Word: tasers
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Stand back or you’ll get Tasered too!": That was the yell of an angry police officer when a concerned onlooker stepped forward to protest the shocking of a student with a Taser in the UCLA library. The incident took place nearly two weeks ago, when a student refused to produce his ID during a standard check of library premises by police...
Most accounts of the situation agree that the student refused to leave and, when he lay prone in protest, was shocked by a taser five times. A video of the event, taken by cell phone and circulated on YouTube, has sparked widespread disgust. The officer’s threat to Taser the intervening onlooker demonstrates what is perhaps most shocking about the incident: the wanton and unnecessary use of violence...
Tabatabainejad’s attorney, Stephen Yagman, stated that Tabatabainejad eventually agreed to leave the library but when a police officer refused to remove his hands from Tabatabainejad, Tabatabainejad fell to the ground in further protest against his unjust treatment. The attendant police then used a Taser on Tabatabainejad, who reacted by trying to get “the use of brutal force to stop by shouting and causing people to watch,” the LA Times quoted Yagman as saying...
...Taser unsafe? Rick Smith, the company's CEO, staunchly defended its technology in a press release issued the same day as the Amnesty International report, claiming that "while not risk-free," it was "safe and effective." (The company has not responded to TIME's repeated requests for interviews.) Matthew Tobias, a special-operations commander for the Chicago police, says the department stands behind Tasers and plans to keep using them. "Tasers reduce injuries to officers and citizens," says Tobias. Police in Cincinnati, Seattle and Madison, Wis., have also backed Tasers in written reports...
Such endorsements could help the company rebound. In the 1990s, medical concerns about pepper spray--which came to a head when several people died after being sprayed--led to studies that indicated the spray was not to blame. With more studies, Tasers could be similarly exonerated. And even though Taser's stock has plummeted, it is still above where it was in early 2004. "The company has performed extremely well, but its rate of growth has slowed," says Joe Blankenship, an analyst at Source Capital Group, who notes that Taser is flush with cash. As it fights its many battles...