Quote:
Originally Posted by Officer of Engineers
Tasers are alot less damaging than 6 bantons clubbing. That was the only other alternative.
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No, it wasn't.
The guy was there for 10 hours. Surely it was possible in that time to find someone who could speak Polish & a mental health professional. In fact, police departments worldwide should have the latter attached to them as a matter of course. Sending Police to deal with someone who is in mental distress is a recipie for disaster.
In this case the Police seem to have decided what they were going to do before they even reached the guy. One of the problems with the expansion in the deployment of 'non-lethal' technologies such as Tasers & Pepper spray is that it sometimes encourages Police to use force where other alternatives would be better. Another problem is that these technologies have unpredictable outcomes. Perhaps the average person can take a Taser or pepper spray, but in some people these carry the risk of very serious injury or death. There is no way of knowing this until the technology is used on them.
This whole situation was badly mismanaged, first by the airport & then by the police. A man whose only apparent crime was to be mentally distressed in an airport is dead. It really should give cause to think about how such situations are dealt with in future.