Are Tasers Safe?

Tools

By Nick Lough

Story Published: Oct 11, 2007 at 9:22 PM MDT

Story Updated: Oct 12, 2007 at 7:09 AM MDT

LAUREL - There continues to be debate over whether tasers, sometimes used by law enforcement, can be lethal. A new study suggests they're safe, but critics still say there is evidence otherwise.
Laurel Police received their first tasers through a grant several months ago. Officers say they are not lethal and a new study by the American College of Emergency Physicians agrees. Thursday, I put myself on the receiving end of a taser.
Tasers are a tool used by police departments across the country to subdue suspects quickly. They are not meant to harm individuals, but taser critics say the weapons are sometimes misused by departments. They believe officers fire them too quickly before assessing certain situations and that they can be deadly.
Laurel Police Officer Jason Wells disagrees. "It is absolutely not a toy absolutely not," said Wells. "There's a study out there where two cities who had to use deadly force and after having the taser implemented have no had to take a life. That's the first time in ten years those departments have not had to use deadly force."
The American College of Emergency Physicians just released a study on tasers that reviewed nearly a thousand cases where tasers had been used. They found no case resulted in death because of the taser. Two of the cases reviewed did end in a fatality, but the study says it was not because the two individuals were tasered. The study also included three others needing to be hospitalized after being subdued by the weapon, two from falls. The third was not clear.
Every Laurel police officer has to be tazed before he or she is able to carry one. Laurel Police say they've only had to use tasers twice since they got them. They say a suspect's fear of the taser itself helps officers more than the public might imagine.

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