I am not a policeman and not necessarily their (particularly woman) largest supporter. However I can see how mistakes are made under the stress they face. I recall seeing a video a little while back where it escalated and the woman got back in the car and shot a policeman before one could figure out what was happening. He shot and killed her right after. I don’t envy them.
Around here they carry the taser with the butt toward the front, firearm with the butt toward the rear. It’s not like they are adjacent to each other on the belt where a quick grab might return the wrong one.
The tasers cops carry today look and feel like a pistol. As Tam said on her blog, this is maximally stupid. She recalled the Japanese word “poka-yoke”, which essentially means “idiot-proof design”. When I was still engineering automation systems for Detroit, this was Guiding Principle #1. But not for designers of tasers, apparently.