It’s bad enough that tasering of adults has gotten out of hand. But now an eight-year-old in South Dakota has become a victim of this dangerous police weapon.
Officers arrived at the child’s home after receiving a call from her babysitter that the child had a knife and was trying to cut herself - but so far there had been no injury.
According to reports, the officers did not attempt to talk the child into putting down the knife or use any other less dangerous approach to diffuse the situation. They were at the scene for less than two minutes before shooting “her with 50,000 volts of electricity with a weapon that put two hooks into her,” noted the family’s attorney.
This was nothing more than a “child throwing a tantrum,” the attorney added.
Nevertheless, Hughes County State Attorney Wendy Kloeppner released a report noting her satisfaction with the independent investigation that found “deploying a taser was the best viable way to diffuse the situation.”
Based on the high number of deaths resulting from taser use on adults, it’s hard to see how risking a child’s life could be the “best viable” alternative to grabbing or coaxing a knife out of an eight-year-old’s hand.
Tell the State Attorney to charge the officer who tasered this eight-year-old girl!
We, the undersigned, find this excessive use of force on a child, beyond unreasonable.
Equally disturbing is the State Attorney’s reported statement that “no charges” were filed against the child. Does this mean the Attorney would consider charging an eight-year-old with a crime?
The child’s mother says the officers could easily have called her and allowed her to talk to her daughter and calm her down. Even if they felt the child was going to cut herself, it makes no sense that a grown man would think he couldn’t get an eight-year-old to release a knife - even less sense for a pair of police to think that the two of them couldn’t have accomplished this quite easily.
Did the officers actually feel they were in any imminent danger should they attempt this? If so, one must wonder if this police department provides any effective training in anything but weapon use.
We request that the Pierre police department take immediate steps to train its officers in ways to diffuse such situations in the future and stop using tasers so freely on anyone - much less on kids! We also ask that the State Attorney file charges against the officer who tasered this 8-year-old in Pierre.
Thanks for your time.
