>> I personally do not believe in tasers as I have personal knowledge of cops that used them out of pure meanness.
Sorry, they’re here to stay. As for the “pure meanness” use, that’s a good way to get fired AND put in jail.
TASERs are used when:
1/ There is an immediate threat to the cops or others
2/ The subject is actively resisting
3/ In fast-paced / rapidly evolving events
4/ Serious crimes
5/ The subject is attempting to escape
Time for you to do some research:
2/ https://www.taser.com/legal
I do not have a problem agreeing with your five examples as to when a method of force should be used. What I do not care fore is using a taser to accomplish this. My point is, prior to tasers LEO’s must have had some effective way to deal with unruly subjects.
There is this belief that a taser is a more “humane” way to control a subject as opposed to shooting or beating the hell out of a person. I agree with this.
The problem is the bad cop taking advantage of this. This narcissistic control freak uses a badge to have power over others. He’s smart enough to know the public thinks beating someone with a baton is violet and cruel because it inflicts pain and leaves easily detectable bruising. So the bad cop will take advantage of this misconception and abuse people with a taser. Fact is, the taser is very painful. This is torture.
The vast majority of cops are just plain good people out doing a job they believe in.
Here on FR there have been numerous threads brought to life discussing cops that shoot dogs, taser people unjustifiably, shoot people or whatever. Many of these are truly bad cops. The bad cop I knew tasered people because he knew he could get by with it. There was no way this guy could possibly get fired as he had no LEO chain of command that could fire or investigate him.