IL - Roger Holyfield, 17, dies after tazing by Jerseyville police, 28 Oct 2006

[crypto6]

Iviola, I agree that it sounds as if your cousin did all the right things in this case and I pray that he will be found innocent of all charges. I hope that no one thinks I am bashing cops for defending themselves when their lives are in danger, because that is simply not the case. But, there are countless cases of cops that get a little too carried away and use brutality against citizens when they should not. Every case should be investigated on its own merits and I personally feel that the force used against this boy was excessive. Unfortunately, this boy will never be able to receive the help he obviously needed and that is a true shame for him and his family.

I'll strongly second that about your cousin: Life and death situation and he doesn't even need the benefit of the doubt because there's none there. He did the right thing. Lived in ATL for 11 years and in spite of the activists' spew, he'll get a fair shake and be exonerated.

 

[Details]

And a tazer is as much 'potentially leathal force' as a peanut butter sandwich is. Sure, either can kill a suceptible someone, but that doesn't make them a lethal weapon

I think we've been snookered by the taser manufacturer; these things aren't safe, and I won't venture into what you do with peanut butter sandwiches that makes them so dangerous.

Peanut butter sandwiches are lethal - pull one out, or just have eaten one very recently, and you can kill a person with a bad peanut allergy. Just as a tazer can kill someone with a weakness for them.

An officer who uses a tazer is no more using 'potentially lethal force' than an officer using a peanut butter sandwich. Both can kill, and neither is expected to.

 

[Details]

From what the ME said, the tazer might have been the best shot at saving him, by forcibly calming him down - but too late.

See the above, and any standard cardiac or neurology text. This is asinine from a medical viewpoint, unless calming is a euphemism for a dirt nap.

Knocking him out, getting him to calm down seems to me to be the only thing that might stop if the problem that's going to kill him is, as I interpret the ME report, too fast of a heartbeat, the body running too fast, being driven that way by the mind.

If you take remedial statistics, you'll find out that the odds of the police running into criminals with pretty well any disease or hereditary or undiagnosed weakness is a virtual 100%.

Huh?? My med stats courses weren't remedial, so help me here: Are you saying that virtually everyone is diseased, or that through his/her career any LE will encounter some disease relevant to this discussion (cardiac dysrhythmias, tachycardic syndromes, cardiac myopathy, etc)???

"the police" - not one particular officer, but the police in general. "criminals" - not every single criminal, but again, criminals in general. In the set of criminals, all kinds of diseases and weaknesses exist, at a similar or higher rate as the general population. When the police (in general) run into any (general) criminal, there's always some chance that this criminal can have pretty well any disease. Extrapolate that across all arrests, all interactions, and that basicly means that the police in general will run into nearly every possible disease, in the body of criminals in general. Then we sit here, hear about the few rare cases, and expect that the police should put their lives in jeapordy (and by extension, ours as well), by handling all criminals as if they have these rare problems. And forget about all the common criminals (including other street shouters who resist the police) whose lives are saved when the police have an alternative to real lethal force.

Statistics are incomplete and irrelevant when they don't include both sides. Thousands of lives are saved by the tazer. Tens and hundreds of thousands are tazer'd, and have no problems at all. This number includes most police officers, since it's a common part of training for them to experience exactly what their non-lethal alternatives do.

You handcuff somebody and you are in charge of their safety. One can't be held responsible for unknown outcomes, but is responsible for known consequences, and this case illustrates one.

There are lots of known consequences - including peanutbutter. But they are so rare, so unlikely, should these unlikely consequences be considered above the likely consequences of using physical force? In most circumstances, the tazer is far safer, leaves far less lasting damage, and is far less likely to kill.

BTW, thanks for the reply; it gave me a chance to research tasers. I look forward to any replies. I understand your stance and agree: To hold LE responsible for dirtbags' outcomes, one must overcome basically all obstacles except gross negligence or malicious intent. I think the former is relevant here.

Submitted for your viewing pleasure,
Crypto6

Anytime - but I have to severely disagree about the gross negligence. Going hands on when the police have an alternative is what I think is the wrong choice - there's no reason to get into a stupid wrestling match which can cause injury or death as well, when there is a nice alternative like a tazer that is safer (how many police caused deaths due to guns or choke holds or other types of old-fashioned methods?).

 

[lviola]

I'll strongly second that about your cousin: Life and death situation and he doesn't even need the benefit of the doubt because there's none there. He did the right thing. Lived in ATL for 11 years and in spite of the activists' spew, he'll get a fair shake and be exonerated.

Thank you very much. He still has nightmares about the shooting. We all feel terrible and could not imagine what Corey's family go through without their son.

He was such a young man.

 

[GlitchWizard]

My cousin is going through this now in Atlanta...
If what Ray did was murder then sooner or later every decent police officer in this country will be put behind bars.

I hope he has money for a good attorney. The system is all messed up for police officers, just as much as it is for the rest of us....and even though he didn't do anything wrong - there are many people out there for his blood right now. (The family of the guy he shot, and everyone within ear shot of them who thinks it was racially motivated.) I hope he gets, not just a fair trial, but one that exonorates him.

 

[Details]

I hope he has money for a good attorney. The system is all messed up for police officers, just as much as it is for the rest of us....and even though he didn't do anything wrong - there are many people out there for his blood right now. (The family of the guy he shot, and everyone within ear shot of them who thinks it was racially motivated.) I hope he gets, not just a fair trial, but one that exonorates him.

The people I worry about on the jury are the sympathetic ones. They're just oh so sad for the family, and friends, and he was a wonderful kid, and he shouldn't have died just for stealling a car - everyone makes mistakes, and his family is in so much pain, it'd just be nice to help them get some closure....

They're not bad people, and not the reverse racists - they just are thinking with their emotions, responding to another person's pain - but they don't think about reality, and how someone else has to pay for their decision, and the facts of the case just don't matter as much as that feeling that somehow the kid could have been saved, and the police should have known how to do that - it's their jobs! Nice people - but you sure don't want to be on the wrong side of wherever their emotions land! And they don't belong on a jury.

A lot of very bad verdicts have come from this type of juror, especially against someone they see as 'the man' - a big company, a rich doctor... or a police officer. That's where a bunch of money was given in the silicone breast implant trials - with no evidence that the implants did anything at all bad (and to this day, there is no evidence linking them to any diseases).

Or, there was the case a friend of my mom's was involved in... a doctor invited everyone he worked with to a party on his yacht. There they were, having fun.... but this one nurse went and was drinking a bit much. So, they tried to cut her off, but she managed to get her hands on even more alcohol. So, they put her in a room below when she passed out, and figured she would be OK. She slipped out of the room, and jumped over the side of the boat. They rescued her, took care of her - but she still had some paralysis, so she sued the doctor. Such a sad story - she was a wonderful woman, and now she could never walk again, could never be a nurse again - shouldn't this doctor, who has more than enough money, pay some part of her massive bills and lifelong care? So - the jury goes in to deliberate, and the first thing the foreman says is, "So, how much should we give her?" No question of was the doctor at fault, just pure sympathy for this nurse. My mom's friend holds them up to do a vote first on if they should give her anything - she's the sole holdout. Every person on that jury wasn't concerned about if the doctor was really at fault, just that this poor person was hurt and needed help, and they, on the jury, could give that help. Well, having a holdout meant they had to think about that issue - and everyone realized when discussing it that there wasn't a single place they felt the doctor, nor anyone else, had been negligent. They came back with the verdict of "Not Guilty" for the doctor.

A long story, but that, and these other cases are why I really am scared when I see one of these emotional type cases going to a jury. If there isn't someone on that jury, and all it takes is one, who will stand up for the facts, some very, very bad verdicts can come down and punish innocent people. I really hope Ray has at least one coldhearted, factual person on his jury.

 

[LovelyPigeon]

There is much dispute about "excited delirium". I found this warning, though, about using multiple strikes with a taser against people who appear to be in the throes of an elaborately excitable condition:

The effectiveness of pepper spray and impact techniques (baton strikes and beanbag rounds) "will likely be diminished with individuals who are unresponsive to pain."
If empty-hand techniques are to be tried, "then the officers should be trained in advance to function as part of a multiple-officer takedown team."

A better choice may be Conducted Energy Devices (Tasers). However, current research cautions about a possible link "between MULTIPLE such applications and death in persons with symptoms of ED. To mitigate this risk, a SINGLE Taser application should be made before the subject has been exhausted."
(The Taser should be used not in the hope of gaining compliance but to create a window of disablement during which officers can establish physical control of the subject.) - http://www.policeone.com/writers/columnists/ForceScience/articles/119828/

 

[Details]

There is much dispute about "excited delirium". I found this warning, though, about using multiple strikes with a taser against people who appear to be in the throes of an elaborately excitable condition:

The effectiveness of pepper spray and impact techniques (baton strikes and beanbag rounds) "will likely be diminished with individuals who are unresponsive to pain."
If empty-hand techniques are to be tried, "then the officers should be trained in advance to function as part of a multiple-officer takedown team."

A better choice may be Conducted Energy Devices (Tasers). However, current research cautions about a possible link "between MULTIPLE such applications and death in persons with symptoms of ED. To mitigate this risk, a SINGLE Taser application should be made before the subject has been exhausted."
(The Taser should be used not in the hope of gaining compliance but to create a window of disablement during which officers can establish physical control of the subject.) - http://www.policeone.com/writers/columnists/ForceScience/articles/119828/

Doesn't sound like they've got much in the line of good approaches - pepper spray and beanbags won't work, and physical force will be difficult, the tazer is the best - but maybe will cause harm if they don't gain control the after the first shock - "possible link" - not very well known.

 

[MistyM]

even if someone is handcuffed, they can still do damage, like biting the police officers. and that can be dangerous, because you dont know what someone might be carrying in their body fluids. if i were in the polices position and i couldn't calm that person down i would use whatever i had that would *probably* not kill them. he didn't get shot and they didn't beat him into unconsciousness. they used something that was approved for them to use to calm someone down. they couldn't just sit there and let him go crazy! what were they supposed to do, let him loose? let him sit in the back of the car kicking and screaming and maybe hurt himself bad and then they would get into trouble anyways? this was a horrible accident, not caused by the police but by the unit used on him. the police had NO idea that it was going to kill him. in their heads they were probably more worried about getting into trouble for letting him kill himself in the back of the car from self inflicted injuries than from the bloody tazer. maybe people don't understand what police have to deal with.

 

[*~Aimee~*]

I think that there is more to this then meets the eye, could you please provide a link to the full story.

I put money that there was some sort of 'drug" history or drug use involved.

I live in Jville and went to school with his mom. He wasn't on any drugs. Was standing on corner saying he wanted Jesus. His mom sued police, dispatch, and Jerseyville and won. This was her only child. His bday was today. He would of been 31. So sad and my heart goes out to Rita.

Oh and Jerseyville no longer use Tasers

 

[*~Aimee~*]

No need to taser someone unarmed, handcuffed, laying face down that I know of

Illinois Wrongful Death Lawsuit Settled by Police Over Excessive Taser Use - AboutLawsuits.com

The complaint alleged that officers used unreasonable and excessive force when they placed Holyfield under arrest without sufficient cause. Although he was unarmed, handcuffed and laying facedown on the ground, the officers reportedly shot Holyfield with a Taser several times.

 

[rodneymullenmg]

I live in Jville and went to school with his mom. He wasn't on any drugs. Was standing on corner saying he wanted Jesus. His mom sued police, dispatch, and Jerseyville and won. This was her only child. His bday was today. He would of been 31. So sad and my heart goes out to Rita.

Oh and Jerseyville no longer use Tasers

I believe you. LE has a history of brutality. This is another one. So sad