This morning I finally got around to watching the RCMP kill Robert Dziekanski, a Polish immigrant who spoke no English, with three shots from a taser at the Vancouver airport in September. Sickening that no one seemed to have compassion for the man. No one even attempted to revive him once he collapsed. It bummed me out all day.
Now Boing Boing links to a video of Patrolman John Gardner of the Utah Highway Patrol tasing a man in front of his family simply for refusing to sign his traffic citation. The driver in question, Jered Massey, doesn’t appear to be a danger to me. In fact, when he complied with Gardner’s request to get out of the car, he was not told he was under arrest and was probably assuming Gardner would show him the speed limit sign he had been asking to see.
I believe Mr. Gardner should now be out of a job, though there doesn’t seem to be much chance of that happening. The taxpayers of Utah will be paying a high price for condoning this behavior.
The cops think they’re fucking Captain Kirk with these tasers. When the lawsuits keep piling up perhaps police departments won’t be so quick to pull the taser trigger.