OK, subdue this 16 year old. I'll watch.
Posted on 07/25/2008 1:43:02 PM PDT by LibWhacker
OZARK, Mo. -- A family wants answers about what happened to their son that left him hospitalized. Early Saturday morning, police found Mace Hutchinson, 16, underneath the Highway F overpass over U.S. 65.
Mace ended up in intensive care at a hospital. His parents believe the actions of Ozark police officers contributed to his injuries and slowed doctors’ abilities to speed his recovery.
“We called the police. My wife was afraid he was going to get ran over or hit,” said witness Doug Messersmith.
Messersmith and his wife were the last known people to see 16-year-old boy walking, shortly before their phone call to 911.
“He looked a little agitated but, other than that, he didn't look to be falling down drunk or anything like that,” he said.
By the time officers arrived, the teen was off the 30-foot overpass, lying on the shoulder below along U.S. 65, with no good explanation as to how he got there.
“According to the doctors, all injuries are consistent with a fall,” said his aunt, Samantha.
Mace's dad believes it was just that, a fall, not a jump. The question is why.
“They tested his system. He was clean of drugs and alcohol. We don't know why unless just being in shock and the whole thing in itself caused him to forget everything,” said Hutchinson.
His aunt says he is undergoing major surgery for a broken back and broken heel. While he was lying on the ground, she wonders why Ozark police used an electric stun gun on him up to 19 times.
“I'm not an officer, but i don't see the reason for ‘Tasering’ somebody laying there with a broken back. I don't consider that a threat,”
His dad says the use of the stun gun delayed what would have been immediate surgery by two days.
“The ‘Tasering’ increased his white blood cell count and caused him to have a temperature so they could not go into the operation.”
“He refused to comply with the officers and so the officers had to deploy their Tasers in order to subdue him. He is making incoherent statements; he's also making statements such as, ‘Shoot cops, kill cops,’ things like that. So there was cause for concern to the officers,” said Ozark Police Capt. Thomas Rousset.
Police say although there are several unanswered questions; the reason for the use of a stun gun is not one of them.
“It's a big concern for the officers to keep this guy out of traffic, to keep him from getting hurt,” said Rousset.
Mace was still in intensive care on Wednesday night, listed in fair condition. He was scheduled for surgery again on Thursday. The family, along with the Ozark Police Department, hopes someone will see this report and come forward with some information. You can call (417) 699-4789 with information or call the Ozark Police Department.
I have never met a 16 year old I do not think any local cop could subdue. These men should be in shape, they should be able to handle this situation. I have seen it first hand, they reach for their tasers at the drop of a hat. I would say somebody is going to get killed, but people already have. Should be ashamed of themselves.
Sheesh.
OK, subdue this 16 year old. I'll watch.
Non-lethal weapons seem like a good idea, but lately the Tasers are being misused. If this pattern of misuse continues, they will be removed. That would be unfortunate because it could be an effective tool if used properly.
Great food...and unbelievably reasonably priced. It's in an old Prohibition-era roadhouse, and the decor is, uh, shall we say, ''eclectic''.
Note to self... If incapacitated with broken back decline PD help from hurting self worse...lol
i’ll hold judgement because this is too weird. was he walking around? i have seen people tasered simply because of what they said but not while they were laying on the ground with a busted back.
“‘Shoot cops, kill cops,’ things like that.”
I call BS.
[... These men should be in shape...]
Those “men” could have been FEmen officers.
So I’m thinking, it would be interesting if
doctors discover the tasering actually
provided some kind of medical benefit to
Mace’s spinal chord.
Would that be fortuitous providential
serendipity?
Don’t know... I don’t think a person can walk if his back is broken. What I’m imagining here, because the article is short on facts, is that he was writhing around in agony, the cops come along and tell him to hold still so they can cuff him, but he is unable to comply because he was in too much pain, so they tased him??? I hope that’s not the case, but ...
We are only hearing one side on this. We have no idea what happened. All we are hearing are comments from the television news interviewing the family.
I would wait until some more information comes out. Sure, there are idiot cops out there, just like there are idiots in every field.
Until we accuse them of just sadistically tasering the guy 19 times (who said 19 times...the kid? His family? The news?)
This just sounds too weird to me.
Broken heel, talus, is a ball like bone and requires a lot of energy to ‘break’, actually crush. I know because I had to jump down two stories to concrete while being chased and robbed. You can sort of walk on it, but it's tender for a while. Not much to do but let the calcium repair it.
Overpass. My guess the kid jumped, crushed his heal, compressed fractured his back and basically knocked the hell out of himself.
“Oh my God, he’s coming right at us”
I want answers as to why these parents named their son “Mace”.
Im sure that's what they had in mind! They did say they were trying to help. What a great bunch of guys ;)
Specifically, from his parents, who we know little about, beyond the fact that they named their son "Mace". I'll wait for info from other sources too.
“He was a crazed madman!”
Assuming the accuracy of the story for the sake of this post:
1. If he was making incoherent statements, why assume coherency in the words ‘Shoot cops, kill cops’, unless he had a means of carrying out an intent.
2. Did the words ‘Shoot cops, kill cops’ come before or after they tasered him as he lay with a broken back? If after, many would sympathize with the sentiment.
#1. This article was written by a “reporter”, who may or may not have an agenda, but who probably couldn’t get a job most anywhere else due to low IQ and lack of language comprehension, typical of most of them.
#2. I am not a fan of cops tasering anyone who happens to be saying or doing anything they don’t like.
With that said, I’ve actually seen an old man in full cardiac arrest take 4 or 5 firemen to restrain him from getting up off the floor, pulling out his ET tube and IV, and generally laying into any of those firemen trying to restrain him from doing that— WHILE he was having CPR done to him. As soon as compressions were stopped due to his movements, he basically was dead, unmoving on the floor. As soon as chest compressions were started again, his seriously aggressive and combative movements would start. This went on for over 45 minutes that we tried to save him.
I’ve also seen frail, 80 year old ladies who had to have 2 or 3 or 4 people to restrain them from hurting someone or themselves. I’ve also watched a lot of people who are sick or badly injured try to walk away and are aggressively combative with those trying to immobilize them so they don’t injure themselves more. One of the first tenets of trauma care is to keep the patient calm, lying down and immobile so they don’t compromise themselves even more.
So I don’t ever doubt that this type of scenario could take place. Although it seems that tasering is more than a bit of overkill in this instance. But that also is something none of us could say as we weren’t there and, more importantly, were weren’t the cops who were trying to provide aid or whatever to the 16 year old.
He's busy lifting weights, no need to subdue him..........
After a little more thought, you're right! This guy epitomizes all the other 16 year olds I see running around this country. /sarcasm off plus a barf!
Contriction of muscles by electrical impulses in an untreated fracture could have serious negative implications. The last thing you want is increased pressure on a fracture.
My mom, a physician, just read your comments. She laughing her ass off and I too got a real chuckle out of it. If a person is in cardiac arrest there will be no such exhibits of physical activity...none.
There are far more of him than you realize.
The cops said they were trying to keep him from “running out into traffic” or some such nonsense. The kid had a broken back, and was LAYING on the side of the road. The cops are lying and I hope the family sues the crap out of them.
It’s interesting to note that this has dropped entirely out of the local news.
Cops overreacting with tasers!?!
The HELL you say!
now now, don’t get in the way of his fantasy that he knows better than anyone else.
http://www.columbiamissourian.com/stories/2008/07/25/man-falls-overpass-after-apparent-taser-use/
Similar thing happened today in ColuMbia MO too. STRANGE WORLD INDEED.
http://kmiz.com/news/story.php?id=11875&author=News%20Staff&category=&franchise=&county=&city=&partner=
good video of colimbia tasering.
I think you are being a bit hasty in deciding to hang the cops on the basis of a news report with very little factual information that is long on emotion and speculation on the part of interviewed relatives.
Not saying the cops didn’t do something wrong, and that may yet be proven, just saying the whole story isn’t being told yet.
As a West Virginia Mountaineer once said, “No matter how thin I make my flapjacks, they still have two sides.”
FWIW, I don’t see how the cops could be fully aware his back was broken. Especially if he was verbally and perhaps even physically resisting them, it wouldn’t be the first thing to jump into their heads.
To some extent, this reminds me of the criticisms of cops injuring or shooting some guy who is off his meds, or mentally retarded, or schizophrenic. How are they supposed to diagnose a person during a potentially violent confrontation?
That's exactly why there are Paramedics out on the street, not doctors.
It is well known 'on the street' that the worst place to pick up a patient from is a doctor's office. Doctors have no training in or concept of emergency medicine. That's why it's a specialized field now.
If a person is in cardiac arrest there will be no such exhibits of physical activity...none.
You're absolutely correct- if you are standing there, as most doctors do, with their thumb up their @ss trying to figure out what pill to prescribe or what operation will make the most money, while doing nothing for the patient except letting them expire. Since there is no cardiac perfusion or oxygenation in asystole, there will be no physical activity. But once you provide oxygenation through an ET tube with a BVM and perfusion through cardiac compressions, you can certainly get both mental and physical activity. Maybe she should take a course in CPR. Any grade or high schooler who has taken a CPR course knows how that works. Or maybe CPR is just a hoax and those patients who were in cardiac arrest who survived and actually came back to thank me for saving their lives don't know what they're talking about, but your mom does. Yeah, that's the ticket.
Your mother's ignorance of basic or advanced life support certainly doesn't bode well for patients in her care who experience an emergency health compromise. Glad she is not my doctor.
Any EMT/Paramedic or EMS personnel on FR care to respond with their experiences?
Board Certified in both Emergency Medicine and Radiology I really wouldn't consider her ignorant in the field of medicine.
I'll take it that you're a two week wonder EMT or a wannabe physician that could make the score.
Is that Phillip Phister at 16 years old??
Have no desire to make this into a pi$$ing match over qualifications and experience, but I asked a current local Paramedic about the situation and he said “Yep, I’ve seen the exact very same thing.”
It’s amazing what **experience** you can get OUTSIDE of the double glass doors of the emergency room. And also why he said they now carry cards from their medical authority that basically tell any doctor on the scene who wants to interfere in patient treatment to basically take over full medical responsibility from the scene to the ER or pi$$ off. Many’s the time when I wished I’d had one of those when I was on the street.
“I think you are being a bit hasty in deciding to hang the cops on the basis of a news report with very little factual information”
I wasn’t basing my statement on the article posted, I was basing it on a news report on the TV citing police officials statements. I live about an hours drive from Ozark. Somebody’s lying and it isn’t the kid or the parents.
And again, this story has totally dropped out of the news reports in this area.
Strange that there is only one recorded case of patient cognization of a CPR incident available in current medical literature (JAMA, Lancet, etc.) which includes firefighter/paramedic publications. That incident was reported in India.
Were you aware also that survival rate of cardiac arrest victims where CPR is initiated in the field is only 1% to 3%. Not such a great record.
Be leery of medical stories where there is no medical documentation by professionals.
You make it sound like these guys just decided to tase this kid 19 times for no reason other than possibly their personal enjoyment.
That just doesn’t sound logical to me. Whenever someone is in a bind with the cops, friends and relatives always say “He was such a wonderful boy. He would never do anything that would cause a problem with the law.”
And they are wrong the vast majority of the time. Not saying this is absolutely the case this time, but, if you live in the USA and you hear the sound of hooves, it is probably horses, not zebras.
That’s amazing, lifting that much weight with a broken back.
And you apparently can’t understand a “statement” from the police that runs contrary to logical thought. The kid was laying on the ground with a broken back. That much is fact. What the police said in their “statement” doesn’t fit that fact.
And yes the news is full of stories of LEO’s tasing someone for the apparent heck of it.
And for the record, the record on this kid shows that he hasn’t had any run ins with the police, no discipline record at school or anything else to indicate that he was anything other than just a kid.
Whatever. You weren’t there, you didn’t see what happened, and you are ready to be judge, jury and executioner.
The world is full of teenagers who don’t have any issues or run-ins with the law, then one day they do. Someone thought the kid was acting erratically enough to be frightened for his safety even without sadistic police around.
And you weren’t there either. I’m basing my thoughts on what was said BY THE POLICE. The fact that someone called showed they were concerned about the kid. When the police got there, the kid was LYING ON THE GROUND WITH A BROKEN BACK. Based on that FACT, what I heard the cops say doesn’t fit. Hitherto, SOMEONE IS LYING and it ain’t the kid!
It’s okay for you to believe what you want to if it makes you feel better.
Interesting news indeed.
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