutes
Offences against the Person Act 1861
Criminal Justice Act 1967
Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984
Anti Terrorism Act 2005
List of cases
Brady v Maryland [1963] Supreme Court, USA
DPP v Majewski, [1977] AC 443, [1976] 2 All ER 142, [1976] 2 WLR 623, 62 Cr App Rep 262, 140 JP 315, [1976] Crim LR 374, 120 Sol Jo 299
DPP v Smith [1961] AC 290, House of Lords
R v Ashman(1858) 1 F & F 88
R v Cox (1818) R & R 362 (CCR)
R v Vickers [1957] 2 QB 664
SALLY RAMAGE
Homepage:
http://www.sallyramage.net
more important info on the taser debate
14.07.2006 11:53
A large insurer of law enforcement agencies has issued a position paper on Tasers that cites 10 risk management considerations for their safe and effective use and directly refutes concerns of activist groups that allege these popular control tools are dangerous and inhumane.
In contrast to intense criticism from Amnesty International and the American Civil Liberties Union, which have called for a moratorium or tight restrictions on Taser use, the League of Minnesota Cities Insurance Trust has concluded after a thorough review of available studies that these weapons have "resulted in a considerable reduction of arrest-related injuries to both officers and subjects" and are a "safe and effective" means of "controlling dangerous behaviour and overcoming resistance."
A paper titled "Police Use of Conductive Energy Devices (Tasers)," the complete "risk management memo" can be accessed at
www.lmnc.org/search97cgi/s97is.dll
The report concludes that while Tasers are highly effective in helping officers achieve control over violent and resistive subjects, they pose a very low risk of injury to the individual arrested. Scientific and medical studies have...largely debunked claims that Tasers have been a primary cause of death for individuals who have perished while in police custody.
esearch indicates that when used appropriately, Tasers "generally present a very low risk of danger to the subject....Law enforcement agencies have reported notable declines in injuries to officers and arrestees once Tasers are introduced into a confrontation. Tasers have alleviated the need for deadly force in many encounters with armed individuals. In many cases, an officer's mere display of the device is sufficient to overcome an individual's willingness to fight or resist.
No device has ever been--and perhaps never will be--100% safe, the report acknowledges. However, "substantial evidence" from current research indicates that Tasers pose scant risk to healthy individuals.
If drug impaired or mentally ill subjects are at any greater risk, as some critics contend, medictal professionals who have thoroughly studied the issues believe...the risk stems from multiple applications of electrical energy," the report states. The report recommends a limit to the duration of electrical discharge cycles to no more than 15 to 20 seconds.
The report points out that arrestees may be already in a medical danger zone before police arrive. Such influences as cocaine and methamphetamine and extreme mental/physical states like excited delirium can provoke a life-threatening cardiac event, for example, regardless of police intervention.
A report on Taser safety from the Canadian Police Research Centre in 2005 concludes that existing studies indicate that the risk of cardiac harm from a Taser application is very low. In addition, the CPRC found there is no definitive research or evidence to suggest that Taser use has caused death.
The Trust report summarizes the findings of half a dozen studies . The report states that Tasers were effective for 90% of the time that fired probes struck on target. Ineffectiveness was tied to suspects' thick clothing, misses generally to deployment during foot pursuits. Once Tasers were on the street, excessive force complaints declined more than 25%, subject injuries more than 24% and officer injuries more than 23%. The devices were credited with preventing a dozen suicides.
njuries to subjects and officers are reported as low in Taser deployments when compared with other use-of-force situations. Of subjects Tasered, 71% were impaired by alcohol, mental illness or delusion.
These are ten risk management considerations to help minimize the risks of using conductive energy devices:
1. Involve your local governing body in deciding whether to equip officers with Tasers. This lets local politicians weigh in on Taser issues "while they are more abstract," rather than being confronted by them "for the first time after an emotionally charged incident has occurred." Optimally, local officials should be well versed in the benefits and risks of Taser use before they need to respond to a media or citizen inquiry about police use of the devices.
2. Strongly consider the Taser X26 rather than the M26, which uses more wattage to incapacitate a subject. The X26, with its digital pulse controller and lower wattage, "increase [es] the margin of electrical safety."
3. Training should reflect "multiple applications, particularly continuous cycling for periods exceeding 15-20 seconds may increase the risk to the subject and should be avoided when practical." If you have not gained control after 15-20 seconds, "reassess and consider another force option or disengagement." On the other hand, the memo points out, "continuous cycling may be a very prudent choice when the apparent alternative is escalation to deadly force."
(Dr. Bill Lewinski, executive director of the Force Science Research Centre, told Force Science News that the Centre "encourages only limited use of more than 3 Taser applications until further research results are known about the safety of frequent and repeated applications.")
4. Be sure policy and training providing guidelines for when to use the Taser in the probe mode versus the drive-stun mode.
5. If you're going to use a Taser, "do so before everyone is exhausted...as soon as it becomes apparent that arrest needs to occur and that lower-level force options are unlikely to work" or are otherwise inappropriate. "[P]prolonged struggle heightens the risk to both the officer and the subject." Taser use may accentuate "the negative physiological effects of physical exhaustion" and respiratory impairment may become a concern when a Taser is used during, or at the end of, an extended struggle.
6. "Pregnancy contraindicates [Taser] use because of the risk of miscarriage. With pregnancy, [Taser] use is clearly preferable to a firearm if the situation warrants deadly force, but is less justifiable if the situation does not require a firearm."
7. "Try to avoid discharging through probes placed on the head. Scientific evidence suggests that electrical outputs delivered to the head are capable of producing seizures."
8. "Carefully consider the ramifications of [Taser] use on children and the elderly." Backlash from the public (including judges and jurors) may be strong in these cases, and people with smaller bodies may have "a lower margin of safety with regard to electrical currents." However, the paper cautions against "blanket prohibitions" that may expose officers and others "to unreasonable risks of danger due to the alternatives."
9. Give careful consideration regarding the use of Tasers on officers as a part of their training. "Officers are better equipped to defend their use of the device on the witness stand if they have themselves experienced" Taser incapacitation. However, "occasional injuries" have been reported because of Taser discharges in training. The Trust acknowledges, "there is no clear solution to this dilemma," but stresses that it should be "recognized and resolved thoughtfully."
10. "As with other force transactions, it is imperative that officers prepare accurate and detailed reports" of Taser use. Reports should document: the circumstances leading to Taser deployment...verbal commands given...the subject's response...why Taser was selected instead of other less severe force options...where the probes struck the suspect...the approximate number of cycles delivered...and how the situation was resolved.
SALLY RAMAGE
e-mail:
sallyramage@hotmail.com
Homepage:
http://www.sallyramage.net
DIG EVEN DEEPER...
29.08.2006 01:31
LAW/UNITED KINGDOM AND EUROPE
A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF CORPORATE FRAUD SALLY RAMAGE
A Comparative Analysis of Corporate Fraud: Book Fourexamines
corporate fraud in the United Kingdom compared with that of two civil
law neighboring countries, France and Germany, as well as the United
States. The objective of the study is to discover how fraud occurs, how
the two different legal systems treat fraud, contributing factors, and if
recommendations were made to authorities in an attempt to combat
this illegal activity.
The UK can learn much from the French legal system and the way
France prosecutes corporations. Germany’s Criminal Code is equally
comprehensive in its prescriptive definitions of fraud, especially
corporate fraud. Although the UK is striving for a general law against
fraud, the UK Fraud Offence Bill is very inadequate, lacking detailed
solutions. The UK has become entrenched in upholding legal privilege,
bowing to intense lobbying by the legal profession. And the use of
electronic evidence, vital in prosecuting modern corporate fraud,
remains overlooked.
The attitude toward corporate fraud in the UK remains laissez-faire. By
analyzing corporate fraud in the US, France, and Germany, author
Sally Ramage highlights examples that the UK can take from these
countries that combat corporate fraud without derogation of established
international human rights.
Sally Ramage, a member of numerous scholarly
organizations, is an established author of law books
and articles. She has been a visiting university law
lecturer for three years. A Comparative Analysis of
Corporate Fraudis Ramage’s eighth law textbook.
J.DOE
SCIENTIFIC INFORMATION ON TASERS
01.09.2006 23:35
From NEW SCIENTIST, 12 NOVEMBER 2005, article
“Do non-lethal Taser stun guns really offer police the safe alternative to firearms that their makers promise?
ARTICLE by PAUL MARKS
Placed on the Taser article debate as fair use for educational purposes…
“ A young woman screams in pain and falls from the open door of her SUV onto the tarmac… Seconds earlier , a florida traffic cop had fired his Taser stun gun at her, delivering a 50,000 volt shock and leaving her convulsing in agony on the roadside…………………………………………………………..
The use of such apparently disproportionate force to arrest a non-violent person seems a clear-cut infringement of civil liberties… Critics say the incident is an example of the way the use of Tasers is escalating in countries where police are armed with this less-lethal weapon. “Tasers are suffering from mission creep”, says Nick Lewer, who studies conflict resolution at the University of Bradford in the UK. “From being an alternative to lethal firearms they are now becoming an indiscriminate compliance tool”.
Lewer’s research shows Tasers are being used against people who pose no risk, and on people who are already restrained… Taser incidents that Lewer studied were against handcuffed people. What’s more, some people are being shocked more than once in a bid to incapacitate them.
Each shock lasts 5 seconds and induces excruciating muscular spasms. Epidemiologist Viktor Bovberg of University of Virginia School of Medicine in Charlottesville studied Taser use in the Los Angeles area from 1995 to 2004 with colleagues John Kenny and Bosseau Murray from Penn State University.
They found that 46% of people complied with police commands after one shock, 34% after two shocks , 14% after three shocks and 6% after four shocks or more.
Graham Cooper, head of the United Kingdom’s Defence Sub-Committee on Medical Implications of Less-Lethal Weapons (DOMILL), which approved the Taser for United Kingdom Police in specialist firearms teams, says officers should avoid multiple shocks. “If they have to shock somebody five or six times, there is something fundamentally wrong with THEIR APPROACH and it is plainly not working”, Cooper told NEW SCIENTIST….In its tests DOMILL found that Taser pulses were not sufficient to trigger extra heartbeats or chaotic contraction (ventriculat fibrillation) in BEATING GUINEA PIG HEARTS IN VITRO. AND HUMAN HEARTS ARE MUCH MORE RESISTANT to such interferance, says COOPER…
In many cases people had a drug and alcohol induced condition called EXCITED DELIRIUM when they were struck. THERE IS SPECULATION THAT PEOPLE WITH THIS CONDITION ARE MORE LIKELY TO SUFFER A FATAL CARDIAC ARRHYTHMIA WHEN TASERED THAN OTHERS.
DOMILL ran tests ON SHEEP TISSUE in which they steeped the cardiac fibres, THE HEART’S ELECTRICAL CONDUCTORS, in seven recreational drugs. (see article in EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF PHARMACOLOGY, Volume 518, page 123). They found that “angel dust” and ecstacy seriously interfered with the heart’s electrical timing signals and that these drugs on their own can induce fatal cardiac arrhythmias….
Mike Massine from the Canadian Police Research Centre in Victoria, British Columbia said that Police should avoid using a Taser on such people if they can. Massine trawled 4600 TASER INCIDENTS FROM US, UNITED KINGDOM, CANADA and AFGHANISTAN and analysed those incidents in which the person Tasered was suffering from such drug taking…He found around ONE THOUSAND SUCH CASES (out of 4600 cases) . Symptoms of drug use include profuse sweating, high body temperature,wide-eyed stare,high pain tolerance, self-harm, unintelligible speech….
Although Taser the company, has seen off 5 lawsuits for wrongful deaths or injury, there is still uncertainty about the safety of Tasers… UNITED KINGDOM POLICE now hope to use Tasers outside specialist firearms units…
SMUGLING OF TASERS IS RIFE. THEY ARE OFTEN ADVERTISED ON E-BAY, though the company forbids their re-sale. AND PIRATED VERSIONS ARE NOW BEGINNING TO APPEAR IN CHINA….Said David Webb , an engineer at Leeds University, “Governments and the United Nations must now get involved to control and certify these systems as safe”.
ENDS
Sally Ramage
e-mail:
sallyramage@hotmail.com
Homepage:
http://sallyramage.demonweb.co.uk
AT LEAST SEVEN FEET AWAY FROM THE SUBJECT...
09.09.2006 11:48
The probes, when fired into a target, deliver pulses of energy that cause involuntary muscular contractions in the striated muscle tissue between the contact points of the probes. It's important to note that the human heart is not made of striated muscle tissue, and is not affected by the TASER wave energy. The striated muscle tissue that is affected essentially contracts causing a pain similar to severe muscle cramping most of us have experienced at some point in our lives. The brain's desire to release the muscle cramp is over-ridden by the TASER wave energy pulses which continue to contract the muscle.
When you pull the trigger on the TASER ECD (M26 or X26), the probes are fired and a five-second energy delivery is initiated. That five seconds can be extended or cut short. Multiple five second bursts can be delivered, but TASER emphasizes the need to gain control of the subject TASERed as quickly as possible. Multiple five second bursts should not be viewed as "perfectly okay" or even desirable with a highly combative subject. The TASER wave energy delivered in five seconds, circumstances and officer survival considerations permitting, should be sufficient to get the subject handcuffed or otherwise restrained so that additional energy bursts are not required.
The effect of the TASER needed to be quantified, and TASER did so using the M26 as its benchmark. The term "Muscular Disruption Unit" or MDU for short, was developed to express how much muscular control was lost by the target in the striated tissue between the probes. As the benchmark, the M26 was rated at 100 MDUs. Evolution in the probe design and energy delivery system from the M26 to the X26 resulted in a lower power use by the X26, but a greater MDU rating. The X26 carries an MDU rating of 105, making it five percent more effective than the M26.
Sally Ramage
freely available over the counter....
16.09.2006 08:01
The Associated Press State & Local Wire
Minnesota stores will soon be able to sell stun guns as powerful as those used by police, despite growing concerns about the weapon's safety and occasional fatalities. No permit or training is required in Minnesota for the $999 consumer model of the Taser, which is already available on the Internet.
The Taser, an acronym for Thomas A. Swift Electric Rifle, delivers 50,000 incapacitating volts to its victims by way of two barbed darts attached to 15 feet of wire. The Star Tribune reported Sunday that it has documented 105 cases nationwide since 1983 in which a person died after being shocked by police with an electric stun weapon. Three people have died in Minnesota in the past 14 months, the newspaper said.
News accounts of 14 of the deaths nationwide quote coroners, medical examiners or forensic pathologists as saying the Taser may have been a contributing factor. In the Minnesota cases, the Star Tribune said, public records do not cite a Taser as a factor in two deaths, and the information wasn't available on the third. A spokesman for Taser International Inc., of Scottsdale, Ariz., told the newspaper the weapons don't kill, but actually save lives. "We know that Tasers are used every day, and we will be involved in tragic incidents involving in-custody deaths that are very similar to in-custody deaths that have occurred when Tasers have not been used," Steve Tuttle said. "We have never been listed as a direct or primary cause of death in our company's existence."
When the Taser is used to prevent a dangerous situation from becoming worse, the company contends, the weapon should get credit for saving lives. Using that standard, they contend that 4,000 lives have been saved in the past five years.
Taser International says about 5,400 law-enforcement agencies use the weapon, including 219 in Minnesota.
It's prohibited in at least seven states, including Wisconsin, and some cities, including Chicago, New York City and Washington, D.C. While it's legal to carry one in Minnesota, it's a felony to possess one in Wisconsin.
At least two other men have died in Minnesota after being shocked by a Taser:………………..
J.DOE
Hmmmm!
29.09.2006 11:53
the International Traffic in Arms Regulations- 2003
The International Traffic in Arms Regulations (“ITAR”) have recently been amended to implement a Congressional mandate that exporters of U.S. Munitions List(“USML”) articles must provide the Department of State a report containing all
shipment information, including a description of the item, quantity, value, port of
exit, end-user and country of designation of the item following each export. The
amendment also requires exporters to use electronic filing for export information
through the Automated Export System (“AES”) for items identified in the
Commerce Control List and the Department of State’s USML that require a
Shipper’s Export Declaration (“SED”). The AES is the electronic equivalent of filing with the U.S. Bureau of Customs and Border Protection (“BCBP”) a paper Form No. 7525V, SED. This electronic filing of export information is mandatory for export of USML articles, unless a written exception is granted by the Department of State. Implementation of the electronic filing of the export information using the AES system for shipments of USML articles was mandatory as of October 18, 2003. Exporters, however, are required to file a paper copy of the AES document with the BCBP until December 18, 2003, to ensure proper transition from the paper to electronic reporting. The amendment also requires that oral, visual, or electronic transmissions of technical data and defense services, which had not been previously monitored by the BCBP, be reported directly to the Department of State regardless of the type of ITAR authorization, whether a license, agreement or exemption. Exporters must provide the new Department of State report directly to the Directorate of Defense Trade Controls (“DDTC”). A copy of the report shall also be provided to the BCBP upon request for those shipments that are exported using a U.S. Port.DDTC is finalizing its system for direct electronic reporting of export data, and electronic reporting will be mandatory on January 18, 2004, for reporting exports against DSP-5 technical data licenses, Manufacturing License Agreements, and Technical Assistance Agreements. Mandatory electronic reporting for all licenses and agreements to DDTC is being delayed in order to ensure that AES is fully operational before DDTC implements the direct reporting requirement. DDTC
anticipates reporting will include the applicant’s registration code, the USML
category of the technical data or defense service, license and/or exemption number,
and country of ultimate and, if applicable, intermediate destination.
Until the electronic reporting system is operational, reporting the export of technical data under a Form DSP-5 and defense services under a Manufacturing License Agreement or Trade Assistance Agreement will require the following:
For reporting exports of technical data that are licensed on a Form DSP-5, the applicant must selfvalidate the initial export on the original DSP-5 and return the license to DDTC. Exports of additional copies of licensed technical data would be subject to the exemption provided in Section125.4 of the ITAR. For initial export of technical data and defense services using an agreement or a license, the export must be reported by letter to DDTC with the attention line reading “Initial Export Notification forAgreement (or License)” with the agreement or license number referenced.In the event technical data authorized by a license or agreement is exported using a U.S. Port, the exporter must file the export information in accordance with Section 123.22(b)(3)(iii) of the ITAR, which requires that effective January 18, 2004, the exporter provide export data electronically to DDTC. The technical data shipment must be accompanied by a copy of the electronic notification sent to DDTC and must be made available to BCBP upon request.
J.Doe
keeping tabs on it
01.11.2006 13:15
Teen Dies After Police Stun Gun Shooting(AP) - JERSEYVILLE, Ill.-A teenager carrying a Bible and shouting "I want Jesus" was shot twice with a police stun gun and later died at a St. Louis hospital, authorities said.In a statement obtained Tuesday by The Associated Press, police in Jerseyville, about 40 miles north of St. Louis, said 17-year-old Roger Holyfield would not acknowledge officers who approached him and he continued yelling, "I want Jesus."Police tried to calm the teen, but Holyfield became combative, according to the statement. Officers fired the stun gun at him after he ignored their warnings, then fired again when he continued struggling, police said.Holyfield was flown to St. Louis' Cardinal Glennon Hospital after the confrontation Saturday; he died there Sunday, police said.An autopsy was planned for Tuesday.The statement expressed sympathy to Holyfield's family but said city and police officials would not discuss the matter further.Calls Tuesday to Jerseyville Police Chief Brad Blackorby were not immediately returned. The department has been using stun guns for about five months, according to the statement.In a report released in March, international human rights group Amnesty International said it had logged at least 156 deaths across the country in the previous five years related to police stun guns.The rise in deaths accompanies a marked increase in the number of U.S. law enforcement agencies employing devices made by Taser International Inc. of Scottsdale, Ariz. About 1,000 of the nation's 18,000 police agencies used Tasers in 2001; more than 7,000 departments had them last year, according to a government study.Police had used Tasers more than 70,000 times as of last year, Congress' Government Accountability Office said.Amnesty International has urged police departments to suspend the use of Tasers pending more study. Taser International said the group's count was flawed and falsely linked deaths to Taser use when there has been no such official conclusion.The city of St. Louis also drew unwanted attention for crime this week when it was named the most dangerous U.S. city by Morgan Quitno Press. The ranking looked only at crime within St. Louis city limits, not its metro area.---On the Net:Taser International,
UPSET
1.6 million dollar orders in the last three months...
21.02.2007 13:44
Taser International Inc., the world's largest maker of stun guns, said fourth-quarter earnings rose more than 1200 PERCENTAGE as the company increased sales of the weapons to foreign law enforcement agencies.
Net income surged to $2.32 million, or 4 cents a share, from $179,126, or break even, a year earlier. Revenue jumped 53 percent to a record $19.3 million, the Scottsdale, Arizona-based company said today in a statement.
Taser's products are gaining acceptance among U.S. police departments, while law-enforcement agencies in FRANCE have begun purchasing the electric stun guns.
The company recorded $1.6 MILLION IN ORDERS FOR TASER GUNS from FRENCH LAW ENFORCEMENT AGENCIES IN THREE MONTHS TO JANUARY 2007.
McKay predicted earnings per share of 4 cents on revenue of $18 million to $20 million. He rates the shares a ``buy'' and doesn't own any.
Shares of Taser rose 20 cents yesterday to $8.32 in Nasdaq Stock Market composite trading.
Seven product liability suits filed against Taser were dismissed during the fourth quarter. About 50 such cases are pending and 30 lawsuits have been dismissed or won by the company through the end of the fourth quarter.
The company said it will make a final, $8 million payment late in the first quarter to settle $21.8 million in shareholder lawsuits. Taser agreed in August to pay $20 million as part of the settlement and $1.75 million in stock for the plaintiffs' attorneys' fees.
Last month, Taser introduced the C2 ``PERSONAL PROTECTOR STUN GUN '' at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. The new version starts at $299 and the company will begin shipping it in April. Purchasers must first complete a legally required background check before they can activate their Tasers either over the Internet or by phone.
On Jan. 11, Taser filed suit against STINGER Systems Inc., accusing it of selling products that infringe on Taser's patent suit against rival stun-gun maker BESTEX. last May.
TASER WATCH
POLICIES OM TASER USE NEEDED
02.06.2007 11:43
A man who died after a confrontation with police in Seat Pleasant on Saturday afternoon was subdued by officers who used stun guns on him after he was handcuffed, two law enforcement sources said yesterday.
Marcus D. Skinner, 22, received at least one Taser shock from each of two officers, one of them from Fairmount Heights, the other from Prince George's County, said the sources, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing. The officers used their Tasers sequentially, not simultaneously, one of the sources said.
After being handcuffed, Skinner remained combative; he reportedly spit at officers and may have tried to kick them, one source said. At one point, Skinner's legs were bound with a cloth restraint, though it was unclear whether that occurred before or after the Tasers were used, the two sources said.
Tasers, which resemble pistols, deliver 50,000-volt shocks and can be used to shoot probes into a suspect or be applied directly to someone's body. The two officers applied their Tasers to Skinner, one of the law enforcement sources said.
The county police department's policy on the use of Tasers does not prohibit employing them on a handcuffed suspect. The policy says Tasers can be used "to control a dangerous or violent subject when lethal force does not appear to be justified."
Tasers can also be used when other tactics to control a suspect have been ineffective, when the suspect is actively resisting and when it would be unsafe to approach within reach of the suspect, the policy states.
Dean Jones, treasurer of the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 89, which represents most county officers, said a suspect "can still kick someone's head off when handcuffed, particularly if he's had any martial arts training."
Prince George's police and officials with the state's attorney's office are investigating the circumstances around the death. County police and state's attorney's officials said they could not comment on the investigation because it is ongoing.
Skinner's sister, Jamala Smith, 30, said yesterday that an official in the state medical examiner's office said an autopsy on her brother had been completed but that pathologists were awaiting the results of toxicology tests. She said the official did not tell her whether a cause of death had been determined.
Officers endangered Skinner's life by using Tasers, Smith said. "They could have used pepper spray, a baton, anything but a Taser," she said.
Public information officers for the county police have said that investigators were still sorting out which officers used Tasers. Officers from the Seat Pleasant, Fairmount Heights and county police departments responded about 3:30 p.m. Saturday in the 6800 block of Greig Street.
This is how the incident unfolded, according to one of the law enforcement sources and other officials:
A group of mostly children were at an apartment complex's pool Saturday afternoon when Skinner began fighting with a woman. Skinner may have also chased some girls around the pool, the source said. Skinner did not live in the complex but grew up in Seat Pleasant and had friends in the neighborhood, his sister said.
A lifeguard called police.
An officer from nearby Fairmount Heights was the first to arrive. By the time a Seat Pleasant officer arrived, the Fairmount Heights officer had Skinner on the ground and was preparing to handcuff him. The Seat Pleasant officer helped handcuff Skinner.
A county ambulance arrived after being called for the woman who was allegedly assaulted. The woman declined to go to the hospital, and the paramedics left at 3:50 p.m., said Mark Brady, chief spokesman for the county fire department.
About that time, a second Fairmount Heights officer and a county police officer arrived.
Skinner tried to spit on the officers, one of the law enforcement sources said, and the first Fairmount Heights officer to arrive used a Taser on him. The county officer later also used his Taser on Skinner, the source said.
The county police officer took Skinner in his cruiser to Prince George's Hospital Center in Cheverly.
By the time they arrived, Skinner was unresponsive. He was pronounced dead at 5:20 p.m.
The police departments involved did not identify any officers in the incident.
Smith said her brother lived with another sister in District Heights. She said he had had troubles off and on but was trying to get his life together.
According to Prince George's court records, Skinner in recent years has been arrested on suspicion of a handful of petty crimes, including possession of marijuana and stealing car plates. All of the charges were dropped by prosecutors or dismissed.
viewer
Literature Review
08.06.2007 12:25
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"E.R.A., Handgun Control, and the Death Penalty." American Bar Association Journal 68 (1982): 266-67.
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Viewer
Mass.,USA Taser Legislation
26.06.2007 13:28
ENACTED
The Commonwealth of Massachusetts
----------------------------------
In the Year Two Thousand and Three
----------------------------------
Chapter 170
AN ACT RELATIVE TO THE POSSESSION OF ELECTRONIC WEAPONS.
Whereas, The deferred operation of this act would tend to defeat its purpose, which is to authorize forthwith certain possession and use of electronic weapons, therefore it is hereby declared to be an emergency law, necessary for the immediate preservation of the public convenience.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives in General Court assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:
SECTION 1. Chapter 140 of the General Laws is hereby amended by striking out section 131J, as appearing in the 2002 Official Edition, and inserting in place thereof the following section:-
Section 131J. No person shall possess a portable device or weapon from which an electrical current, impulse, wave or beam may be directed, which current, impulse, wave or beam is designed to incapacitate temporarily, injure or kill, except: (1) a federal, state or municipal law enforcement officer, or member of a special reaction team in a state prison or designated special operations or tactical team in a county correctional facility, acting in the discharge of his official, duties who has completed a training course approved by the secretary of public safety in the use of such a device or weapon
designed to incapacitate temporarily; or (2) a supplier of such devices or weapons designed to incapacitate temporarily, if possession of the device or weapon is necessary to the supply or sale of the device or weapon within the scope of such sale or supply enterprise. No person shall sell or offer for sale such device or weapon, except to federal, state or municipal law enforcement agencies. A device or weapon sold under this section shall include a mechanism for tracking the number of times the device or weapon has been fired. The secretary of public safety shall adopt regulations governing who may sell or offer to sell such devices or weapons in the commonwealth and governing law enforcement training on the appropriate use of portable electrical weapons.
Whoever violates this section shall be punished by a fine of not less than $500 nor more than $1,000 or by imprisonment in the house of correction for not less than 6 months nor more than 2 1/2 years, or by both such fine and imprisonment. A law enforcement officer may arrest without a warrant any person whom he has probable cause to believe has violated this section.
SECTION 2. The secretary of public safety shall develop a uniform protocol directing state police and municipal police officers to collect data pursuant to this act. Such data shall include the number of times the device or weapon has been fired and the identifying characteristics, including the race and gender, of the individuals who have been fired upon. Not later than 1 year after the effective date of this act, the secretary of public safety shall transmit the necessary data to a university in the commonwealth with experience in the analysis of such data, for annual preparation of an analysis and report of its findings. The secretary shall forthwith transmit the university's annual report to the department of the attorney general, the department of state police, the Massachusetts Chiefs of Police Association, the executive office of public safety and the clerks of the house of representatives and the senate.
House of Representatives, July 7, 2004.
Preamble adopted, (Thomas M. Finneran), Speaker.
In Senate, July 7, 2004.
Preamble adopted, (Joan M. Menard), President.
House of Representatives, July 7, 2004.
Bill passed to be enacted, (Thomas M. Finneran), President.
In Senate, July 7 , 2004.
Bill passed to be enacted, (Joan M. Menard), President.
July 15, 2004.
Approved,
at 2 o'clock and 25 minutes, P.M.
(Mitt Romney)
Governor.
READER
New UNMANNER Taser-EQUIPPED SPY-HOVER
11.07.2007 17:38
The 2.4 gram TASER XREP (pictured) leaves an ordinary 12-gauge barrel at about 300 feet per second. When it hits, as well as providing "blunt impact", four barbed electrodes puncture clothes to deliver the same painful jolt as one of the firm's handheld weapons. The 20-second shock comes from a lithium ion battery.
XREP is a new initiative . A third application of "Neuro-Muscular Incapactation" will see a battery of six- wired -taser -darts sprayed simultaneously in a 20 degree arc. The Taser Shockwave is aimed at border guards who feel the need to take down several people.
The TASER Shockwave addresses the need for enhanced area denial and force protection at checkpoints where life-and-death decisions must be made instantaneously. The new designs are the latest Taser efforts to apply cattle prod technology to many other scenarios. At CES this year, it launched a version for consumers,
UNMANNED TASER APPLICATIONS - iRobot, is manufacturer of the "Packbot" tracked -crawler-droid, known to the US Army as SUGV and noted for its XBox-360-like controller. The Packbot, now has one key capability – weaponry by way of Taser.
These new robots can remotely engage, incapacitate and control dangerous suspects with integrated TASER electronic control devices.– iRobot® PackBot Explorer™ with TASER X26 device .
Also, an Arizona company named Ionatron has funding to develop "directed . The US Army has a flying hover-bot - officially known as the Micro Unmanned Aerial Vehicle . This remarkable machine flies using a ducted fan. The hover-droid and its ground control station can be carried in a couple of backpacks, and it can travel at almost 60 mph and as high as 10,500 feet.
The Micro UAV weighs 16lb and can carry video cameras
A reader
US Constitutional right to own firearms
13.07.2007 21:07
Interpreting the Second Amendment
By Scott Bursor
The 103d Congress passed the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act[1] and the ban on "assault" weapons,[2] two of the most controversial gun control measures in American history. President Clinton, who signed those measures into law, later assured the overwhelming majority of the American people who believe that they have a constitutional right to own firearms[3] that "[t]he Members of Congress who voted for that bill and I would never do anything to infringe on the right to keep and bear arms to hunt and to engage in other appropriate sporting activities."[4]
The Second Amendment provides that "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."[5] And though this provision of the Bill of Rights has been avoided by the Supreme Court,[6] ignored by the legal academy,[7] and dismissed by even the most fervent defenders of civil (p.1126)liberties[8] for several decades, the trend toward more restrictive regulation of firearms is likely to generate a renewed interest in this "Lost Amendment."[9]
Some outspoken supporters of more restrictive gun control have urged that the Amendment be repealed.[10] Others have taken a less forthright tack by arguing that despite the apparent clarity of its language ("right of the people"), the Second Amendment was never meant to guarantee an individual right to own arms. Rather, they argue, it was designed solely to allow the states to continue to maintain their militia units (or, in modern terms, the National Guard) free from federal interference. Thus the Amendment presents no obstacle to even the total prohibition of private firearm ownership. This notion has been referred to as the "states' right" theory.
Although the states' right theory is understandably very attractive to supporters of more restrictive regulation of firearms[11] and has been accepted by a number of courts,[12] it is seriously flawed and has proven to be virtually indefensible in the law reviews.[13] Thus, the claim that the (p.1127)right to bear arms was intended to ensure the states' dominion over formal military units such as the National Guard is rarely heard in serious (p.1128)constitutional discourse.[14] However, the debate over the Amendment's meaning has not been closed. Rather, the terms of the debate seem to have shifted. Instead of arguing over whether the Amendment was meant to guarantee an individual right, the debate has evolved to a more sophisticated and intricate exploration of why the Amendment guaranteed that right.
This more sophisticated debate is carried on largely within what I will call a "functional framework." This framework is constructed from the rationales for the adoption of the Second Amendment--the reasons that the ratifiers sought to protect private gun ownership. Within this functional framework or approach there is still much room for disagreement. The states' right theory, for example, has evolved into a more refined doctrine which concedes that the Amendment originated as a protection of an individual right but holds that the scope of that right is limited to militia service. Thus, there is no right to own arms for personal or private self-defense.[15] Other approaches recognize a right to own arms to defend the state,[16] to resist the state,[17] for personal self-defense,[18] or for combinations of these purposes.[19] Still another alternative is embodied in President Clinton's suggestion that the right to keep and bear arms is limited to hunting and appropriate sporting activities.[20]
Thus, the central issues in the current Second Amendment debate could be phrased as follows: Why did the ratifiers of the Bill of Rights seek to protect the widespread ownership of arms? And how, given modern conditions, are we to interpret that protection? These are the issues that I will explore in this Note.(p.1129)
Part I examines the late-eighteenth-century conception of the relation between a right to arms and a free society. Analysis of the dominant political and philosophical ideas of the era suggests that widespread private ownership of arms was understood to serve at least four interrelated functions. An armed populace was thought to be the best means of defending the state, sensitizing the government to the rights of the people, preserving civil order and the natural right of self-defense, and cultivating the moral character essential to self-government. I label these the military, political, civil, and moral functions and conclude that the Second Amendment was designed to protect private ownership of arms so that the citizenry would remain capable of performing each of these functions.
In Part II, I consider the modern relevance of the view of the armed citizenry embodied in the Second Amendment. Many commentators have asserted that this view is a dangerous anachronism inapplicable to late-twentieth-century America. After rejecting these assertions as unfounded, I argue that despite the advent of modern police forces and professional armies, an armed citizenry is still capable of performing each of the four functions.
Because much of the rhetoric employed to discourage recognition of a Second Amendment right laments the absurdity that individuals would be allowed to own flamethrowers or nuclear weapons, it is important to demonstrate that a proposed theory does not compel such a result. Part III applies my functional theory of the Second Amendment to several gun control measures to illustrate that such a theory is capable of protecting the rights of citizens without invalidating reasonable restrictions on the keeping and bearing of arms.
I. A Functional Analysis of the Second Amendment.
We must begin by examining the rationale offered for the right to keep and bear arms. The text of the Second Amendment states that its ultimate end is "the security of a free State."[21] The means to that end is "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms."[22] In seeking to determine how private (p.1130)ownership of arms was believed to contribute to that security, we look to the understanding of the ratifiers and the traditions that influenced them.
A. The Ideological Origins of the Right to Arms
Madison drafted the Bill of Rights with the aid of innumerable suggestions from his countrymen, most commonly in the form of the state bills of rights and the hundreds of amendments suggested by the state conventions that ratified the Constitution.[23] Indeed, Madison began his work by purchasing a pamphlet that listed over two hundred demands of the state conventions,[24] eliminating some, and rewording and consolidating as many as possible to develop the Bill of Rights.[25] Drafted with an eye toward earning the approval of the statehouses,[26] the Bill of Rights was thus infused from the bottom up with the dominant ideology of the day.
That ideology was the Whig ideology, which dominated American politics in the late eighteenth century. John Adams estimated that ninety percent of Americans were Whig sympathizers at the time of the American Revolution.[27]
"In the late Eighteenth Century, a firm background in history was considered indispensable to any legal or political thinker."[28] The American Whigs were deeply familiar with Latin, Greek, and English history.[29] They were also intimately familiar with and deeply influenced by the writings of their English predecessors.(p.1131)
John Adams held special regard for Harrington .... Adams and Madison both studied Molesworth in detail; Jefferson's library boasted copies of Sydney, Molesworth and Harrington. These works, and those of Fletcher, were also owned by the likes of Benjamin Franklin, John Hancock, and George Mason. When Burgh's Political Disquisitions were printed in the colonies, Benjamin Franklin served as editor, and the subscription list for the first edition included George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, John Hancock, and John Dickinson.[30]
The American Whigs also drew upon the libertarian and republican thought of the Florentine tradition articulated by authors such as Niccolo Machiavelli, Sir Walter Raleigh, Jean Bodin, John Trenchard, Thomas Gordon, and Walter Moyle.[31]
B. The Functions of Private Arms. The context of the ratification of the Constitution and the adoption of the Bill of Rights suggests that private ownership of arms, as protected by the Second Amendment, was intended to serve at least four functions. First, an armed populace was considered the best military means of defending a free state against foreign conquerors.[32] Second, an armed populace was thought to play an important political role by sensitizing the rulers to the rights of the people.[33] Third, ownership of arms suitable for self-defense was universally held to be among the natural rights of man as well as the most effective means of preserving civil order.[34] And fourth, being armed was considered essential to the dignity and moral character of citizens of a free state.[35] I have labeled these the military, political, civil, and moral functions.(p.1132)
Military.--No one disputes that the military function of the citizen militia was an important consideration in the adoption of the Second Amendment. This agreement is not surprising given the ubiquitous reliance on militia to serve some military function at least since medieval times.[36] Military and political systems in which every free man was obligated by law to possess weapons and to serve in militia when called upon have been traced as far back as 690 A.D.[37] English history is replete with instances in which the militia were called upon for military service.[38] Moreover, the military might of militia was universally praised by authors of the major republican and libertarian treatises.[39]
From America's early colonial history, the militia (not the British army) was the primary, and most effective, means of protection from foreign invaders.[40] Thus, on the eve of the American Revolution, the Baptist preacher John Allen warned King George of the peril of war with Americans who know the use of the gun, and the military art, as well as any of his Majesty's troops at St. James's, and where his Majesty has one (p.1133)soldier, who art in general the refuse of the earth, America can produce fifty, free men, and all volunteers, and raise a more potent army of men in three weeks than England can in three years.[41]
This sentiment was expressed more conservatively by the Continental Congress in its declaration of July 1775, in which it warned the English that "men trained in arms from their infancy, and animated by the love of liberty, will afford neither a cheap or easy conquest."[42] These warnings did not go unnoticed, as the widespread American ownership of arms was often cited by Parliament as a reason to negotiate with the colonists rather than use force.[43] These circumstances instilled Americans with a well-founded belief in the military superiority of an armed populace as opposed to a select militia or super-select standing army.
Political.--The Whigs believed that the widespread ownership of arms would prevent domestic tyranny by sensitizing the rulers to the rights of the people. Most Federalists and all Anti-Federalists shared the Whig tradition's suspicion of government and desire to prevent the concentration of power that they believed inevitably led to tyranny. They had justified the American Revolution by appealing to the natural rights of men and the idea that governments "derived their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed."[44] Similarly, our Constitution is premised on the sovereignty of the individual and the idea that individuals yield some of their sovereignty to the government to promote their interests (not the interests of their rulers).[45]
The idea of individual sovereignty, when examined against the backdrop of the republican and libertarian principles of the Whigs, yields great insight into the political dimension of the relationship between armed citizens and their government. The Framers were familiar with Aristotle's warning that "the commonwealth is theirs who hold the arms: the sword and sovereignty ever walk hand in hand together."[46] Andrew Fletcher, (p.1134)an early Whig who was widely read in the colonies,[47] also warned that "he that is armed, is always master of the purse of him that is unarmed."[48]
These axioms were embodied in the Second Amendment's guarantee of an armed populace--a guarantee that was the ultimate check in the Constitution's grand design of checks and balances, a guarantee that the people would remain free, sovereigns of themselves. These axioms indicate that an armed citizenry is absolutely necessary to ensure the subordination of military to civilian control, to keep the rulers sensitive to the rights of the people, and to maintain the people's ability to resist tyrannical rulers. For indeed, democracy and civil rights cannot exist where the citizens are disarmed.[49]
Civil.--The widespread ownership of arms was also intended to preserve the natural right of self-defense. During the consideration of our Bill of Rights, the personal right to own arms for self-defense was much less discussed than were the political aspects of the right to bear arms. Such discussion was lacking not because the Framers did not believe in such a right, but because it was the least controversial aspect of the right to arms. Nevertheless, there is ample evidence of the widespread belief in the right to own arms for self-defense.
The English considered the right to self-defense to be the premier natural right upon which all other rights depended. The English Declaration of Rights of 1689 was widely understood to encompass such a right.[50] And although the Declaration only guaranteed Protestants the (p.1135)right to own arms and would have allowed the disarming of Catholics, even the most anti-Catholic members of Parliament considered it oppressive to do more than reduce their armament. A 1689 act, passed when there was still risk of King James, a papist, returning to the throne, allowed Catholics to retain all arms needed for self-defense.[51] The debate surrounding this measure evidenced the belief that the natural right of self-defense was inviolable. "The act's zealous sponsor, who complained during the debate that 'we are so mealy-mouthed and soft-handed to the Papists,' nonetheless explained that Parliament should not seize arms 'necessary [for the] defense of their houses.'"[52]
The view that the right to own arms for self-defense was the first right of nature was held on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. James Burgh's Political Disquisitions, which played a central role in the shaping of political thought in the colonies,[53] exhorted that "he, who thinks he is his own master, and has what he can call his own, ought to have arms to defend himself, and what he possesses ...."[54] Given the uncontroversial nature of this sentiment, the natural right to own arms for personal self-defense was soon codified in the constitutions of several states. Meeting in 1776, the constitutional convention of Pennsylvania, presided over by Benjamin Franklin, framed a Declaration of Rights which stated "[t]hat the people have a right to bear arms for the defense of themselves, and the state."[55] A year later, Vermont's constitutional convention adopted verbatim the same provision.[56](p.1136)
Other states adopted provisions that spoke of the "common defense."[57] However, such language was not meant to abrogate the right to use arms for personal self-defense. The Parliament that enacted the 1689 English Declaration of Rights clearly saw such language not as a restriction, but as an amplification of the right.[58] The circumstances surrounding the adoption of the Massachusetts Constitution evidenced the same belief. The Massachusetts convention proposed the following language: "The people have a right to keep and bear arms for the common defence."[59] Some objected to the use of such language as possibly restricting the right.[60] John Adams, the drafter of the provision, probably dismissed such a reading. When read in conjunction with Article I, which included among the unalienable rights "defending their lives and liberties; ... and protecting property,"[61] the provision clearly protected the right to own arms for personal self-defense.[62] Further, because the right to keep and bear arms remained in "the people," they would, of course, be able to use their arms for lawful purposes in addition to the common defense.[63]
The demands for a federal Bill of Rights expressed at many of the state ratifying conventions also envisioned a right to keep and bear arms for self-defense and other lawful purposes. The first call for the inclusion of a right to bear arms in the federal Constitution was advanced in a failed motion made during the Pennsylvania ratifying convention which would have demanded "[t]hat the people have a right to bear arms for the defense of themselves and their own state, or the United States, or for the purpose of killing game."[64] The Pennsylvania delegates did not secure enough votes to condition ratification upon such a call, but their report was widely circulated throughout the states and influenced the drafting of subsequent bills of rights.[65] Madison, when drafting the Bill of Rights in the First Congress, worked from a reprint of the state demands that included the (p.1137)Pennsylvania report.[66] Although the language of the Second Amendment does not speak explicitly of a personal right to self-defense, several factors indicate that this absence stems from Madison's belief that its inclusion was commonly understood: The right to self-defense was the least controversial aspect of the right to arms,[67] and the right to self-defense was, at the time, universally believed to be man's first natural right, inseparable from the people's right to arms.[68] Thus, it is not surprising that in the process of paring down the list of demands to a reasonable number of amendments, Madison considered it unnecessary to explicitly mention self-defense in the text of the Second Amendment.
During the Senate's debates about the proposed Bill of Rights, that body rejected a motion to insert the words "for the common defense" next to the words "to bear arms."[69] We have no record of the debates because the Senate debates at this time were conducted in secret;[70] thus the reason for the rejection is unknown. However, there are two possible explanations. Either the Senate, like the Parliament of a century earlier, believed the language dangerously expanded the right, or they shared the concern of those in Massachusetts who had feared that such language could be read to restrict the right. The militia's strong showing in the recent Revolution and the nearly universal regard for a citizen militia seem to indicate that the Senate was concerned with the latter. Regardless of the reason, the Senate intended to preserve the individual citizens' natural right of self-defense that existed at common law and was imported from England.
Moral.--A central tenet of the republican tradition held that being armed is essential to the development of civic virtue and good moral character. Both Machiavelli and Harrington "considered the bearing of arms to be the primary means by which individuals affirmed their social (p.1138)power and political participation as responsible moral agents."[71] Burgh, who directly influenced many of the Framers,[72] articulated the "integral relationship ... between the possession of arms and the spirit and character of the people."[73] He denounced English society's loss of virility and virtue, and insisted that "interested only in luxury and commerce, Englishmen had surrendered their arms" and yielded their military responsibilities to a professional army.[74]
Other commentators also recognized the importance of the right to bear arms to moral development. Joel Barlow illustrated this belief in his Advice to the Privileged Orders in the Several States of Europe, writing that a government that disarms its people "palsies the hand and brutalizes the mind: an habitual disuse of physical forces totally destroys the moral; and men lose at once the power of protecting themselves, and of discerning the cause of their oppression."[75] Adam Smith likewise lamented the fate of a disarmed people, who, he believed, inevitably suffered "that sort of mental mutilation, deformity and wretchedness which cowardice necessarily involves in it."[76]
In 1775, the Continental Congress echoed Burgh's and Barlow's contempt for the state of English society and contrasted it with the virtuous republican character of the American people. Warning against attempts to tyrannize the colonists, the Congress declared that [i]n Britain, where the maxims of freedom were still known, but where luxury and dissipation had diminished the wonted reverence for them, the attack [of tyranny] has been carried on in a more secret and indirect manner: Corruption has been employed to undermine them. The Americans are not enervated by effeminacy, like the inhabitants of India; nor debauched by luxury, like those of Great-Britain.[77]
The recognition of the moral function of arms did not fade after the Revolution. Years later, Thomas Jefferson advised his teen-age nephew: "As to the species of exercise, I advise the gun. While this gives a moderate exercise to the body, it gives boldness, enterprise, and independence to the mind."[78] This boldness, enterprise, and independence was <(p.1139)believed by the Framers to be necessary to the character of a good citizen and essential to the vitality of democratic government. Thus, by protecting the citizens' right to own arms, the ratifiers of the Second Amendment sought to encourage the moral development of citizens, and hence, the republic.
C. Epilogue ... Prologue. There is some artificiality in distinguishing the military, political, civil, and moral functions of arms embodied in the Second Amendment. It is clear that there is much overlap and interrelation between the functions. The capability of self-defense inherent in the civil function is also among the essential elements of the other three. Likewise, the military function of repelling foreign foes is closely entwined with the ability to restrain domestic tyrants and subdue the military to civilian control that are at the core of the political function.
Historically speaking, it is also clear that the tradition from which the Amendment derives did not make such distinctions. According to classical republican (and to some extent, Whig) ideology, there is no distinction between defending one's self or one's state and no distinction between foreign aggressors, domestic tyrants, or common criminals--all were enemies of the state (people).[79]
The value of this framework lies not in its conceptual neatness or historical accuracy, but in its usefulness as a guide to understanding the Second Amendment. Delineating the functions inherent in the ratifiers' view of the relationship between arms, freedom, and security should serve to clarify inquiry into the protection of that relationship embodied in the Second Amendment. Before considering how best to interpret the Second Amendment in accordance with that view, however, we must address its relevance to our modern world.
II. Arms and the Modern World. Is the view of an armed populace embodied in the Second Amendment still valid in a society with professional military and police forces? Is an armed populace still capable of performing the functions detailed above? Many have argued that it cannot and thus, that the private ownership of arms is an anachronism inapplicable to our current circumstances.[80] (p.1140)These arguments rest on empirical assertions that are highly debatable to say the least.
Commentators often attack the vitality of the military and political functions of the militia concept with the argument that they can no longer be performed by a militia.[81] Simply stated, the argument is that an armed citizenry cannot restrain a domestic tyrant or deter a foreign conqueror backed by a modern army. This empirical assertion is frequently made by lawyers, politicians, or other advocates who offer neither argument nor authority for the proposition.[82] And while this assertion may be true in some limited number of circumstances, as a categorical assertion it is demonstrably false.
Consider some recent examples. The Vietnam War demonstrated that a modern military power can be resisted by guerilla fighters bearing only small arms.[83] This lesson has not been forgotten. In 1992, the United States declined to intervene in the conflict in Bosnia-Hercegovina after an aide to General Colin Powell, then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, advised the Senate Armed Services Committee that the widespread ownership of arms in the former Yugoslav republic made even limited intervention "perilous and deadly."[84] The deterrent effect of an armed populace was emphasized by Canadian Major General Lewis Mackenzie, who led United Nations peacekeeping troops in Sarajevo for five months. Despite the tremendous capabilities of the United States Armed Forces, he explained, the prevalence of arms ownership in the area caused him to believe that if American forces were to be sent to Bosnia, "Americans [would be] killed.... You can't isolate it, make it nice and sanitary."[85]
The validity of these concerns has also been demonstrated in the current conflict in Chechnya where "[m]ore than 40,000 soldiers from the (p.1141)Russian army ... have quickly been humbled by a few thousand urban guerrillas who mostly live at home, wear jeans, use castoff weapons and have almost no coherent battle plans or organization."[86] The Russian army's nuclear capability apparently has not translated into a tactical advantage in the streets of Chechnya.
In addition to these anecdotal examples, there is further evidence of the military practicality of an armed citizenry. The 1966 Arthur D. Little, Inc. Report ("the Little Report"), commissioned by the United States Department of the Army, concluded that in spite of recent technological developments in the modes of waging war, a modern war will almost certainly be a "shooting war" in which the basic individual weapon of combat will be the rifle.[87]
The Little Report does more than refute the notion that riflemen are militarily obsolete in the nuclear era. It offers an additional insight into the military value of armed citizens: they make better soldiers when they enter the service. They are significantly better marksmen than those who did not own arms prior to enlistment (even when marksmanship is measured after military training) and are more confident in their ability to perform effectively in combat.[88] Furthermore, gun owners are more likely to enlist, to prefer combat outfits, and to become marksmanship instructors.[89]
David Williams's Civic Republicanism and the Citizen Militia: The Terrifying Second Amendment[90] presents another version of the obsolescence argument. Essentially, Williams argues that because there is no universal militia and because gun owners are not a representative sample of the American population, the political function of private arms ownership is an anachronism.[91] That is, because today's armed citizens are only a slice of the population, motivated by self-interest rather than the common good, they cannot (or will not) perform their role of keeping the government sensitive to the rights of all citizens.[92]
Despite this supposed obsolescence, Williams recognizes that "[t]he right to arms and the universal militia were significant structural elements in the polity contemplated by the Constitution," and therefore urges courts to "update the [Second] Amendment."[93] Williams' "updated Second (p.1142)Amendment would ... have no independent content but would be a shadowy gravitational presence in interpreting the rest of the Constitution ... to increase the influence of the people over their government."[94] According to Williams, the Second Amendment ought to be interpreted in such a way that it does not protect the right to own arms (which it explicitly mentions), but in a way that pulls the Constitution toward policies such as "workplace democracy," "campaign finance reform or proportional representation," and greater protection of "statutory welfare and other kinds of property that provide autonomy in the modern world."[95]
Upon reading Williams's republican interpretation of the right to keep and bear arms, one may be struck by the differences between his conception of autonomy and that of the republican tradition espoused by Aristotle, Machiavelli, Fletcher, Burgh, and the shapers of the Bill of Rights. Williams's analysis is insightful in its sensitivity to the important political function of arms in our constitutional scheme. However, by suggesting that tinkering with our electoral processes and welfare payments can better serve that function, Williams turns a blind eye to the tenet of the republican tradition that motivated the adoption of the Amendment: Political and civil rights are inseparable from a right to arms. Our Constitution recognizes that those who have arms are masters of the state, not those who are proportionately represented or more firmly entrenched on the public dole.
Williams also recognizes the important role of the Second Amendment in ensuring the subordination of the military to civilian control. He is at least concerned about the possibility of the "populace stand[ing] effectively disarmed before the might of the state."[96] But Williams would tolerate that "nightmare" so long as courts "apply ... the Constitution stringently against the military and police."[97] His belief that courts can subdue an ambitious military runs directly counter to a central tenet espoused by every influential writer in the republican tradition and perhaps best stated by Machiavelli: "[I]t is unreasonable to expect that one who is armed will obey willingly one who is unarmed; or that any unarmed man will remain safe among armed servants."[98] The Framers of the Bill of Rights heeded this warning and placed their faith in armed citizens as the ultimate bulwark against tyranny. Williams would ignore the warning and place his faith in courts.[99](p.1143)
Williams is not alone in his belief that the Second Amendment is an anachronism. Others have argued that the notion that citizens bearing small arms could offer effective resistance to a modern army is absurd.[100] It is interesting to note that, while dismissing the capabilities of millions of armed citizens as a check on a modern army, they suggest that nine lawyers can adequately fill that role.
Nevertheless, the question of whether armed citizens can serve as an effective check on the state in our nuclear age is an important one. The belief that an armed citizenry would subdue aggressive rulers and keep them sensitive to the rights of the people was perhaps the most important motivation for the inclusion of the right to keep and bear arms in the Constitution.[101] Thus, the continued vitality of an armed populace as a check on the modern state should have important implications on our interpretation of the Second Amendment. As I have noted above, there is little reason to dismiss the effectiveness of a modern militia.[102] Much to the contrary, the Little Report and the conflicts in Vietnam, Bosnia, and Chechnya[103] offer compelling evidence that armed citizens can restrain, deter, or repel a modern army.[104]
Some, while acknowledging the effectiveness of an armed citizenry as a check on government, have questioned the prudence of such a scheme. Certainly, we ought not encourage or facilitate armed uprisings whenever a particular group feels shorted by the political process. Moreover, it is entirely legitimate for the government to punish insurrection. Can such punishment be consistent with a proper respect for the political function of the right to arms?
Of course it can. The Second Amendment does not guarantee immunity from punishment for insurrection; it merely guarantees the capacity for resistance. And that capacity, as a check on government, does not go (p.1144)unchecked itself. The Constitution explicitly affirms the validity of punishing insurrection,[105] and the potential of punishment is a check on the armed populace. It strongly discourages armed resistance except in the cases of the most severe encroachments by the government. This idea is best expressed in the Declaration of Independence: "Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed [or challenged] for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed."[106]
The moral function of the right to arms was also recognized by Williams.[107] Nevertheless, Williams renders that function anachronistic by analyzing it only in terms of the virtue instilled by formal militia training and the self-sacrificial aspects of militia service,[108] while ignoring the "boldness, enterprise, and independence" that the Framers believed was engendered by private gun ownership.[109] The moral dimension of the right to arms has more to do with the Framers' beliefs about human nature than the training received in militia service. The Second Amendment embodies a belief that when an individual is rendered defenseless, his character is weakened and corrupted.[110] This belief is no less valid today than it was in the eighteen century. Indeed, it seems to be a universal law of nature that even applies to other species. For example, the effects of disarmament and defenselessness on character have even been recognized in felines, who, when declawed, suffer from neuroses, insecurity, reclusiveness, and irritability.[111] Are we to assume that defenselessness has a lesser effect on the human character? In short, it is easy for advocates to ridicule or dismiss the value of an armed populace given our current circumstances. But the evidence points strongly to the conclusion that, despite our very different circumstances, armed citizens are still (p.1145)capable of performing the military, political, civil, and moral functions that were entrusted to them when the Second Amendment was adopted.[112]
III. Interpreting the Second Amendment.An abundance of literature detailing the historical and ideological origins of the Second Amendment has been produced in the last fifteen years. Though this literature offers excellent insights into the meaning of the right to bear arms, a framework for a Second Amendment jurisprudence consistent with those insights has been lacking.
Don Kates's Handgun Prohibition and the Original Meaning of the Second Amendment[113] presents one example of this incongruity. After providing an excellent analysis of the philosophical and historical origins of the right to keep and bear arms,[114] the language of the Second Amendment and the Bill of Rights,[115] and the proposal and ratification of the Second Amendment,[116] Kates concludes that the Amendment was designed to protect the private ownership of arms "for three purposes: (1) crime prevention, or what we would today describe as individual self-defense; (2) national defense; and (3) preservation of individual liberty and popular institutions against domestic despotism."[117] Thus it would seem logical to interpret the Amendment to protect arms that are useful in performing any one of these functions. In translating this understanding of these purposes into a more concrete formulation of the right, though, Kates asserts that "only such arms as have utility for all three purposes" are constitutionally protected.[118]
Kates also asserts that only such arms as "are lineally descended from the kinds of arms the Founders knew fall within the Amendment's (p.1146)guarantee."[119] Another authority suggests that the Amendment does not include types of arms that could not have been foreseen by the Framers.[120] Nevertheless, no support for these limiting principles appears in the many thorough treatments of the history of the Anglo-American right to arms or in the adoption of the Second Amendment. These limiting principles seem to stem more from the desire to avoid the absurd result that the Second Amendment is absolute and guarantees the right to own even nuclear weapons,[121] than from faithful adherence to the original understanding of the provision.[122]
Adherence to a functional approach would yield a theory of the Second Amendment more consistent with its purposes. Recognizing that the original understanding of the Second Amendment was based on the belief that arms should perform military, political, civil, and moral functions,[123] and that that belief remains viable in modern times,[124] we ought to interpret the Amendment in a way that proscribes interference with armed citizens' capacity to perform those functions. That is, the four functions should serve as benchmarks for measuring the constitutional limits of interference with the right to keep and bear arms . To illustrate this functional approach, I shall consider the federal ban of machineguns,[125] laws prohibiting the carrying of handguns,[126] federal laws prohibiting the sale or delivery of firearms to minors[127] and felons,[128] and miscellaneous burdens on weapons ownership.[129]
A. The Federal Machinegun Ban. A federal law makes it unlawful ... to sell or deliver ... to any person [a] machinegun"[130] and "unlawful for any person to transfer or (p.1147)possess a machinegun."[131] This law does not seriously hinder performance of the civil function because other weapons better suited for self-defense remain available. The primary concern raised by the ban of this militarily useful weapon is that it will render armed citizens incapable of performing their military and political roles. That is, being limited to less potent arms may leave the citizenry too weak to deter an ambitious tyrant (foreign or domestic) backed by a modern army. The touchstone here is the military capability of the armed citizenry vis-a-vis a modern army.
To effectively perform the military and political functions, the citizenry need not be capable of defeating a modern army--it merely needs to be a credible counterbalance to such a force.[132] A merely credible show of force is sufficient because the tyrant contemplating armed conflict must weigh more than just the possibility of defeat. "The decision to use military force is not determined solely by whether the contemplated benefits can be successfully obtained through the use of available forces, but rather is determined by the ratio of those benefits to the expected costs."[133] Before attempting to conquer an armed people, a tyrant must contemplate the casualties his own forces will suffer, the likelihood of prolonged resistance and civil war, the difficulty of governing during and after such a conflict, and many other difficulties. Even if the tyrant decides that these costs are not too great, his soldiers may not necessarily agree and follow him. The widespread ownership of arms increases the potential costs of military aggression, thereby making such aggression less likely.
In the late twentieth century, notwithstanding the sophisticated weaponry of modern armies, citizens armed with small, relatively basic, firearms can still be an effective deterrent[134] and can offer effective resistance if needed.[135] Thus, at this point in time, it seems unlikely that restrictions such as the ban on machineguns would run afoul of the Second Amendment. By implication, weapons even more potent than the machinegun can be prohibited without undermining the military or political functions of an armed citizenry, thus avoiding the ad absurdum and ad horribilus implications of an unlimited right.[136] Nevertheless, a broader ban, of, for instance, all semiautomatic firearms, might tilt the balance of (p.1148)power so heavily against armed citizens that it would fall within the scope of the Amendment's prohibition. It is also possible that, as weapons technology progresses, and armies possess more sophisticated weaponry, what was formerly beyond the Constitution's protection (e.g., machineguns) might then fall within it to preserve the balance.
B. Prohibitions on Carrying Handguns. In many jurisdictions, citizens are effectively denied the right to carry handguns when they leave their homes.[137] It is immediately apparent that such laws hinder the civil function by severely hampering law-abiding citizens' ability to defend themselves against criminal attacks.[138] The laws' moral and political effects are perhaps less obvious. Studies have shown a rising fear of crime,[139] and Americans have demonstrated a willingness to disregard essential rights and grant broad powers to the police to protect them.[140] One illustration of this phenomenon is the eagerness of residents of high crime areas to forego their Fourth Amendment rights by endorsing aggressive police programs. In many large cities, the police operate with a "free-ranging mandate to stop cars and search bodies," and with "impunity from criticism because residents of high-crime neighborhoods, too scared to go outside when the street lights come on, have demanded the programs."[141] Perhaps this is also an illustration of (p.1149)the diminished reverence for freedom and capacity for democratic government that Jefferson and the First Continental Congress associated with being disarmed.[142] C. Laws Prohibiting Minors and Felons from Owning Firearms.
Current federal laws prohibit the sale or delivery of firearms to minors and felons,[143] but such laws do not interfere with any function of the armed citizenry. As Kates explains,
In classical republican political philosophy, the concept of a right to arms was inextricably and multifariously tied to that of the "virtuous citizen." Free and republican institutions were believed to be dependent upon civic virtu which, in turn, depended upon each citizen being armed--and, therefore, fearless, self-reliant and upright.... One implication of this emphasis on the virtuous citizen is that the right to arms does not preclude laws disarming the unvirtuous citizens (i.e., criminals) or those who, like children or the mentally unbalanced, are deemed incapable of virtue.[144]
D. Miscellaneous Burdens on Weapon Ownership. Gun control strategies have often involved measures that do not prohibit gun ownership but make it more costly or troublesome to obtain arms or ammunition. Senator Moynihan's recent proposal to impose a special tax on ammunition[145] exemplifies this strategy. Other such burdens include the Brady Law's five-day waiting period for the purchase of a firearm,[146] and cumbersome and expensive licensing regimes, which are in force in many jurisdictions.[147]
A functional approach can be employed to determine if such measures are indeed a hindrance to the performance of the military, political, civil, or moral functions of private arms ownership. A finding of such hindrance would not, however, end the inquiry. "As [the Supreme Court's] jurisprudence relating to all liberties ... has recognized, not every law (p.1150)which makes a right more difficult to exercise is, ipso facto, an infringement of that right."[148] If it is determined that the law hinders the exercise of a constitutionally protected activity, further inquiry is necessary to determine whether the hindrance exceeds constitutional bounds. There are several doctrinal approaches that could be utilized for such inquiry. For example, such inquiry could take the form of the least restrictive means test,[149] strict scrutiny,[150] or the "undue burden" analysis that the Supreme Court has developed for determining the constitutionality of restrictions on the exercise of the right to an abortion.[151] Thus, a functional approach does not compel absolutism, as it is reconcilable with many conventional limiting principles. The last fifteen years have seen the debate over arms and rights in America evolve from a simplistic quarrel over whether the Second Amendment protects private arms ownership to a more sophisticated debate over the scope of that right.
IV. Conclusion. This current debate raises two central issues. First, what interests were the Amendment intended to protect? A functional analysis of the roles of arms in a free society, as commonly understood at the time of the Amendment's ratification, indicates that widespread arms ownership was intended to deter and, if necessary, repel foreign aggressors,[152] prevent domestic tyranny by sensitizing the rulers to the rights of the people,[153] preserve the natural right of self-defense,[154] and facilitate the development of civic virtue and moral character essential for self-governance.[155] Second, in light of this understanding and our modern circumstances, how are we to interpret the Second Amendment? The interpretation most consistent with that understanding is one that focuses on preserving the citizenry's capability of performing those roles. Such an interpretation avoids the absurd and (p.1151)horrible results of an absolute right to arms[156] while protecting the rights and safety of citizens.
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[+] An earlier version of this Note won first prize in the 1995 Firearms Civil Rights Legal Defense Fund Scholarship Contest. I gratefully acknowledge the helpful suggestions of Robert Cottrol, Don Kates, Joseph Olson, and numerous other participants at the 1995 New Orleans Conference of Academics for the Second Amendment. I am also grateful to Johnny Carter for his valuable comments on several earlier drafts, and to Steve Maloney for his help in locating some of the more obscure sources cited in this Note.
[1] Pub. L. No. 103-159, § 102, 107 Stat. 1536 (codified at 18 U.S.C. § 922(s)-(t) (1994)) (requiring a five-day waiting period for the purchase of a handgun).
[2] Pub. L. No. 103-322, §§ 110101-110106, 108 Stat. 1796, 1996-2010 (codified at 18 U.S.C. §§ 921(a)(30), 922(v)-(w) (1994)) (outlawing the manufacture, transfer, or possession of semiautomatic assault weapons and the transfer or possession of large capacity ammunition feeding devices); see also Ann Devroy, Crime Bill is Signed with Flourish, Wash. Post, Sept. 14, 1994, at A4 ("President Clinton yesterday signed the bitterly contested ... bill that bans several assault weapons ...."); Katharine Q. Seelye, As Senate Debates Crime Bill, Weapons Ban Is the Focus, N.Y. Times, Aug. 23, 1994, at A14 (detailing the passage of the assault weapons ban in the House).
[3] A recent U.S. News & World Report poll asked, "Do you agree that the Constitution guarantees you the right to own a gun?" 75% agreed; 18% disagreed. Gordon Witkin, The Fight to Bear Arms, U.S. News & World Rep., May 22, 1995, at 29; see also Don B. Kates, Jr., Handgun Prohibition and the Original Meaning of the Second Amendment, 82 Mich. L. Rev. 204, 206-07 n.11 (1983) (citing two national surveys indicating that 70% to 87% of Americans believe the Constitution gives individuals the right to keep and bear arms).
[4] President William J. Clinton, State of the Union Address (Jan. 24, 1995), in 141 Cong. Rec. H584, H587 (daily ed. Jan. 24, 1995) (emphasis added).
[5] U.S. Const. amend. II.
[6] The Supreme Court has repeatedly denied certiorari in Second Amendment cases. See infra note 12.
[7] See Sanford Levinson, The Embarrassing Second Amendment, 99 Yale L.J. 637, 639-40 (1989) (noting the absence of significant discussion of the Second Amendment in "law reviews, casebooks, and other scholarly legal publications" (footnotes omitted)). Levinson suspects the following:
the best explanation for the absence of the Second Amendment from the legal consciousness of the elite bar, including that component found in the legal academy, is derived from a mixture of sheer opposition to the idea of private ownership of guns and the perhaps subconscious fear that altogether plausible, perhaps even "winning," interpretations of the Second Amendment would present real hurdles to those of us supporting prohibitory regulation.
Id. at 642 (footnote omitted).
[8] See American Civil Liberties Union, Policy Guide of the American Civil Liberties Union 95-96 (1993) (Policy #47) ("Except for lawful police and military purposes, the possession of weapons by individuals is not constitutionally protected.").
[9] Robert A. Sprecher, The Lost Amendment, 51 A.B.A. J. 554 (1965).
[10] E.g., George F. Will, America's Crisis of Gunfire, Wash. Post, Mar. 21, 1991, at A21 (editorial) ("[G]un control advocates who want to square their policy preferences with the Constitution should face the need to deconstitutionalize the subject by repealing the embarrassing amendment.").
[11] See, e.g., Warren Spannaus, State Firearms Regulation and the Second Amendment, 6 Hamline L. Rev. 383, 390 (1983) (embracing the states' right theory to justify gun control measures).
[12] See, e.g., United States v. Johnson, 497 F.2d 548, 550 (4th Cir. 1974); Cody v. United States, 460 F.2d 34, 37 (8th Cir.), cert. denied, 409 U.S. 1010 (1972); Stevens v. United States, 440 F.2d 144, 149 (6th Cir. 1971); Vietnamese Fishermen's Ass'n v. Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, 543 F. Supp. 198, 210 (S.D. Tex. 1982); United States v. Kozerski, 518 F. Supp. 1082, 1090 (D.N.H. 1981), aff'd, 740 F.2d 952 (1st Cir.), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 842 (1984); Eckert v. Pennsylvania, 331 F. Supp. 1361, 1362 (E.D. Pa. 1971), aff'd, 474 F.2d 1339 (3d Cir.), cert. denied, 410 U.S. 989, and cert. denied, 411 U.S. 920 (1973) (all endorsing the states' right theory).
[13] Of the 34 law review articles published since 1980 that offer substantial discussion of the Second Amendment, only 3 endorse the states' right theory. All 3 appeared in symposia in which anti-gun groups were invited to submit articles detailing their positions. Two were written by lobbyists for anti-gun groups. See Keith A. Ehrman & Dennis A. Henigan, The Second Amendment in the Twentieth Century: Have You Seen Your Militia Lately?, 15 U. Dayton L. Rev. 5 (1989); Dennis A. Henigan, Arms, Anarchy and the Second Amendment, 26 Val. U. L. Rev. 107 (1991). The third was written by a politician. See Spannaus, supra note 11 (Minnesota Attorney General).
In contrast, articles endorsing the view that the Second Amendment protects an individual right have been authored by some of the major figures in constitutional law and have been published in the most prestigious law reviews. See, e.g., Akhil R. Amar, The Bill of Rights and the Fourteenth Amendment, 101 Yale L.J. 1193, 1205-11, 1261-62 (1992); Akhil R. Amar, The Bill of Rights as a Constitution, 100 Yale L.J. 1131, 1164 (1991) [hereinafter Amar, Bill of Rights as a Constitution]; David I. Caplan, The Right of the Individual to Bear Arms: A Recent Judicial Trend, 1982 Det. C.L. Rev. 789; Robert J. Cottrol & Raymond T. Diamond, The Second Amendment: Toward an Afro-Americanist Reconsideration, 80 Geo. L.J. 309 (1991); Robert Dowlut, Federal and State Constitutional Guarantees to Arms, 15 U. Dayton L. Rev. 59 (1989); Robert Dowlut, The Current Relevancy of Keeping and Bearing Arms, 15 U. Balt. L.F. 32 (1984); Robert Dowlut, The Right to Arms: Does the Constitution or the Predilection of Judges Reign?, 36 Okla. L. Rev. 65 (1983); Richard E. Gardiner, To Preserve liberty--A Look at the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, 10 N. Ky. L. Rev. 63 (1982); Alan M. Gottlieb, Gun Ownership: A Constitutional Right, 10 N. Ky. L. Rev. 113 (1982); Stephen P. Halbrook, Rationing Firearms Purchases and the Right to Keep Arms, 96 W. Va. L. Rev. 1 (1993); Stephen P. Halbrook, The Right of the People or the Power of the State: Bearing Arms, Arming Militias, and the Second Amendment, 26 Val. U. L. Rev. 131 (1991); Stephen P. Halbrook, Encroachments of the Crown on the Liberty of the Subject: Pre-Revolutionary Origins of the Second Amendment, 15 U. Dayton L. Rev. 91 (1989); Stephen P. Halbrook, What the Framers Intended: A Linguistic Analysis of the Right to Bear Arms, Law & Contemp. Probs., Winter 1986, at 151; Stephen P. Halbrook, To Keep and Bear Their Private Arms: The Adoption of the Second Amendment, 1787-1791, 10 N. Ky. L. Rev. 13 (1982); Stephen P. Halbrook, The Jurisprudence of the Second And Fourteenth Amendments, 4 Geo. Mason U. L. Rev. 1 (1981); David T. Hardy, The Second Amendment and the Historiography of the Bill of Rights, 4 J.L. & Pol. 1 (1987); David T. Hardy, Armed Citizens, Citizen Armies: Toward a Jurisprudence of the Second Amendment, 9 Harv. J.L. & Pub. Pol'y 559 (1986) [hereinafter Hardy, Armed Citizens]; Don B. Kates, Jr., The Second Amendment and the Ideology of Self-Protection, 9 Const. Comm. 87 (1992); Don B. Kates, Jr., The Second Amendment: A Dialogue, Law & Contemp. Probs., Winter 1986, at 143, 143-45; Kates, supra note 3; Levinson, supra note 7; Nelson Lund, The Second Amendment, Political Liberty, and the Right to Self-Preservation, 39 Ala. L. Rev. 103 (1987); Joyce L. Malcolm, 54 Geo. Wash. L. Rev. 452 (1986) (reviewing Stephen P. Halbrook, That Every Man Be Armed: The Evolution of a Constitutional Right (1984)); Joyce L. Malcolm, The Right of the People to Keep and Bear Arms: The Common Law Tradition, 10 Hastings Const. L.Q. 285 (1983); Thomas M. Moncure, Jr., Who is the Militia--The Virginia Ratification Convention and the Right to Bear Arms, 19 Lincoln L. Rev. 1 (1990); Elaine Scarry, War and the Social Contract: Nuclear Policy, Distribution, and the Right to Bear Arms, 139 U. Pa. L. Rev. 1257 (1991); Robert E. Shalhope, The Armed Citizen in the Early Republic, Law & Contemp. Probs., Winter 1986, at 125; William Van Alstyne, The Second Amendment and the Personal Right to Arms, 43 Duke L.J. 1236 (1994).
David C. Williams, Civic Republicanism and the Citizen Militia: The Terrifying Second Amendment, 101 Yale L.J. 551 (1991), takes an unusual position that is difficult to classify but is addressed below at some length. See infra notes 15, 90-111 and accompanying text.
George Anastaplo, Amendments to the Constitution of the United States: A Commentary, 23 Loy. U. Chi. L.J. 631, 688-93 (1992) does not explicitly endorse either the individual or states' right view. Anastaplo does opine that what is to be done about gun control is a political rather than constitutional question. Id. at 693. Nevertheless, he seems to regard the Second Amendment as being somewhat analogous to the First. He says that
[t]o emphasize a personal right here [under the Second Amendment], with little or no regard for the obligations and demands of the community in protecting itself, is something like putting the emphasis in the First Amendment upon the physical act of speaking without regard for the primary public-discourse aspect of the traditional right to "freedom of speech."
Id. at 691. Instead of erasing the Second Amendment from my copy of the Constitution, I will attempt, throughout this Note, to show how a proper "regard for the obligations and demands of the community in protecting itself" might shape the contours of the individual right to arms.
[14] See, e.g., Robert J. Cottrol, Gun Control and the Constitution at xxxv (1994) ("To claim, as some have, that the Second Amendment was meant to protect a body like the National Guard, is to severely misread the historical record in ways so fundamental as to warrant almost instant dismissal.").
[15] See, e.g., id. (explaining the refined states' right theory which holds that "since the militia has essentially disappeared, the individual right also ceases to exists"); see also Williams, supra note 13, at 586 (asserting that because it assumes "a universal militia of a type which does not exist today ... the literal wording of the Second Amendment is meaningless").
[16] See, e.g., Roy G. Weatherup, Standing Armies and Armed Citizens: An Historical Analysis of the Second Amendment, 2 Hastings Const. L.Q. 961, 1000 (1975) (arguing that the Second Amendment "was designed solely to protect the states").
[17] See, e.g., Levinson, supra note 7, at 651 (stressing the republican rationale of keeping arms to deter and resist government tyranny).
[18] See, e.g., Cottrol & Diamond, supra note 13 (stressing the importance of the right to keep and bear arms for self-defense, particularly for segments of the minority community that, historically, have not received adequate protection from the police).
[19] See, e.g., Kates, supra note 3, at 268 (concluding that the Amendment was designed to protect the private ownership of arms "for three purposes: (1) crime prevention, or what we would today describe as individual self-defense; (2) national defense; and (3) preservation of individual liberty and popular institutions against domestic despotism").
[20] See supra text accompanying note 4.
[21] U.S. Const. amend. II.
[22] Id. The Amendment also speaks of a "well regulated Militia," which could be read as the means by which the security of a free state is to be protected. However, any distinction between the "Militia" and the citizenry at-large is unwarranted.
Nowadays, it is quite common to speak loosely of the National Guard as "the state militia," but 200 years ago, any band of paid, semiprofessional part-time volunteers, like today's Guard, would have been called "a select corps" or "select militia"--and viewed in many quarters as little better than a standing army. In 1789, when used without any qualifying adjective, the "militia" referred to all Citizens capable of bearing arms.... [So] "the militia" is identical to "the people" ....
Amar, Bill of Rights as a Constitution, supra note 13, at 1166 (emphasis in original) (footnotes omitted). Thus, throughout this Note, I will use the terms "militia," "people," "armed citizen(s) (ry)," and "armed populace" interchangeably.
[23] See 12 The Papers of James Madison 58 (Charles F. Hobson & Robert A. Rutland eds., 1979) (editor's note); David T. Hardy, Origins and Development of the Second Amendment 71 (1986) [hereinafter Hardy, Origins]; Hardy, Armed Citizens, supra note 13, at 605-06 (all discussing Madison's reliance on suggestions from state conventions).
[24] 12 The Papers of James Madison, supra note 23, at 58; Hardy, Origins, supra note 23, at 71; Hardy, Armed Citizens, supra note 13, at 605-06.
[25] Bernard Schwartz, The Great Rights of Mankind: A History of the American Bill of Rights 160-91 (1977).
[26] Madison himself had stated that he favored the adoption of a Bill of Rights only because it was "anxiously desired by others." 11 The Papers of James Madison, supra note 23, at 297. Madison's draft of the Bill of Rights was thus intended to "embody a present consensus of opinion about the obvious rights of human beings." Hardy, Armed Citizens, supra note 13, at 605.
[27] Hardy, Armed Citizens, supra note 13, at 571 & n.55.
[28] Id. at 586 n.128.
[29] As David Hardy has observed,
It was an age when Patrick Henry might, although admittedly lacking in legal knowledge, gain admission to the bar by his grasp of history and logic; when a solid knowledge of Latin and Greek, and of such authors as Homer, Demonsthenes, and Xenophon, was an entrance requirement for many colleges; and when Jefferson might spend his spare time accumulating one of the best historical libraries in the colonies and Madison his correcting footnotes in Latin translations.
Id.
[30] Id. at 586-87 (footnotes omitted); see also Lawrence D. Cress, Citizens in Arms: The Army and the Militia in American Society to the War of 1812, at 35 (1982) (describing the influence that both Whig and Opposition authors had on colonial political thought through the dissemination of works to "political leaders, public orators, and pamphleteers too numerous to mention"); Caroline Robbins, The Eighteenth-Century Commonwealthman 102 (1959) (noting that Americans like James Madison and John Adams studied the writings of liberal Whig Robert Molesworth "when they were considering the problems of the New World").
[31] See Robert E. Shalhope, The Ideological Origins of the Second Amendment, 69 J. Am. Hist. 599, 601, 601-05 (1982) (tracing the libertarian notion of a right to bear arms from the Florentine tradition of the "citizen-warrior as the staunchest bulwark of a republic"). On the relationship of the Florentine, libertarian, and republican traditions, see generally J.G.A. Pocock, The Machiavellian Moment: Florentine Political Thought and the Atlantic Republican Tradition 199-213, 290-92 (1975).
[32] See infra section I(B)(1).
[33] See infra section I(B)(2).
[34] See infra section I(B)(3).
[35] See infra section I(B)(4).
[36] See James B. Whisker, The Citizen-Soldier and United States Military Policy 3 (1979) (noting that the medieval citizen-militia had been fully structured by the end of the tenth century).
[37] Hardy, Armed Citizens, supra note 13, at 562. ("It is likely, though, that 'the obligation of Englishmen to serve in [the militia (or fyrd)] is older than our oldest records.'" (quoting J. Bagley & P. Rowly, A Documentary History of England 1066-1540, at 152 (1965))); see Whisker, supra note 36, at 4-6 (discussing the organization and training of the select and great fyrd and noting that the citizens in the select fyrd were required to provide their own weapons).
[38] See generally Joyce L. Malcolm, To Keep and Bear Arms: The Origins of an Anglo American Right 19-20, 31, 61-62 (1994) (noting the military role of the militia in the English Civil War, the Interregnum, and the Second Dutch War).
[39] See Shalhope, supra note 31, at 601, 601-05 (describing a libertarian theme of American Republicanism as a "fear of standing armies and the exaltation of militias composed of ordinary citizens"); see also 2 James Burgh, Political Disquisitions: Or, An Enquiry into Public Errors, Defects, and Abuses 345 (Philadelphia, Robert Bell & William Woodhouse 1775) ("[T]his author prefers a militia to an army."); David Hume, Idea of a Perfect Commonwealth, in Hume: Political Essays 221, 230 (Knud Haakonssen, ed., 1994) ("[W]ithout a militia, it is vain to think any free government will ever have security or stability."); Richard Price, Observations on the Importance of the American Revolution and the Means of Making it a Benefit to the World 9 (Boston, True & Weston 1818) ("Free states ought to be bodies of armed citizens, well regulated, and well disciplined, and always ready to turn out, when properly called upon, to execute the laws, to quell riots, and to keep the peace.").
[40] See Daniel J. Boorstin, The Americas: The Colonial Experience 361 (1958) ("From their American experience the colonies had come to believe that defense began at home.... [T]hey believed that the British Constitution hallowed their assertion that treasury and army must be locally controlled."); David Hawke, Colonial Experience 396 (1969) (noting that Pennsylvania pacifists quickly learned that the British Army was not going to adequately protect them in the French and Indian War, and that only local militias would do the job); Gordon S. Wood, The Radicalism of the American Revolution 163-64 (1992) (noting that, during the Seven Years War in the 1750s, New England militias outraged the British commander by refusing to join in under his command, instead preferring the free, contractual agreements inherent in the local militias).
[41] John Allen, An Oration upon the Beauties of Liberty, or the Essential Rights of the Americans at xiv (2d ed. 1773), microfilmed on 3 Early American Imprints 1639-1800, No. 13016 (Clifford K. Shipton ed., American Antiquarian Society).
[42] 1 Journals of Congress 163 (1800-1801).
[43] Hardy, Armed Citizens, supra note 13, at 593.
[44] The Declaration of Independence para. 2 (U.S. 1776).
[45] See U.S. Const. pmbl. ("We the People ...."); id. amend. IX ("The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."); id. amend. X ("The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.").
[46] 3 John Adams, A Defence of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America 472 (photo. reprint 1971) (London, C. Dilly & John Stockdale 1788) (quoting Marchamont Nedham, The Excellency of a Free State, or the Right Constitution of a Commonwealth (1656)); See also 2 Burgh, supra note 39, at 345 ("Those, who have the command of the arms in a country, says Aristotle, are masters of the state ....").
[47] See Hardy, Origins, supra note 23, at 47; see also supra text accompanying note 30.
[48] Andrew Fletcher, The Political Works of Andrew Fletcher, Esq. 9 (London, J. Bettenham 1737).
[49] Joel Barlow described the link between democracy, equality, and arms:
Only admit the original, unalterable truth, that all men are equal in their rights, and the foundation of every thing is laid; to build the superstructure requires no effort but that of natural deduction. The first necessary deduction will be, that the people will form an equal representative government.... Another deduction follows, that the people will be universally armed.... A people that legislate for themselves ought to be in the habit of protecting themselves; or they will lose the spirit of both.
Joel Barlow, Advice to the Privileged Orders in the Several States of Europe, Resulting from the Necessity and Propriety of a General Revolution in the Principle of Government pt. 1, at 69-70, 72 (New York, Childs & Swaim 1792) (emphasis omitted).
[50] See, e.g., 1 William Blackstone, Commentaries *143-44 ("The fifth and last auxiliary right of the subject ... is also declared by the [1689 Declaration of Rights] and it is indeed, a public allowance under due restrictions, of the natural right of resistance and self-preservation ...."). During the debate over the 1689 Declaration the private ownership of arms for self-defense was much less controversial than ownership of arms for political reasons.
[D]ownplaying the role of the armed citizenry in maintaining liberty, the [Declaration] claimed for the individual a right to be armed. In light of this shift, it is particularly ironic that some modern American lawyers have misread the English right to have arms as merely a "collective" right inextricably tied to the need for a militia. In actual fact, the Convention retreated steadily from such a position and finally came down squarely, and exclusively, in favour of an individual right to have arms for self-defence. Not only was the militia left out of the Declaration of Rights, but even the notion that private arms were necessary for common, as opposed to individual, defence was excluded.
Malcolm, supra note 38, at 119-20 (footnote omitted).
[51] Malcolm, supra note 13, at 309.
[52] Hardy, Armed Citizens, supra note 13, at 581 n.103 (quoting 5 Parl. Hist. Eng. 182-83 (1688-1689) (alteration in original)).
[53] See supra text accompanying note 30.
[54] 2 Burgh, supra note 39, at 390. The influential American jurist St. George Tucker expressed a similar sentiment in 1 William Blackstone's Commentaries, with Notes of Reference to the Constitution and Laws, of the Federal Government of the United States; and of the Commonwealth of Virginia pt. 1 app. at 300 (photo. reprint) (St. George Tucker ed., Philadelphia, Birch & Small 1803) [hereinafter Tucker's Notes on Blackstone] ("The right of self defence is the first law of nature ....").
[55] Stephen P. Halbrook, A Right to Bear Arms: State and Federal Bills of Rights and Constitutional Guarantees 21-22 (1989) (quoting Pa. Const. of 1776, Declaration of Rights art. XIII). This provision was modified by the Pennsylvania Declaration of Rights of 1790, but the protection of the right to be armed for self-defense was no less certain. The later declaration stated "[t]hat the right of the citizens to bear arms in defense of themselves and the state shall not be questioned." Pennsylvania Declaration of Rights, art. XXI (1790).
[56] Vt. Const. of 1793, ch. 1, art. 15 (noting that the relevant provision originally appeared in Vt. Const. of 1777, ch. 1, art. 15).
[57] See Halbrook, supra note 55, at 22-23 (analyzing the adoption of a right to bear arms in the states of Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Vermont, and Massachusetts that incorporated the "common defense" idea).
[58] See supra note 50.
[59] Journal of the Convention for Framing a Constitution of Government for the State of Massachusetts Bay 41, 226 (Boston, Dutton & Wentworth 1832) (1779-1780) [hereinafter Massachusetts Convention].
[60] See Halbrook, supra note 55, at 42 (noting that the towns of Northampton and Williamsburg proposed alterations to the amendments that would include a reference to self-defense as well as to the common defense).
[61] Massachusetts Convention, supra note 59, at 223.
[62] Halbrook, supra note 55, at 42.
[63] Id.
[64] 2 The Documentary History of the Ratification of the Constitution 597-98 (Merrill Jensen ed., 1976) (emphasis added).
[65] Edward Dumbauld, The Bill of Rights and What It Means Today 11 (1957).
[66] See Schwartz, supra note 25, at 121-24, 156-59 (noting that the compendium of state demands, which Madison had at hand when drafting the Bill of Rights, included the proposals of the Pennsylvania minority); see also Irving Brant, James Madison, Father of the Constitution 1787-1800, at 264 (1950); Hardy, Origins, supra note 23, at 71; Hardy, Armed Citizens, supra note 13, at 605-06; Shalhope, supra note 31, at 608 (all noting that Madison worked from the lists of amendments suggested by state conventions).
[67] See supra note 50.
[68] See 1 Tucker's Notes on Blackstone pt. 1 app. at 300 ("The right of self-defense is the first law of nature.... Whenever standing armies are kept up, and the right of the people to keep and bear arms is, under any color or pretext whatsoever, prohibited, liberty, if not already annihilated, is on the brink of destruction."); Stephen P. Halbrook, That Every Man Be Armed 89-90 (1984) (noting unanimity of opinion on this understanding of the right to bear arms).
[69] Journal of the First Session of the Senate of the United States of America 129 (New York, Thomas Greenleaf 1789).
[70] See Hardy, Origins, supra note 23, at 76 ("No record was kept of the Senate debates until 1794. As a result, we do not know the substance of that body's deliberations on the Bill of Rights.").
[71] Shalhope, supra note 31, at 603.
[72] See supra text accompanying note 30.
[73] Shalhope, supra note 31, at 604.
[74] Id. at 604, 604-05.
[75] Barlow, supra note 49, pt. 1, at 68.
[76] 2 Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations 373 (London, W. Strahan & T. Cadell 1776).
[77] 1 Journals of Congress 163 (1800-1801).
[78] The Life and Selected Writings of Thomas Jefferson 349 (Adrienne Koch & William Peden eds., 1993).
[79] See Don B. Kates, Jr., The Second Amendment: A Dialogue, Law & Contemp. Probs., Winter 1986, at 143, 147 ("As the Founders would have conceived it, the yeoman repelling intruders from his dwelling was, with the same arms, acting both in his own and the common defense--whether those intruders were felons, oppressive officials, or enemy soldiers.").
[80] See, e.g., Wendy Brown, Guns, Cowboys, Philadelphia Mayors, and Civic Republicanism: On Sanford Levinson's The Embarrassing Second Amendment, 99 Yale L.J. 661, 665 (1989) ("[The] vision of an armed citizenry, collectively resisting the excesses of state power on behalf of itself as a community, is at best nostalgic, and at worst dangerously naive ...."); Ehrman & Henigan, supra note 13, at 40 (asserting that the right to keep and bear arms is an anachronism inapplicable to modern times); Williams, supra note 13, at 586 ("[U]nder modern conditions, the literal wording of the Second Amendment is meaningless.").
[81] See, e.g., Brown, supra note 80, at 665 ("[O]f what serious assistance are handguns and machine guns for the defense of the state in a nuclear age?" (emphasis omitted)).
[82] See, e.g., id.
[83] See Michael L. Lanning & Dan Cragg, Inside the VC and the NVA: The Real Story of North Vietnam's Armed Forces 101 (1992) ("Beginning in the late 1950's the VC relied on outdated equipment, primitive weapons, and leftover ammunition from the war against the French."); James W. McCoy, Secrets of the Viet Cong 3 (1992) ("[By] beat[ing] back the finest troops and equipment that the west could send against it[,] ... the North Vietnamese Army ... proved that warfare doctrines which emphasized human assets and maneuver were superior to the most technologically advanced methods available.").
[84] See Sid Balman Jr., Military Experts Advise Against Armed Intervention in Bosnia, UPI, Aug. 11, 1992, available in LEXIS, News Library, UPI File (reporting that the aide cited widespread ownership of arms, in addition to the presence of multiple factions and racial hatred, as a reason not to intervene).
[85] Id.
[86] Michael Specter, For Russia's Troops, Humbling Days, N.Y. Times, Jan. 8, 1995, at A1.
[87] The Arthur D. Little Report: A Study of The Activities and Missions of the NBPRP (1966), reprinted in Whisker, supra note 36, at 47, 57. Whisker notes that the Little Report "was not written for a pro-guns organization" and "is of the highest professional standards." Id. at ix.
[88] See id. at 58.
[89] Id.
[90] Williams, supra note 13.
[91] Id. at 590-91.
[92] Id. at 591.
[93] Id. at 598.
[94] Id.
[95] Id. at 597-600.
[96] Id. at 601.
[97] Id.
[98] Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince 88 (George Bull trans., Penguin Books 1968) (1514).
[99] Contrast Williams's faith in the ability of courts to control the military with the views of a Revolutionary war veteran and friend of both Jefferson and Madison:
Arms can only be controlled by arms. An Armed nation only can keep up an army, and also maintain its liberty.... An armed nation only can protect its government against an army. Unarmed, and without an army, a nation invites invasion. Unarmed, and with an army, it invites usurpation. All nations lose their liberties by invasion or usurpation.
John Taylor, An Inquiry into the Principles and Policy of the Government of the United States 178, 180 (1814).
[100] See, e.g., Brown, supra note 80, at 665 (posing the question: "[O]f what serious assistance are handguns and machine guns for the defense of the state in a nuclear age?" (emphasis omitted)).
[101] See supra text accompanying note 49.
[102] See supra text accompanying notes 82-89.
[103] Consider again the current conflict in Chechnya. Feeling that the Russian government has violated their rights, the Chechans have turned to the ultimate arbiter of their rights--their arms. Khasan Aliyev, a Chechan fighter, says he has taken up arms because "the Russians have no right to treat us this way." Specter, supra note 86, at A11. Aliyev's tone is clear: "We will wait for them wherever they are. How long will it have to go on before they realize we won't surrender?" Id. One wonders how zealously Aliyev would assert what he believes to be his rights were he disarmed and facing the Russian army.
[104] See supra text accompanying notes 84-89.
[105] See U.S. Const. art. I, § 8, cl. 15 (granting Congress the power "To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions"); id. art. III, § 3, cl. 2 ("The Congress shall have Power to declare the Punishment of Treason .... "); id. amend. XIV, §§ 3, 4 (prohibiting persons that "have engaged in insurrection or rebellion" from holding office and voiding debts "incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States").
[106] The Declaration of Independence para. 2 (U.S. 1776).
[107] See Williams, supra note 13, at 579-81 (noting that service in the militia involved self-sacrifice and instilled civic virtue in the citizenry).
[108] Id. at 580.
[109] See supra text accompanying note 78.
[110] See supra text accompanying notes 71-77.
[111] Montgomery County Humane Society, Declawing Cats: Manicure or Mutilation? 1 (on file with the Texas Law Review). For an illustration of similar symptoms of defenselessness exhibited by humans, see infra text accompanying note 141.
[112] Perhaps it is worth mentioning the burden of proof on this issue. The burden of proof, I would think, must fall on those who urge that the Second Amendment's protection of private arms ownership be disregarded because changing circumstances have rendered it an inefficacious means to the desired end. In our system, we generally regard constitutional rights as being fairly important. One response to the changed-circumstances argument is that Article V of the Constitution sets out the procedures for adapting the Constitution to changing circumstances. Whatever the merits of that response, it seems that at a bare minimum, if changed circumstances are to abrogate a constitutional right, the bases for the abrogation should be clearly established. That has not been the case with regard to the Second Amendment.
[113] Kates, supra note 3.
[114] Id. at 225-39.
[115] Id. at 214-20.
[116] Id. at 220-25.
[117] Id. at 268.
[118] Id. at 259 (emphasis in original). Later, Kates defends this assertion by arguing that "[s]ince [in the late-eighteenth century] citizens would depend upon the same kinds of weaponry for performing all three functions (individual defense, military defense, and law enforcement) of what the Founders saw as an integral whole, the arms contemplated by the amendment are such as are suitable for all three functions." Kates, supra note 79, at 148.
[119] Kates, supra note 3, at 259.
[120] Hardy, Armed Citizens, supra note 13, at 636 (remarking that restrictions on modern weaponry--weapons unforeseen at the time of the Framers--"do[] no violence to the freedoms the Framers sought to protect").
[121] See Kates, supra note 3, at 259 ("This triple test resolves the ad absurdum and ad horribilus results ... sometimes viewed as flowing from an individual right interpretation of the amendment.").
[122] But see Hardy, Armed Citizens, supra note 13, at 636 (arguing that the Second Amendment's guarantee should not apply to weapons that pose qualitatively different social costs than the weapons familiar to the Framers).
[123] See supra Part I.
[124] See supra Part II.
[125] 18 U.S.C. § 922(b)(4), (o) (1994).
[126] See infra note 137.
[127] 18 U.S.C. § 922(b)(1) (1994).
[128] Id. § 922(d)(1).
[129] Such burdens include various taxing and licensing regimes. See, e.g., infra text accompanying notes 145-47.
[130] 18 U.S.C. § 922(b), (b)(4) (1994).
[131] Id. § 922(o); see also 26 U.S.C. § 5845(b) (1994) (defining the term "machinegun").
[132] Lund, supra note 13, at 113-14.
[133] Id. at 115 (emphasis in original).
[134] See supra text accompanying notes 84-85 (Illustrating the deterrent effect that the widespread possession of arms in Bosnia had on the United States's decision whether to intervene in the conflict).
[135] See supra note 83 (noting the success of the poorly armed North Vietnamese Army and Viet Cong against the well-equipped United States armed forces); text accompanying note 86 (illustrating the resistance that poorly armed Chechan rebels have maintained against the superior firepower of the Russian army).
[136] See supra note 121 and accompanying text.
[137] New York, for example, has criminalized the possession of "any firearm," N.Y. Penal Law § 265.01(1) (McKinney Supp. 1996), and classified the possession of "any loaded firearm" as a felony. Id. § 265.02 (McKinney 1989). Although New York has a licensing provision in its code, that provision grants almost total discretion to the local sheriff whether to issue the permit or not. See id. § 400.00(1) (McKinney Supp. 1996) (requiring that "no good cause exist[] for the denial of the license"). Permits are routinely denied to all but the rich and famous or politically connected. See Kates, supra note 3, at 208 n.17 (noting that the list of permit holders in New York City is composed of people like Arthur Ochs Sulzberger (publisher of The New York Times), Nelson Rockefeller, and others noted for their "political influence, wealth, [or] social prominence"). Another example is California, where it is illegal to carry firearms concealed on the person or in a vehicle. Cal. Penal Code § 12025(a) (West Supp. 1996). Again, the availability of licenses is subject to the unfettered discretion of the local sheriff. See id. § 12050 ("[The local sheriff,] upon proof that the person applying is of good moral character, that good cause exists for the issuance, and that the person applying is a resident of the county, may issue to that person a license to carry a pistol, revolver, or other firearm capable of being concealed." (emphasis added)).
[138] But see Kates, supra note 3, at 267 (recognizing the civil function of the right to bear arms but, nonetheless, asserting that prohibiting arms-carrying outside the home is constitutionally unproblematic).
[139] See Bureau of Justice Statistics, U.S. Dep't of Justice, Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics--1993, at 183-89 (1994) (compiling several studies over 20 years showing an increasing fear of crime).
[140] See Mark Fritz, Cities Seek Answer to Crime in Aggressive Police Programs, Austin Am.-Statesman, Feb. 5, 1995, at A17 (noting that "the climate of fear has turned many communities into glorified crime labs," as citizens are letting police use drastic measures of search and seizure to make their neighborhoods safer).
[141] Id. at A17.
[142] See supra text accompanying notes 77-78.
[143] 18 U.S.C. § 922 (1994).
[144] Kates, supra note 79, at 146.
[145] See Adam Clymer, Finance Panel Agrees on Plan Subsidizing Health for the Poor, N.Y. Times, July 2, 1994, at 1, 7 (noting that the provision of the health care bill that would have imposed a special tax on ammunition was defeated in the Senate Finance Committee by a vote of 15 to 5).
[146] 18 U.S.C. § 922(s)(1)(A)(ii)(I) (1994).
[147] See, e.g., Cal. Penal Code §§ 12051-12054 (West 1992 & Supp. 1996) (requiring applicants for a license to carry a firearm to undergo fingerprinting, investigation, and various filings and requiring applicants to pay fees to cover the costs of the application process); N.Y. Penal Law § 400.00 (McKinney 1989 & Supp. 1996) (requiring applicants for a license to carry firearms to file various forms, submit photographs, submit to a police investigation, and pay fees to cover these costs).
[148] Planned Parenthood v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833, 873 (1992).
[149] See Lund, supra note 132, at 123-24 (suggesting application of the least restrictive means analysis to gun control laws).
[150] See Jay R. Wagner, Comment, Gun Control Legislation and the Intent of the Second Amendment: To What Extent Is There an Individual Right to Keep and Bear Arms, 37 Vill. L. Rev. 1407, 1451-57 (1992) (advocating the application of strict scrutiny to federal gun control legislation).
[151] See Casey, 505 U.S. at 874-98 (applying the "undue burden" standard to a Pennsylvania law restricting access to abortions). Though the undue burden standard has not been precisely defined, it would generally prohibit regulations that have "the purpose or effect of placing a substantial obstacle in the path of" a person seeking to exercise her right. Id. at 877.
[152] See supra section I(B)(1).
[153] See supra section I(B)(2).
[154] See supra section I(B)(3).
[155] See supra section I(B)(4).
[156] See supra note 121 and accompanying text.
Jane Doe
STUN GUNS WIN AGAINST LAW CLAIMS AND MAKE PROFIT
17.08.2007 12:36
Stun-gun maker Taser swings to profit
Taser International Inc. distanced itself from hefty litigation last year and reported Monday that it swung to a second-quarter profit on strong sales to police departments nationwide.
The stun-gun maker posted earnings of $3.7 million (€2.68 million), or 6 cents per share, compared with a loss of $9.6 million (€6.95 million), or 15 cents per share, in the prior-year quarter. The 2006 quarter included a shareholder litigation expense of $17.7 million (€12.81 million). Taser shares rose 60 cents, more than 3 percent, to $17.74 in midday trading Monday.
Chief Executive Rick Smith said the Scottsdale, Arizona-based company's visibility is improving as it prevails in more lawsuits.
Sales swelled 59 percent to a record $25.9 million (€18.74 million) from $16.2 million (€11.72 million) a year ago due to growth in its core law enforcement market and sales to the U.S. military.
Taser's stock price plunged two years ago under the weight of government scrutiny, wrongful death lawsuits and negative press.
Eight product liability lawsuits were dismissed during the quarter, marking more than 50 lawsuits that have been dismissed or resulted in favorable rulings for the company since 2004.
International sales also accounted for $5.5 million (€3.98 million) during the quarter, representing 21 percent of all sales.
This week, Taser is launching a smaller consumer version of its police weapons to the public. The company said the C2, available in a variety of colors, including metallic pink, can stop people from 15 feet away.
Taser stun guns fire electrically charged darts that carry 50,000 volts for several seconds, temporarily immobilizing targets. The weapons are now used by more than 11,000 law enforcement agencies.
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viewer
UNITED KINGDOM NON-FIREARMS -TRAINED POLICE WILL USE STUN GUNS -AUGUST 2007
01.09.2007 17:13
As Tasers are made available to more police officers in England and Wales, BBC News looks at the use of the electric stun guns - seen as a "less lethal" alternative to conventional weapons.
Q: How do Tasers work?
The air Taser gun looks like a pistol but uses compressed air to fire two darts that trail electric cable back to the handset.
When the darts strike, a five-second 50,000-volt charge is released down the cable, causing the suspect's muscles to contract uncontrollably.
Electrical signals - Taser waves or T-Waves - overpower the body's normal electrical signals, temporarily confusing the nervous system.
A laser helps target the suspect and the Taser, which runs off eight batteries, works at ranges up to 21ft (6.4m).
Q: When were Tasers first introduced in England and Wales?
A 12-month trial began in April 2003 which saw specialist firearms officers in five police forces - Lincolnshire, Metropolitan, Northamptonshire, North Wales and Thames Valley - carrying stun guns for the first time.
They were only allowed to use them in circumstances where they were authorised to draw weapons.
During the trial, Tasers were deployed in 60 incidents and aimed in 40 of these incidents, but were only actually fired 13 times.
The Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo) said: "One of the most striking findings of the trial was the deterrent effect of the weapon."
Q: How has the use of Tasers expanded since their introduction?
More than 3,000 Tasers have been issued to firearms officers in Britain since 2003.
Between then and July 2007, they were used in more than 800 incidents.
Officers could only use them when confronted by an armed attacker, but in July 2007 those powers were extended to include incidents of serious violence or threat.
From September 2007, the use of Tasers will no longer be limited to firearms officers.
As part of a 12-month trial, other frontline police from 10 forces in England and Wales will carry the stun guns.
The Home Office says these officers will undergo a rigorous selection procedure and will have to complete Acpo-approved training.
The forces taking part are Avon and Somerset, Devon and Cornwall, Gwent, Lincolnshire, Merseyside, Metropolitan, Northamptonshire, Northumbria, North Wales and West Yorkshire.
Q: How safe are Tasers?
There is some controversy surrounding the use of these 50,000-volt stun guns.
Amnesty International says the weapons, which temporarily disable a suspect, have been linked to more than 70 deaths in America.
It warns they cause "intolerable pain" and may exacerbate the risk of heart failure in people under the influence of drugs or with some health problems.
In 2006, Brian Loan, 47, died several days after being shot by a Taser in County Durham.
A coroner recorded a verdict of death by natural causes, attributing his death to heart disease, but his sister, Barbara Hodgson, refused to accept the Taser was not to blame and said future cases would prove her right.
But Tasers have become standard police equipment in the UK and are regarded as a less dangerous alternative to guns.
The Defence Scientific Advisory Council's sub-committee on the Medical Implications of Less Lethal Weapons (DOMILL), an independent group of medical experts, has issued four statements on the medical implications of the use of the Taser.
Its view is that the risk of death from primary injury with a Taser is low and certainly very much lower than that from conventional firearms.
Q: What checks are there on the use of Tasers?
During the first pilot of Tasers in 2003, all incidents in which they were discharged were referred to the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC), which investigates police complaints.
Now, only if there is a complaint, death or serious injury are incidents referred.
The IPCC says Tasers are a useful alternative to lethal weapons where used appropriately.
The Home Office says it monitors and produces a detailed report every time a Taser is deployed.
This information is collated every three months and assessed by the medical panel, DOMMILL.
Every time the Taser is fired it releases up to 40 confetti-like ID tags which identify which officer used the weapon.
The weapons also have a microchip carrying data about when they were used and for how long which can be downloaded onto a computer.
More UNITED KINGDOM police are now able to use Taser stun guns in the line of duty.
Non-firearm specialists in 10 forces across England and Wales are to be permitted to use the 50,000-volt weapons to protect themselves or civilians.
However, fears have been raised that the one-year trial could compromise public safety if it is not
In the UK, the Home Office insists officers will undergo a rigorous selection procedure before being allocated Tasers. Previously around 3,000 were in use, but only by members of police firearms units.
The Tasers deliver powerful electric shocks and are intended to be a less lethal alternative to regular police weapons.
Non-firearms police officers in England and Wales will have access to Taser electric stun guns from Saturday under plans to give frontline officers more powers when confronted with violent suspects.
Previously the 50,000-volt devices could only be used by firearms officers.
The year-long trial in 10 forces will allow officers to fire the guns if faced with violence or threats.
Up to August 30th, 2007, they could only be used by UNITED KINGDOM police officers when confronted by an armed person.
The guns, which are to be used by non-firearms officers working in specially trained units, temporarily disable a suspect by firing two barbed darts trailing electric wires.
The plans were proposed by the then Home Secretary John Reid in May 2007
Human rights groups are against the use of the guns because they have been linked to dozens of deaths in America and Canada.
Viewer
TASER WOMEN
17.12.2007 15:10
An enterprising Arizona woman has redefined the Tupperware party paradigm for the 21st century, and is hosting girlie get-togethers where security-conscious women can get to grips with the US's fave non-lethal lethal weapon - the Taser.
According to the Arizona Republic, Dana Shafman, founder of Shieldher Inc, has already hosted Taserware bashes in Phoenix and Scottsdale, offering hands-on experience of the Taser C2, which can then be bought for $300, or $350 with the optional laser sight.
The Arizona Republic points out that, for safety reasons, the Taserware parties feature a cardboard cut-out for target practice, and no alcohol is available, just in case someone overdoes the sherry and goes Taser-crazy.
The only cause for concern among mothers was the C2's range of colours - black, blue, pink and silver - some of which might lead their kids to view the weapon as a toy. Mum-of-two Caily Scheur said: "I want to protect my children from [the Taser] just as much as I want to protect myself by using it."
Scheur explained that once she took delivery of her C2, she'd keep it locked in a box under the bed with the keys out of the kids' reach. She will, of course, have to wait for the obligatory background check before she can activate her Taser via the manufacturer's website or with a quick phone call to Taser Inc.
The Taser is prohibited for consumer use in Hawaii, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, and Wisconsin
A READER
SEPTEMBER 2007
23.04.2008 12:47
AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL have pointed to 150 cases in the UNITED STATES WHERE PEOPLE WHO HAVE BEEN TASERED HAVE DIED IN CUSTODY.
Trial of tasers on healthy people has been the basis of report published by Jeffrey Ho
See Journal of Emergency Medicine, DOI:10.1016/j.jemermed.2007.02.018; Annals of Emergency Medicine, DOI:10.1016/j.annermergmed.2007.05.04.
WRITER
Tasers and suicide bombers
22.12.2008 14:57
Gordon
Tasers in the UK- Raoul Moat story
11.07.2010 21:23
Sally Ramage
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