29-03-2010, 09:46 PM
Magda Hassan Wrote:SEATTLE (AP) - Three Seattle police officers were justified when they used a stun gun on a pregnant mother who refused to sign a traffic ticket, a federal appeals court ruled Friday in a case that prompted an incredulous dissent.
Malaika Brooks was driving her son to Seattle's African American Academy in 2004 when she was stopped for doing 32 mph in a school zone. She insisted it was the car in front of her that was speeding, and refused to sign the ticket because she thought she'd be admitting guilt.
Rather than give her the ticket and let her go on her way, the officers decided to arrest her. One reached in, turned off her car and dropped the keys on the floor. Brooks stiffened her arms against the steering wheel and told the officers she was pregnant, but refused to get out, even after they threatened to stun her.
The officers - Sgt. Steven Daman, Officer Juan Ornelas and Officer Donald Jones - then stunned her three times, in the thigh, shoulder and neck, and hauled her out of the car, laying her face-down in the street.
Brooks gave birth to a healthy baby two months later, but has permanent scars from the Taser. She sued the officers for violating her constitutional rights, and U.S. District Judge Richard Jones allowed the case to continue. He declined to grant the officers immunity for performing their official duties and said Brooks' rights were clearly violated.
But in a 2-1 ruling Friday, a panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals disagreed. Judges Cynthia Holcomb Hall and Diarmuid F. O'Scannlain held that the officers were justified in making an arrest because Brooks was obstructing them and resisting arrest.
The use of force was also justified because of the threat Brooks posed, Hall wrote: "It seems clear that Brooks was not going to be able to harm anyone with her car at a moment's notice. Nonetheless, some threat she might retrieve the keys and drive off erratically remained, particularly given her refusal to leave the car and her state of agitation."
They also noted that the force used wasn't that serious because the Taser was in "touch" mode rather than "dart" mode, which hurts more. They reversed the lower court's opinion and held that the officers were entitled to immunity from the lawsuit.
The officers' lawyers, Ted Buck and Karen Cobb, said the officers made the right decision under the circumstances they faced.
"Police officers have to have the ability to compel people to obey their lawful orders," Buck said. That's all the court recognized today. The 9th Circuit just applied the law instead of getting caught up in the otherwise unfortunate factual circumstances."
The majority's opinion outraged Judge Marsha Berzon, who called it "off the wall."
"I fail utterly to comprehend how my colleagues are able to conclude that it was objectively reasonable to use any force against Brooks, let alone three activations of a Taser, in response to such a trivial offense," she wrote.
She argued that under Washington law, the officers had no authority to take Brooks into custody: Failure to sign a traffic infraction is not an arrestable offense, and it's not illegal to resist an unlawful arrest.
Berzon said the majority's notion that Brooks obstructed officers was so far-fetched that even the officers themselves didn't make that legal argument. To obstruct an officer, one must obstruct the officer's official duties, and the officers' only duties in this case were to detain Brooks long enough to identify her, check for warrants, write up the citation and give it to her. Brooks' failure to sign did not interfere with those duties, she said.
Furthermore, Brooks posed no apparent threat, and the officers could not have known how stunning her would affect the fetus, or whether it might prompt premature labor - another reason their actions were inexcusable, Berzon said.
Brooks' lawyer, Eric Zubel, said he would ask the 9th Circuit to rehear the case.
"This is outrageous - that something like this could happen to a pregnant woman, in front of an elementary school, at 8:30 in the morning, to someone who posed no threat whatsoever," he said.
Another stun gun (taser) story, this time the victim died.
Taser files scathing lawsuit against B.C. inquiry
CTV.ca News Staff
Date: Fri. Aug. 14 2009 2:38 PM ET
Stun-gun manufacturer Taser International filed a lawsuit in B.C. Supreme Court on Friday to try to overturn the recommendations of the Braidwood inquiry, accusing the inquiry of bias.The Arizona-based company says the inquiry into the death of Polish immigrant Robert Dziekanski at Vancouver International Airport, led by Justice Thomas Braidwood, was biased because it neglected to enter evidence brought forward by Taser.
In court documents, the U.S.-based company asks the court to throw out much of inquiry's report which was released last month."The commission breached basic principles of fairness and fundamental justice... both in its procedure and in the manner in which the report and its conclusions were reached," Taser International lawyer David Neave told CTV News in an interview at his Vancouver office ahead of the filing.Taser International also alleges that the inquiry's findings were unsupported by medical science.Neave says the company believes the stun guns are safe and the inquiry's rulings will place law enforcement and the public at greater risk.
Taser is asking the court to quash large portions of the 19 recommendations made by the commission. It is also asking for an injunction that would bar Braidwood from using the findings in any future rulings.
However, opponents say the company is using the lawsuit to intimidate its critics and protect its balance sheets."The Taser manufacturers are worried about losing profits... that's their sole motive here. It isn't about public safety, it isn't about whether Tasers kill or not. It's about how much money they make," Liberal MP and public safety critic Ujjal Dosanjh told CTV News.Police forces across Canada have already begun restricting the use of Tasers in response to the inquiry, which released its findings July 23 in a 546-page report. Some of those recommendations include tougher standards for the use of Tasers and a five-second time limit on the deployment of the devices.The 40-year-old Dziekanski died following an altercation with four Mounties at the Vancouver airport. The Mounties used a stun gun on him for more than 30 seconds in an effort to calm him; he died of cardiac arrest shortly after."Those recommendations are based on incomplete information with respect to the medical and scientific information that was available and that we provided to the commission," said Neave.
Officials with the Braidwood inquiry have not offered comment to the suit.
There is a still a second Braidwood commission of inquiry yet to come, due to start in the fall. While the first inquiry was commissioned to make recommendations on the appropriate use of Tasers in British Columbia, the second hearing will provide a complete record of the circumstances of Dziekanski's death.The lawsuit seeks to ban Braidwood from using material from his first report in any future reports.