Tasers are the most wonderful tool imaginable for law enforcement. Have a mentally ill man in custody who wants to catch his breath because he’s tired? We can’t have that! Taser him a couple of times and after that I’m sure he’ll straighten up and fly right.
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — Broward County deputies shocked a mentally ill inmate with Tasers in court after the man asked deputies for a few minutes to catch his breath before he was led from the courtroom.
Assistant Public Defender Anne LeMaster said deputies told 22-year-old inmate David Jones it was time to go Friday. When he resisted, they shocked him twice. Jones had just been found mentally incapable to stand trial and was ordered transferred to a state mental hospital.
The public defender’s office says the deputies used excessive force and filed a complaint with the Broward Sheriff’s Office.
Jones was handcuffed and shackled.
So, a handcuffed and shackled individual, tired, confused, perhaps disoriented, and found unfit to stand trial got a little unscheduled electroshock treatment from two Broward County Deputy Sheriffs? Are we surprised? Of course not. Are we concerned? Only if we care about human rights. Otherwise, we’re conservatives and confederate heritage supporters who think the bastard got what was coming to him (from the comments to the article):
I say the crminal probably got what he had coming. If he was “mentally incapable to stand trial” as this limp-wristed judge decided, then he probably did something really bad and got out of it by being sent to a hospital instead of a cell where he belonged. I’m tired of criminals getting out of their punishments by being labeled as mentally incapable–whatever the hell that means. They always seem to have the sense to do the crime but get out of it by not allegedly being culpable. Well maybe that little bit of shock therapy will help him along. I hope he hit his head on something on the way to the floor.
America. Love it or get tasered. Multiple times.
some people can’t call it a good day until someone, somewhere, is punished, for something.
Too many people are in jail. I’m suspecting a ploy to keep the unemployment rate down.
Where was the judge? Sitting there like a potted plant?
May have already left the bench or was busy with the next case.
they were only trying to be of assistance by giving him an early start on his electro
shockconvulsive therapy l guess…who knows, we may yet see a resurrection of the full frontal lobotomy if this trend continues.Performed by well trained and duly qualified police officers, and only when no other means of restraint is possible.
It has seemed like the undercurrent of authoritarianism in this country is going into hyper-drive. We’ve legitimized torture. . . Why not, right?
Though in all seriousness, comments like that do0shbag’s and the shit I’m hearing in person, ain’t much different from one and other. Look at the shit going down in the Twin Cities. “You dirty fucking hippies are getting what they deserve – a boot in the ass.”
The Republicans have built a now-crumbling empire on fomenting outright hate for their political adversaries. Not disagreement or mis-trust; full blown hate. Anything that puts us in our place. (“Us” being anyone who is not “them” in their minds.)
This has nowhere to go but down, in my opinion.
/incoherent rant
Enough about Bush already! The poor guy hears voices that MAKE him kill!
Not all totally florid psychotics are totally harmless all the time, despite their incapacities. Especially under stress of being cuffed. That alone would has likely set a lot of folks off pretty well without a severe disease.
Police are supposed to use tasers as a second to last resort to pulling your pistol. Not to make someone immediately comply with what you tell them to do when they are already in handcuffs and shackled.
No one reported that the man was threatening anyone or struggling. And the defense attorney filed a complaint against the deputies involved. Public dfenders and defense attorneys don’t do that lightly, since when they meet with clients in jail settings or in court they need the protection of the officers from their clients violent reactions as often as anyone else.
From a separate account of the incident:
So first they punched him, then they tasered him, all because he didn’t move quickly enough. Trust me, there are better ways to handle situations like this one, especially when the individual is already restrained.
Given the evidence presented here, I’d agree with you. But I wasn’t there and know this stuff can get very complicated, very quickly.