Saskatchewan police will alert public to taser use

February 5, 2009
By Canwest News Service

SASKATOON — The Saskatoon Police Service will notify the public every time an officer uses a Taser.

Police Chief Clive Weighill announced the change in a letter to Canwest News Service and a followup interview, responding to a request for police records of all incidents in which Tasers have been used.

“We reviewed how we do business and we thought it would be a good idea to let the public know anytime we use a conducted energy device,” Weighill said in an interview. “It’s a controversial topic and the public should know when they’re used properly and, if they’re deployed and there’s a problem, they should know about that as well.”

The Saskatoon Police Service has two Tasers, which only the emergency response team uses.

The Saskatchewan Police Commission is reviewing the use of Tasers by the province’s 14 municipal and First Nation police services.

Weighill said he would like all front-line officers to carry Tasers. “Any way we can help our officers make a decision where they don’t have to use lethal force is better for all of us,” Weighill said.

In his Jan. 29 letter, Weighill said he won’t release the police records themselves because they contain names of officers and witnesses as well as information about police tactics.

Mayor still behind taser use

I wonder if the "Calgary doctor" Fiacco refers to is well known "excited delirium" advocate and taser promoter Dr. Christine Hall.

July 30, 2008
Newstalk 650, Saskatoon

While respecting the decision of the Saskatchewan Police Commission, the Mayor hopes they will eventually allow tasters for frontline officers. Right now, it's status quo and the devices are just used by SWAT teams.

But Pat Fiacco went to Calgary last year to a presentation by a doctor and he thinks in cases where a suspect has died they're getting a bad rap. He'd like officers and the Commission to hear that presentation also. Fiacco is fearful more deaths will occur if guns continue to be the main tool at the police's disposal.

Saskatchewan police chiefs want taser issue revisited

July 28, 2008
Anne Kyle, Regina Leader-Post
With files from James Wood

REGINA -- The province's association of chiefs of police respect the Saskatchewan Police Commission's decision to rescind the motion to expand the use of conducted energy devices (CEDS) but it doesn't fully agree with the decision.

"The Saskatchewan Association of Police Chiefs hopes this decision will receive further review from the commission in due course. Obviously, when you look at expanding any use of force tool, certainly, foremost in that decision is officer and citizen safety,'' said Prince Albert Police Chief Dale McFee, president of the SAPC.

On Friday, the commission, the province's independent regulatory body for municipal police, announced it was reversing its previously stated plans to allow Tasers. The commission was in the process of developing a policy for their use, but on Friday the commission chair Michael Tochor said it was rescinding last year's decision to approve the use of Tasers. That decision was in response to the controversy over the use of Tasers in connection with a number of deaths, including the death of a Polish citizen Robert Dziekanski at the Vancouver International Airport in October, and a lack of adequate information on the full consequences of their use.

"Decisions to expand the methods of dealing with difficult issues relating to the safety of officers and citizens is something our police agencies always take seriously,'' McFee said.

"We feel, if there is another tool available that improves safety for all, obviously it needs to be looked at. From a policing perspective anything that we do in relation to the use of force whether it is the use of a firearm, the use of a CED, or the use of a baton -- that is all reported and it is all reviewed. At the end of the day the police are accountable for their actions.

"Each potentially dangerous situation requires a different response and we have to remember in many situations the next response in keeping safe is the service firearm. The goal for all is safety to all,'' McFee said.

The police commission announced Friday it won't authorize the general use of CEDs by members of the province's 14 municipal and First Nation police services until more information is available. SWAT team members will continue to be allowed to use stun guns.

Regina Police Chief Troy Hagen said that the commission's decision will not change current practises within the Regina Police Service operation. Currently no Regina police officers other than trained SWAT members, who are trained in their usage, carry CEDs.

Saskatoon police chief Clive Weighill said he hoped the commission would have adequate information to revisit the Taser issue in six months.

"Naturally we would like to have that option available for our officers because right now they don't have the option. They have to go right from baton or pepper spray right up to lethal force. It would make sense to us that if there is an option available we should be allowed to use it," he said Monday.

However, Weighill would not link the lack of Tasers to the four times Saskatoon police used their firearms last year. There were two high-profile police shootings in December, one that saw a women wounded by police and another that saw the death of Dwayne Charles Dustyhorn.

Further recommended reading over at Excited-Delirium's website on this topic - "That's why it's not their decision."

Saskatoon city police add tasers to weapons arsenal

December 5, 2003
Rod Nickel, The StarPhoenix

Saskatoon police officers are preparing to add stun guns to their arsenal, as well as semi-automatic firearms aimed at better equipping them for situations like the Columbine High School shooting.

Both the non-lethal Taser stun guns and single-shot carbines are scheduled to become standard equipment in patrol cars by 2006.

Police will continue to carry Glock .40-calibre pistols in their holsters.

City administration has budgeted $62,000 to buy 34 Tasers for police in 2005 and $92,000 to buy an equal number of single-shot weapons to be mounted in cars in 2006.

"The (Taser) technology that's out there is very effective as long as it's deployed properly," said Saskatoon Police Service spokesperson Insp. Lorne Constantinoff.

City police are currently equipped with a baton, pepper spray and firearm. Spray doesn't work on everyone and requires proximity of no further than two metres.

The Taser has a range of six metres.

An officer aims it like a firearm, firing two hooks with a single shot. The hooks, connected to the Taser by a thin wire, dig into the skin of the human target and discharge a 50,000-volt current, causing the person to lose muscle control.

The shock leaves the person feeling dazed for a few minutes, but police say there are no long-term effects.

The decision of when to use a Taser is a judgment call, Constantinoff said, but generally it's appropriate when lethal force isn't warranted and other measures are ineffective or unsafe.

For example, an officer might fire a Taser at a subject threatening him or her with a knife, he said.

The Taser should not be used on a subject who's armed with a gun, because the shock causes muscles to jerk.

"Any tool when it comes to the use of force, to give the officer another option other than lethal force is a good tool," said city police association vice-president Dave Haye.

The police service already owns two Tasers, stored by emergency response team members, who haven't put them to use other than for training.

Saskatoon police stepped up their study of Tasers at the prompting of a coroner's jury looking into the 2001 death of Keldon McMillan. Police shot McMillan in a field south of Wakaw after a high-speed chase and the man's threats to shoot officers.

City police have since become involved in no shootings.

There has been only one firearm shooting by Saskatchewan RCMP officers in the three years since they began carrying Tasers, but shootings are rare anyway, said RCMP spokesperson Heather Russell.

Almost one-third of Saskatchewan RCMP officers are trained to use Tasers, although there are only 60 in use. The RCMP emergency response team and riot squad use half of them, with the remainder spread around busy detachments like Saskatoon, Regina, Battlefords and Yorkton.

RCMP use Tasers to subdue suspects or prisoners in cell blocks or aircraft, Russell said.

City police are also anticipating new car-mounted firearms. Currently, marked city police cars are equipped with pump-action shotguns that fire a spray of pellets. The guns are 20 years old and not ideal for reacting to situations like the 1999 Columbine shooting in Colorado, where two high school students killed 12 classmates and a teacher in a shooting rampage.

In that type of incident, police want to target just the threat, not innocent people nearby who could be hit by the pellet spray.

The new firearm will still look like and function like a rifle, but it will be semi-automatic, eliminating the step of pumping the weapon slide between shots, and fire single shots.

"It would be more surgical," Constantinoff said.