Local police applaud stun gun bill
By Jill Harmacinski and Meredith Warren
Staff writers
Distraught over a bad break-up, the man had barricaded himself in his car in a Danvers parking lot. He was armed with a knife, and repeatedly threatened to kill himself. Police spent hours negotiating with him before he finally surrendered.
Had it been legal, police could have zapped the man with a high-voltage stun gun, neutralizing the potentially deadly situation in seconds.
"Any level of force that's less than lethal we should have been able to use a long time ago," Danvers Police Capt. Neil Ouellette said.
Gov. Mitt Romney signed a bill yesterday allowing police to use the high-voltage weapons against suspects. Massachusetts becomes the 49th state to allow stun guns. New Jersey is now the only state where they are illegal.
"It's an excellent, less-than-lethal-force tool that in certain circumstances could make a difference in injuries or death -- upon the person it is used on, or the officer," Middleton Police Chief Paul Armitage said.
State Rep. Joyce Spiliotis, D-Peabody, said the law would allow police officers to protect themselves with fewer possibilities of injuries. "It's a really positive thing for local police departments," she said.
Although he supported the bill, fellow State Rep. Ted Speliotis, D-Danvers, thinks the use of stun guns should be closely monitored to make sure police aren't using them unless it is absolutely necessary.
"I'm curious to see what effect this will have in the next few years," he said. "We need to study the impact of this."
A great addition
Ouellette said a stun gun would be a great addition to the array of weapons a police officer now carries. Those weapons include a revolver, pepper spray and baton.
"It's a necessary tool and we should have had it years ago," he said.
Criminals are using the guns, Ouellette said, pointing to an armed robbery at the Northshore Mall a decade ago in which a Brinks guard was jolted and robbed of a bag of cash.
Armitage said stun guns can be used to quell a variety of dangerous situations, and they are safer than police batons.
"When you have somebody who is extremely intoxicated or suffering from some sort of mental psychosis, who will not listen to reason or is immune to pepper spray, the officer has to use the baton," Armitage said. "And once you do that, someone is going to get hurt. Bones will get broken."
The guns, known as Tasers because of leading manufacturer TASER International, work by shooting darts attached to thin wires into a suspect from up to 21 feet away. The darts zap suspects with up to 50,000 volts of electricity, instantly causing them to lose control of their muscles and giving police time to apply handcuffs.
The weapon does not injure nerves, muscles or any other body part, according to TASER International, and the company claims no deaths have ever been directly attributed to the weapon.
Armitage said the use of a Taser gun is "obviously better than hitting people with a piece of metal."
Beverly Police Chief John Cassola agrees. "It's a good weapon and it's not lethal," he said.
He noted that some individuals are completely immune to pepper spray. Use of a stun gun would give police another way to safely neutralize a situation. "From the demonstrations I've seen, stun guns are very effective," he said.
Ouellette stressed that stun guns won't turn up on local streets overnight. Officers must undergo special training to understand the stun gun's power and proper use.
"Training will be key," he said.
Staff writer Jill Harmacinski can be reached at (978) 338-2652 or by e-mail at
[email protected].
