Posted on 10/31/2006 6:44:53 AM PST by Types_with_Fist
JERSEYVILLE, Ill. - A teenager carrying a Bible and shouting “I want Jesus” was shot twice with a police stun gun and later died at a St. Louis hospital, authorities said.
In a statement obtained Tuesday by The Associated Press, police in Jerseyville, about 40 miles north of St. Louis, said 17-year-old Roger Holyfield would not acknowledge officers who approached him and he continued yelling, “I want Jesus.”
Police tried to calm the teen, but Holyfield became combative, according to the statement. Officers fired the stun gun at him after he ignored their warnings, then fired again when he continued struggling, police said.
Holyfield was flown to St. Louis’ Cardinal Glennon Hospital after the confrontation Saturday; he died there Sunday, police said.
An autopsy was planned for Tuesday.
The statement expressed sympathy to Holyfield’s family but said city and police officials would not discuss the matter further.
Calls Tuesday to Jerseyville Police Chief Brad Blackorby were not immediately returned. The department has been using stun guns for about five months, according to the statement.
In a report released in March, international human rights group Amnesty International said it had logged at least 156 deaths across the country in the previous five years related to police stun guns.
The rise in deaths accompanies a marked increase in the number of U.S. law enforcement agencies employing devices made by Taser International Inc. of Scottsdale, Ariz. About 1,000 of the nation’s 18,000 police agencies used Tasers in 2001; more than 7,000 departments had them last year, according to a government study.
Police had used Tasers more than 70,000 times as of last year, Congress’ Government Accountability Office said.
Amnesty International has urged police departments to suspend the use of Tasers pending more study. Taser International said the group’s count was flawed and falsely linked deaths to Taser use when there has been no such official conclusion.
The city of St. Louis also drew unwanted attention for crime this week when it was named the most dangerous U.S. city by Morgan Quitno Press. The ranking looked only at crime within St. Louis city limits, not its metro area.
No, but being "combative" with police might call for it.
Read the rest of the article.
I see you have also noticed cops' apparent hatred for dogs.
True but thanks to maggot & puss infested lawyers there is no such thing a a "good" lawsuit. We have a legal system and no longer a justice system. A day without a lawyer in the obituary page is like a day without sunshine.
Why six cops in the first place to restrain a kid crying out I Love Jesus over and over? I could understand two going to check him out, but SIX?!!?! No wonder meth is taking over the midwest, SIX cops in a city of 20,000 called to go out and taze the teenage street preacher.
Let me see if I get this right.
You're blaming police for the meth epidemic?
In border-lingo, "Ay yay yay!"
I was illustrating the absurdity of the ratio of one teenage kid on a corner all by himself and six (or more) cops called to subdue him. I thought you had to have a sense of humor to be a freeper, guess not.
Try pasting one of those stupid smiley faces on the end of your "humor" next time.
Just so we know you're joking :)
"Back when I was a cop (1968-1975), it was "beat the crap out of him with the billy club until he stops resisting."
We have a 130lb kid whose only crime was behaving outside police perceived norms toting a Bible and yelling "I want Jesus." Tasering this kid was unprofessional and unbecoming of an LEO. And if in your time of service your fellow cops would have clubbed this kid, then is it any wonder citizens are growing more and more skeptical of LEOs? Remember to protect and serve? How exactly was this bi-polar kid and his family served?
"I know of no evidence to show that any wrongful actions have ever been established as against these particular officers."
The wrongful action was use of the taser. They had no evidence this kid had committed any crime. His only "crime" was being a nuisance and ignoring their commands. Will you now offer that a public nuisance requires excessive force where they would have shot him otherwise? Is this what law enforcement has become today?
There is no excuse. Nothing can justify this.
Thank you. With all the evidence resulting in death by taser, there is no excuse for LEOs not to know that the taser kills.
Baloney. Every indication here is that the taser was an authorized weapon. As such, its use was not wrongful per se. The only question is whether the level of force represented by the taser was appropriate under the circumstances. And there is barely enough evidence in this article to begin an investigation to reach that conclusion. Maybe it was, maybe it wasn't. But we won't know until the investigations are completed.
They had no evidence this kid had committed any crime. His only "crime" was being a nuisance and ignoring their commands.
You don't know that. You have a partial report in a newspaper. This information isn't even second-hand information; it's third- and fourth-hand information. Until there is a full investigation you don't know what this person did, what his actions were, what threat level he posed or any of the facts necessary to draw a reasonable conclusion as to whether the use of force was appropriate.
Will you now offer that a public nuisance requires excessive force where they would have shot him otherwise? Is this what law enforcement has become today?
Again, you can jump to all the emotional conclusions you want, but I prefer to take the rational, reasonable, and conservative approach and wait until we have all the facts.
There is no excuse. Nothing can justify this.
Unless the decedent acted in a way to justify the use of force, of course.
You gotta watch those bible-wielding stun-guns.
I think we'll find that the cops are idiots for believing they have to subdue somebody shouting "I want Jesus".
What if this kid was mentally ill? Is it a crime to have a mental illness? What law was the victim originally breaking that warranted his being arrested by the police? Was he threatening someone? Was he armed? Did it ever occur to the cops that if the victim was mentally ill perhaps he was incapable of "properly responding to repeated requests to comply with 'lawful directions'"? Is it possible that his alleged 'combative' response may have simply been instinctive fear, and/or an involuntary physiological response to being tazered? Here's a novel idea; how about taking someone who is not armed and dangerous, but may be having some sort of psychotic episode, to a hospital? You know, one of those big buildings with lots of doctors and patients?
Whoever said here that they were just showing him who was boss was right. Cops shouldn't be paid for being that lazy and incompetent, imo.
Cordially,
Again, if your argument is that tasers are not appropriate as a law enforcement weapon, then that is an argument for the manufacturers or the police hierarchy and civilian oversight with the power and responsibility to authorize the use of the weapon by the officers. It doesn't give you or anyone else the right to slander these officers as murderers. If it is an authorized weapon, and the situation calls for its use, then the cops absolutely should use it. Without question.
By the way, your approach is not conservative, it is narcissistic.
No, presuming that these men are innocent unless proved guilty is the conservative approach. If anything is narcissistic, it's your b.s. of implying these cops are "murderers" when they were, as far as we know, just doing their jobs appropriately.
"Now, it's quite simple to defend yourself against a man armed with a banana. First of all you force him to drop the banana; then, second, you eat the banana, thus disarming him. You have now rendered him 'elpless."
my point is we do not know. if he was mentally deficient, he should have had someone of competent authority to watch him. and the article said he was combative. i take that as threatening. tasing someone is a precurser to taking them to the hospital. as i said, cops do not get paid enough to take a gamble as to who MAY be harmful or not.
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