Cop Taser's 72-year old woman video

I'd like to see some responses before I weigh in on this one ...

She was being a nice doggy!.

There's a difference between tasing a 72-year-old woman and tasing a confrontational 72-year-old woman. And she was of the latter.

I agree, she was being overly confrontational, but there are better ways to deal with a woman that old than tazing her, especially when she could have had a serious complication from that.

She was being a nice doggy!, he was being a cabbage-lover, but I agree with some satrical news reporter somewhere that I can't be bothered to go find to quote:

"If you need to taze a 72 year old woman to get her to stop, you ARE a good kitty!. But seriously, it's Texas, we don't taze people we don't like, we shoot them."

This is where personal responsibility comes in. She should have complied with the officer's orders. She did not. Failure to comply results in consequences. He said he would taze her if she didn't back off. She was reaching at the officer. That is more than enough to warrant use of a tazer. You never know what's going to happen. Just because she's 72 doesn't put her above the law or unable to physically attack the cop.

Right completely unprovoked police brutality considering the women was warned multiple times.

I believe wholeheartedly that a cop who's passed the required fitness tests can "take it" from a 72 year old woman and restrain her without tazing her.

Do you SERIOUSLY believe she could have caused him serious damage with what she was doing, and posed an imminent threat to the officer, SO much that he HAD to taze her?

She was warned FOUR times. Four times -- and she even DARED him to tase her.

.. and here's the thing -- do you think she'd condone her grandchildren being THAT disrespectful to a police officer?

For some reason, this old woman thinks that being a 72-year old grandmother means that she is above the law. She had been driving dangerously - he listed out a lengthy list of driving violations, and she told him to go *bleep* himself.

There comes a time when being a crotchety old woman does not cut the mustard and confronting a police officer, when you're entirely in the wrong, is one of them ...

I think he went overboard I mean tazeing her? Come on the worst that could happen is for her to barely knock the wind out of him with a little punch. And for all he knew she could have had a pacemaker and could have died. I think that tazering is over used. And if she was assaulting him all he had to do is to move behind her and handcuff her or restrain her.

~Markbalex

The disrespect shown to the police officer was wrong, but the way he restrained the woman was both unprofessional and unneeded. The situation had not sprung that far out of control, and I think that the policeman just lost his temper.

Well - I think you're both wrong.

First of all -- she pushed this scenario to its limits - she was warned numerous times and she refused to cooperate. Had she done what she was told, had she been willing to cooperate, it would never have escalated to that level.

Secondly -- this incident occurs along a very busy highway, with vehicles traveling along at high speeds very close by. All it takes is one little shove for it to turn fatal.

Thirdly - if he had had to bodily restrain her, given the manner in which she was willingly thrashing around, there would very likely have been more bodily harm involved to her than a pair of taser scars.

She got what she deserved -- in fact, she should been tasered earlier, imo ...

She was asking for it tbh.


Nuff' said.

He did the correct thing. He warned her, and she was asking for it (literally).

Would it have been better not to have to tazer her. Yes, it would have.

He warned her how many times? Five times? He did not simply pull the tazer out and start shooting.

~John

When I first read the thread title, I thought "Holy " But after watching the video, I kinda feel she deserved being tased. Yes, she is old, but she was being uncooperative and defiant. The cop warned her a bunch of times before tasing her, so it wasn't out of the blue.

Of course, it does seem somewhat cruel.

Its half the old lady's fault and half the cops fault because the lady dared him to tase her after lots of warns too and he did but he still shouldn't have done that ...he should have just grabbed her real hard and put hand cuffs

It also wouldn't have escalated had he restrained her properly earlier. Which also would've prevented it from even having the chance to turn fatal. And... no, policemen know a variety of techniques to immobilize an assailant, techniques that don't leave scars or broken bones. She's 76 years old... it isn't that hard to grab her arms and yank them behind her...

That would have violated her constitutional rights bro.

How so, Jelly?

The Fourth Amendment.

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

Sure, he probably had probable cause. But you never know what a judge will consider probable cause at the early stage. When she reaches at the officer, he has definite probable cause.

Here's a good probable cause:

She began babbling and overreacting at a speeding ticket, which shows mental instability. This mental stability, coupled with a very aggressive stance and the closeness of the freeway (which consists of 2,000 pounds flying across a flat surface at 70 mph), made her an unpredicatble person, and so the probable cause would be to restrain her before she caused damage to the policemen, those on the highway, as well as herself. Also, if it's not against her constitutional rights to be jolted with 1200+ volts of electricity, I'm pretty sure it's not against her constitutional rights to be put in the back of a police car and told to be quiet for a little bit.

And do you think the stubborn old lady would cooperate?

I'm thinking Nachomamma meant that her rights wouldn't be violated in that way either.

My grandma just had here 80th birthday and she cooperated with the cops when she got pulled over for a broken light so yes I assume this lady had something wrong with her if she acted this aggressively towards an officer.

She deserved it. The old lady was being uncooperative and the officer said that he was going to tase her as many times as she said she was 72.