Posted on 09/10/2008 11:05:08 AM PDT by Schnucki
ALASKAN State Trooper Mike Wooten admitted yesterday he had used a Taser stun gun on Sarah Palin's nephew, his stepson, but claimed he was no danger to her family.
Mr Wooten - who is Mrs Palin's former brother-in-law - is at the heart of a legislative investigation into whether the Republican vice-presidential nominee abused her power as Alaska Governor.
The state legislature is investigating whether she fired former public safety commissioner Walt Monegan because he would not dismiss Mr Wooten, who went through a messy divorce from Mrs Palin's sister, Molly.
The 36-year-old policeman said he did not drink in his patrol car as the Palin family had alleged in a 2005 complaint before Mrs Palin was elected Governor.
He is clearly uncomfortable about becoming a national figure in the Troopergate investigation which shot into the spotlight last week when Republican presidential candidate John McCain selected Mrs Palin as his running mate.
Mr Wooten said yesterday he had heard rumblings at work in the past few years that the Palin Administration had been trying to get him off the force.
"I heard the rumour mill and hearsay that there was, I guess, pressure being applied to come after my position as a trooper," he said.
"But I didn't know to the extent to what's being sent out to the media now."
(Excerpt) Read more at news.com.au ...
Well, if he’s admitting that I couldn’t possibly care less about the rest of it.
If she brought pressure to get him fired, I have precisely zero problem with it.
I’m honestly not sure how this guy isn’t headed to an Alaskan prison...
This is enough to boot his ass off the force.
I feel a whole hell of a lot better about Palin’s troopergate than Bubba’s version of troopergate.
Palin..tried to fire a nutjob
Clinton used them as pimps.
Huge difference.
Wouldn’t we all love being pulled over on the highway by this moron? What a disgrace.
From Sarah Palin’s perspective he tasered her nephew and her sister’s son. For Wooten this was his stepson. Whatever the relationship the two had they weren’t blood. I’m sure that fact went into Palin’s response. Nothing’s thicker than blood, especially for Main Street America.
In CA, this is a felony (PC 245) as is threatening to shoot someone (PC 422). Were he a cop in CA, he’d be prosecuted and fired.
And on another front today:
No One is investigating Joe Biden or his family today!!!
The article also omits the taser threats Wooten made against Bristal and the death threats against Gov. Palin's father.
This is enough to boot his ass off the force.
How many people if they tasered a stepson would be sent to jail for child abuse at a minimum?
The trooper was suspended for threatening to shoot Sarah’s father.
He admits to tasering the young child.
Evidently, domestic violence is just fine with the dems.
Case closed, this violent buffoon should be in prison—not uniform.
“He is clearly uncomfortable about becoming a national figure in the Troopergate investigation....”
Why, Mr. Wooten? Might it lead to something worse you have done?
Even if the kid asked as an experiment, it was a spectacular act of bad judgment to use a device that is designed to bring down large adult males on a 10 year old child. We don't need idiots like this on the force.
More from the Wall Street Journal:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122084155153309153.html
“An internal police investigation found Mr. Wooten guilty of shooting a moose cow without a permit and testing a taser on his stepson. He admitted to both incidents and served a five-day suspension without pay.”
The following applies to Las Vegas and not Alaska, but it is pretty clear that a Taser is not a toy.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/319245/Las-Vegas-Police-TASER-Regulations
If this guy tasered anyone without just cause or legal authority, the Governor of the state had every reason to use her authority to have him fired. Game over. GOP wins again.
The guy is denying things HE WAS FOUND GUILTY OF!!!!
All the effort to get Palin on a technicality about the plane "on" ebay vs "sold" on ebay but no simple examination of this scumbag and what he was FOUND GUILT of:
"Troopers eventually investigated 13 issues and found four in which Wooten violated policy or broke the law or both:
• Wooten used a Taser on his stepson.
• He told others his father-in-law would "eat a f'ing lead bullet" if he helped his daughter get an attorney for the divorce."
This is "code" for he won't trash the Palin family to the press.
Has anybody heard Mr. Monegan’s explanation of why he DIDN’T think Wooten should be fired? I haven’t, but it seems like it would be relevant information. I keep thinking this must be one of those “more to the story” situations, and I want to hear the rest of the story.
“In theory, the trooper said the stepson wanted to feel what it was like to be tasered, and the trooper obliged
Even if the kid asked as an experiment, it was a spectacular act of bad judgment to use a device that is designed to bring down large adult males on a 10 year old child.”
Extremely bad judgment, as a Taser can kill someone who has, for example, an unknown heart condition. Unlikely in a ten year old, but possible.
A Taser is something you use as an alternative to a gun, to stop someone who is going to do something violent to themselves or to someone else. It is not something with which one plays games, or that someone “demonstrates” on a child even with the child’s consent (since the child is legally unable to give consent).
I have heard that it has been tested on adult volunteers, but only under highly supervised conditions (including presumably medical personnel in case something goes wrong).
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