February 1, 2008

Police Kill Five People With Tasers in January 2008


We noted one taser death last month on our blog. Tasered While Black keeps a good count of the taser attacks that impact on African Americans. Did you know that police killed five people with taser blasts in January 2008?

Tasers seem to be the modern-day version of the police dogs and water hoses they used on our people during the 1960s.


Villagers, doesn't it seem to you that the police policy of using tasers needs to be re-examined? Did these men deserve a death penalty for 'erratic driving' or 'disorderly conduct' or 'failing to obey police commands'?

12 comments:

AAPP said...

Villager, You must be commended for your effort to keep us informed of this 21st century lynching effort and the part of a small minority of uncontrolled local police across America. The violent death and abuse of blacks by police who see the Taser as a "Weapon of Black Destruction" must be brought to the attention of our people. We must fight to make sure that this new electronic apartheid whip is stopped or limited in use. It is a lethal weapon the strikes fear into, men, women, and even children. I urge other Electronic Village readers to blog about this issue.

Again thank you for actually paying attention to this issue early on. Without the Electronic Village, there would be no "Tasered While Black' blog.

Peace and blessing,

AAPP

Deidra said...

Five?! In one month?! Oh hell no. I know what they are trying to do but you don't have to LITERALLY scare people to death just to teach them a lesson. What happen to the police stick? They can't use that anymore? Not saying it's right to use the stick but seriously, what happened to that?

Unknown said...

AAPP - I appreciate your kind words. I'm grateful to you and the person that runs Taser of the Day blog for truly keeping the information in a centralized location. Have you and the Taser of the Day blogger interacted with one another?

Deidra - I'm told that every police department has a written policy on the escalation process when confronting citizens. It begins with verbal commands and escalates at its highest point to shoot to kill. I'm not certain what the formal name is for these escalation orders/policies, however that is what I would like to see documented ... I'm wondering if the taser should be closer to the 'shoot to kill' end of the scale. it seems like many departments have the taser right next to 'verbal command' end of the scale...

Woozie said...

There's quite a difference between getting the death penalty and dying from a taser.

Invisible Woman said...

Those weak reasons are police- speak for "we were completely and unapoligeticaly violating a black person's rights and that uppity negro had the f'n nerve to question it; so we tasered them to death."

Unknown said...

I though tasers were suppose to be safe?

Unknown said...

Woozie - I agree. A citizen getting the death penalty is afforded his civil rights with judge, jury and so forth. A citizen being put to death by police taser is denied his civil rights with the police officer serving as judge, jury and executioner. One is just and within the framework of our laws. The other is unjust and feels like the oppression that comes with a police state mentality...

Unknown said...

Invisible Woman - I agree. The question becomes ... what will we do about it?

BlackProfessionalEvents - Tasers put 50,000 watts of energy into a person. The human body isn't designed for that kind of abuse...

Unknown said...

This taser situation is totally out of control. Yes it is time to do something about that. Hummm, I wonder what the next president's opinion will be on the taser issue...

Unknown said...

Regina - Not just the president's ... what is our mayor's thoughts on tasers? what do our city council members think about tasers? and so forth...

Personally, I don't object to the taser. My objection is that it is used too quickly...

peace, Villager

Woozie said...

Now you know that's not what I meant.

AAPP said...

Villager, your welcome.

Your right I do need to get up with the person who blogs at Taser of the Day. I have some thoughts about next steps regarding taser abuse in black communities across America. I will share my thoughts which are in line with previous afrospear discussions in a few days on this discussion page and on Tasered While Black.