WaPo: Improper techniques, increased risks / Deaths have raised questions about the risk of excessive or improper deployment of Tasers

WaPo: Improper techniques, increased risks / Deaths have raised questions about the risk of excessive or improper deployment of Tasers by Cheryl W. Thompson & Mark Berman:

About this story: At least 48 people have died in the United States since January — about one death a week — in incidents in which police used Tasers, according to a Washington Post examination of police, court and autopsy records. The link between the use of Tasers and the deaths is unclear. At least one of the deaths occurred when an incapacitated person fell and hit his head. Other factors mentioned among the causes of death were excited delirium, methamphetamine or PCP intoxication, hypertensive heart disease, coronary artery disease, and cocaine toxicity. Twelve of the 26 cases in which The Post was able to obtain autopsy reports or cause of death information mentioned a Taser along with other factors. The Post is compiling a database of all fatal shootings nationwide by officers in the line of duty in 2015, available at wapo.st/police-shootings.

“There was a culture from top to bottom that they thought they could use the Taser however they wanted,” St. Lawrence said in September in an interview with The Post. “Deputies were using it as punishment, and you can’t use it as a form of punishment. There was just too much use.”

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