Tazer preventing harm

I really can’t understand the lobbyists against the tasers. There is a very good chance Steven Wallace would be alive today if we had tasers back then, And today’s Herald reports on how the threat of one being used ended a stand off peacefully:

A shirtless fugitive who kept police at bay with tree branches and the occasional haka for nearly three hours threw his arms in the air when an officer threatened him with a Taser.

Police had ruled out using dogs or pepper spray to catch the 36-year-old, who had dragged an officer with his car before crashing into a tree in the Hamilton suburb of Pukete.

In the US, he would probably be dead by now if you have injured a police officer and not surrendered.

The CIB officer had been questioning the man after a complaint from a female jogger that she had been followed. …

The man took off his shirt on the river bank to reveal “Tuhoe” tattooed across his chest. He then waded knee-deep into the water before scrambling back to the river’s edge.

He gestured to a crowd of about 50 on the other side of the river, beat nearby bushes with tree branches and performed an impromptu haka as police tried to get him to give himself up.

I’m beginning to regret they did not use the taser.

Ms Henrikson said the officer with the Taser was introduced to the fugitive, who was told he had the device and was ready to use it.

“Its capabilities were explained,” she said. “This was enough to make the offender completely compliant.”

Funny how the threat of 50,000 volts means you won’t resist arrest.