In Ozark, Missouri, a family is wondering why their 16-year-old son Mace Hutchinson was hit by tasers up to 19 times after he fell (or jumped) from an overpass and broke his back.
Witnesses said that the boy did not seen out of control. Doug Messersmith said that “He looked a little agitated but, other than that, he didn’t look to be falling down drunk or anything like that.”
He was lying on the shoulder when the police arrived. There were no drugs or alcohol in his system and the family believes that he fell from the overpass.
The extensive use of the tasers forced doctors to delay the operation on the teenager for two days.
Ozark Police Capt. Thomas Rousset says that they hit him with the tasers up to 19 times “to keep him from getting hurt” by running into traffic. He added that “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.”
We still have a boy who just fell from an overpass with a broken back and no apparent weapon.
For the full story, click here.
Do you know who’s going to be patrolling America’s streets in the next 5 years and going forward at least a couple of decades? The guys who are currently working as mercenary contractors in Iraq and elsewhere. Sociopaths with a history of steroid and methamphetamine abuse, suffering from PTSD.
State and municipal police forces in America have always given preference in hiring to applicants with military backgrounds. So far that policy doesn’t seem to be working all that well. When KBR and Blackwater goons start hitting Main Street USA, be afraid. Be very, very afraid.
Thank you, George W. Bush.
Groups like NACOLE are not nearly sufficent to curb this wave of police assaults on our citizens and communites. We need to empower local communities, to assemble, vote, and discipline, officers in their community found guilty by the community, of offenses against their citizens.
These community groups would not get their power from the legal justice systems of their communities, but by Congressional legislation, and would have no powers to arrest, detain, or in any way levy civil or criminal charges, or imprison or collect monetary damages.
Their only power, would be discipline of the officers in their community, within the confines of their roles as police. This power would extend from simple write ups on their records, to suspsensions with or without pay, and outright expulsion from the force and the communities in any offical capacity.
This might sound extreme to some of you, at first. But chew on it for a while. Remember, you have as of now, no legal way to defend yourself from police attack. If an officer attacks you for no reason, you have no right to defend yourself. Now, some might argue you do, but try it sometime. Try “putting up your dukes” if a cop attacks you for no valid reason, and see what happens. The sad fact is we citizens, must yield to whatever assaults a policeman sees fit on inflicting upon us, and for whatever reason, and our only recourse is if we can get a DA to investigate it, or IA, or a Judge to consider it, and then try the case and hope for justice. And if that fails perhaps some civil action that might get you a few bucks, but its not likely under most circumstances because of laws barring suits against the police and local govts for doing “their jobs”. And of course all of that is assuming you actually “survive” the attack.
No the fact is its grown serious since 911, and Americans are being beaten, tortured, and killed by our police across the board at an alarming rate. And the only way I see to curb that is putting power across the board into the hands of the citizens to protect themselves within the communities in which they reside.
Once the police know that the people of a community can “vote him out” and he can lose his job, and even be barred from ever practicing law enforcement in that state again, they’ll think twice before shooting a pregnent lady and her unborn child with 50,000 volts of electricity, or shooting a 45 year old Salinas California women to death for pointing a CROCHET HOOK at them.
Or shooting a child injured with a broken back laying on the side of road, 19 times with a taser, for God knows what reason.
Don’t hold your breath on MSM looking closely at this. They are too busy checking out Obama’s fist bumps.
rafflaw
1, July 26, 2008 at 4:35 pm
If so, how much time went by before they were finished shooting the taser 19 times. You would think someone would have woken up before then and said, maybe this isn’t a good idea.
Thats a good question. Firing a Taser is essentialy a “discharge” of the weapon. The weapon contains a chargable power cell, so it seems that one Taser’s charge would expire before he could discharge it 19 times.
I really hope the MSM, doesn’t sweep this one under the rug, like most of these events.
They get back page coverage, and often are mysteriously removed from the web after a month or two by certain online press sites.
We need this front and center, and we need a resolution. And the only resolution that I can think of, that would have any teeth, would be “Citzen Oversight” of the police which patrol their communities.
Allowing the citizens to have a degree of say in who polices their communities and how they police them, would put a modicum of power back in the hands of the citizens of this country, to protect themselves from the one demograph which they are currently forbidden to protect themselves from.
rafflaw
1, July 26, 2008 at 4:35 pm
Bartlebee,
I am not a taser expert, but don’t those things shoot darts with wires on them in order to issue the voltage?
You bet. There’s also models you merely need to touch to the victim, kind of like a cattleprod.
Bartlebee,
I am not a taser expert, but don’t those things shoot darts with wires on them in order to issue the voltage? If so, how much time went by before they were finished shooting the taser 19 times. You would think someone would have woken up before then and said, maybe this isn’t a good idea.
The cop pulling the trigger, in this case, should be charged with the same thing they’d charge you or me with had we done a similar thing to such a severly injured person.
Attempted Murder.
Because after the 3rd charge, the cop knew good and well he could kill the kid, regardless if he knew his back was broken or not. He knew he was injured, and thats enough information to know that death could occur.
He’s lucky he didn’t kill him, but it wasn’t for not trying.
Rafflaw said…
These officers should be shown the door and then sued in civil court by the boy and his family
Agreed. However I think its also time to start looking at the criminal aspects here. After all, being shocked with 50,000 volts 19 times in a row can easily prove fatal.
Couple that with the massive trauma shock to the body caused by the boys broken back, and this could have easily killed the kid.
Quite easily. In fact its a miracle he survived the “attack” by police given his condition.
If I were an ambitous DA, I might consider some aspect of “Attempted Murder” be brought against the lowbrow officer pulling the trigger in this one.
After all, death by tasering is reaching epidemic proportions.
Recently a Dallas man was tasered to death after calling 911 while having a seizure.
Last October Canadian police officers tasered to death a man pleading for help at the airport.
Just last month Long Island police tasered to death a 26 year old Brooklyn man.
Just recently a story in a trial finally produced an actual charge for an officer tasering one Baron “Scooter” Pikes nine times, killing him. The coroners report indicated mr Pikes was dead on the 7th shock from the weapon. The coroner ruled the death, a “Homocide”.
And this is just the tip of the iceberg. In fact, more than 150 citizens have been tasered to death since 2001, and that date is clearly tied to this.
After 911 the people were instructed to effectively elevate the police to a level of omnipotence, where the least question or challenge to authority would be met with overwhelming responses. No one was supposed to question this, after all, Mr Bush told us they were gonna “keep us safe”. And given the nations willingness to surrender their freedoms in exchange for a good nights sleep, it wasn’t too hard for police to push their newly found supremecy to the limit.Its like we were asking them to do it. To dominate us. Not “protect and serve”, but to terrorize us themselves, and our role, is to walk straight ahead, hands at sides, braindead smile on face and never, ever, make any gestures that might indicate discontent with the new order.
Now, 150 Americans have been executed via electrocution, by police who think they have the right to assault and murder the citizens at will. Its as if the taser, a tool designed to protect extremly violent people who cannot be subdued by usual means (i.e. offensive grappling) in a manner so as not to cause death, has been turned into a sort of portable electric chair for the police.
And its not just killing people with them, that encompasses their misuse. Recently police in Witicha, Kansas tasered a NAKED DEAF man to the ground, while he was exiting his own shower, in his own apartment.
They had the “wrong” apartment.
These “heroes in blue” apoligized for the “mistake”, and advised the deaf man to put a sign on his door telling people he was deaf, so this wouldn’t “happen again” to him.
Even worse police in Trotwood, Ohio recently tasered a PREGNANT woman.
I mean a PREGNANT woman.
What kind of cowardly cops in force are so afraid of a pregnant woman, that they hit her, AND her unborn child, with 50,000 volts?
Seriously what kind?
How freaking pathetic does a man have to be, to be so scared he has to taser a pregnant woman and her unborn child?
How do these cowards get on the force?
And as if that wasn’t bad enough, recently, in this blog, we have a thread about Police tasering a BLIND WOMAN.
😐
A BLIND WOMAN.
No the fact is this is an epidemic.
And the truth is, the biggest threat to safety to the American people, is not criminals, terrorists or the boogeyman.
The biggest threat to the physical safety of the citizens of this country, is the Police.
Yes, but the police saw through it this time!
rafflaw
1, July 26, 2008 at 2:39 pm
Bartlebee,
You forgot that the boy was wearing his flesh colored anti-taser suit
Ahhh, the old flesh colored anti-taser suit on the broken back boy trick…. ay?
Martha h,
Here’s an alternative headline:
Stupid thugs with no real skills as police officers either sadistic or too incompetent to immobilize a boy with a broken back. Many authoritarian citizens, happy to trust incompetent thugs no matter what they do, blame the victim.
(I put in that second bit just for you.)
Bartlebee,
You forgot that the boy was wearing his flesh colored anti-taser suit when the police attacked him! Nineteen times with a taser had to take some time to reload. It reminds of that the police in NYC that shot an unarmed guy about 70 or 80 times and they called that a proper use of force! So 19 tasers is a drop in the bucket for a tough, 16 year old boy with a broken back and a broken heel. I think I could have restrained him by merely asking him to hang in there, the paramedics are on the way. These officers should be shown the door and then sued in civil court by the boy and his family.
In fact, when more than one cops feel they need to taser any 16 year old boy, because they aren’t man enough to control him just by grabbing him and putting him down using standard offensive grappling techniques, then they still don’t belong on the force.
We have plenty of sissy’s in society.
But we don’t need to be giving them badges.
Here’s a few tips for you Martha, that should have made it clear your convoluted fairy tale didn’t add up.
From the article;
Witnesses said that the boy did not seen out of control.
And;
He was lying on the shoulder when the police arrived.
And of course, he HAD A BROKEN BACK.
😐
If your saying that several police officers were not physically able to restrain a 16 year old boy, LYING on the side of the road, with a BROKEN BACK, then I perhaps we need to hire less wimpy officers.
Because what kind of sissies, need to taser a 16 year old boy 19 times, who’s lying on the pavement with a BROKEN BACK, don’t deserve to be wearing badges or enforcing laws, since clearly they are not tough enough for such a position in society.
martha h
1, July 26, 2008 at 9:31 am
Alternative headline:
Suicidal man threatens to kill cops despite injured back after jumping off bridge.
Police had to use Taser’s up to 19 times before they were able to control a young man who may have attempted suicide by jumping off a bridge
Hmmm… so the guy has a BROKEN BACK, but he was going to “jump off the bridge” with a BROKEN BACK.
😐
hmmmm… lemmee see…… broken back….
…..carry the 2…..
😐
Nope.
It just doesn’t add up. Sorry Martha.
A guy with a broken back is by definition, immobilized. Tasers, are used to immobilize.And since he already was immobilized, then the use of a Taser would not be necessary.
Much less 19 times.
Which could have easily killed him.
So I got a better headline.
—
Police Use Tasers 19 Times in an Attempt to Jumpstart Martha’s Brain
By Slappy White, AP Reporter, Inbreedia AL.
Earlier today Police officers attempted to jumpstart Martha H’s brain by tasering her on the forehead 19 times. While the operation was unsuccessful, it is hoped that future attempts using higher voltages and embedding the taser hooks deeper into the brain by boring an access hole into the 16 inch thick cranial shell protecting the mustard seed like cerebrum inside, using a special, diamond tipped high speed drill, may prove more effective, although both doctors and police admit it is a longshot.
😐
Film at 11:00.
I think it is time to outlaw the use of tasers. There are studies confirming that their use has expanded well beyond the original idea of a (hopefully) non-lethal way of subduing violent suspects. Legitimate questions may be raised on both accounts: 1. they are not as sub-lethal as presented and 2. they are not being used only for their original intent. Time to stop tasing us bros!
Well, that puts a whole new outlook on the emergency medical system (ems) response. Having worked in trauma centers, the police were almost always an interference, but had not actively harmed and impeded the EMS.
From this and other recent evidence, it appears that law “enforcement” officers are now torturing trauma victims and people with medical emergencies. (Nahsville using forced injections of versed to subdue people and other round the country reports of people being tasered when in fact they are suffering from acute illnesses or injuries).
martha h,
It doesn’t surprise me that you would be thanking the cops for being so modest with their use of their tasers. They were nice enought to let the young man off easy by only doing it 19 times. Have you seen anyone get tasered? The idea that it took 19 taser hits to subdue a person with a broken back and a broken heel would be difficult for officers to cuff and subdue is downright ludicrous. Nowhere in the story did it mention that anyone was concerned that the young man wanted to commit suicide “by cop”. The only thing happening here is attempted murder by “the cops”.
Alternative headline:
Suicidal man threatens to kill cops despite injured back after jumping off bridge.
Police had to use Taser’s up to 19 times before they were able to control a young man who may have attempted suicide by jumping off a bridge.
To complicate matters the young man may have then attempt “Suicide by Cop” while in an agitated state. Police stated that time after time they resorted to Taser’s to immobilize the young man. Fearful that he may have been on severe drugs that could make him much more dangerous despite his injured status police finally were successful in getting control of the situtation after having to resort to up to 19 Taser’s. The young man’s resistance to the Taser’s effect only made the officers more concerned that he was on severe and dangerous drugs that would make bringing him into custody very difficult.