Editor: Once in awhile, there’s a story that we just cannot ignore. I know this has nothing to do about Ocean Beach, but it is an incredibly outrageous report, and goes to show at what level we have sunk to as a society.
OZARK, ARKANSAS. In a small town in this state, a police officer arrived at a home where he had been summoned for a domestic dispute. Officer Dustin Bradshaw found a ten year old girl curled up on the floor of her home, screaming and kicking at her mother, who was trying to get her to take a shower before bedtime.
“Her mother told me to tase her if I needed to,” Bradshaw wrote in his report of the November 12th incident. When Bradshaw tried to take her into custody, she kicked the officer in his groin. He then shot her with his Taser – he describes it as “a very brief drive stun to her back.”
Here is how he described it:
Upon arrival I made contact with a [the mother] and her daughter, [name blacked out]. [The girl] was balled up in the floor crying and screaming. I made several attempts to speak with her and she continued to behave in this manner. [The mother] tried to put [the girl] into the shower to get her ready for bed and I witnessed [the girl] screaming, kicking, and resisting every time her mother tried to touch her. Her mother told me to tase her if I needed to and at this point and [sic] we carried her to the shower. She refused to follow any of her mothers instructions and at this point I decided that there was not going to be a peaceful resolution to the issue. I moved her into the living room area and told her she was going to jail. She continued kicking and crying and I began to try to place her under arrest. She was jerking her arms away from me violently while I was trying to cuff her and thrashing about wildly. While she was violently kicking and verbally combative, [the girl] struck me with her legs and feet in the groin. The subject was actively resisting arrest at this time. I was having a difficult time placing the cuffs on her and administered a very very brief drive stun to her back with my taser. She immediately stopped resisting and was placed into handcuffs. She would not walk on her own and I had to carry her to my police car. She was taken to the Cecil Youth Shelter by direction [deleted].
[See copy of report below.]
Now Ozark Mayor Vernon McDaniel is calling for an investigation into whether the Taser use was appropriate. He also said Wednesday that the girl wasn’t injured and is now at the Western Arkansas Youth Shelter in Cecil. Yet he is requesting the Arkansas State Police to investigate the incident— and if they decline, the FBI.
“People here feel like that he made a mistake in using a Taser, and maybe he did, but we will not know until we get an impartial investigation,” McDaniel said. Since then, the state police has declined his request, as it only gets involved if the officer in question was accused of misconduct or targeted in an internal investigation.
No disciplinary action was taken against Bradshaw, said Police Chief Jim Noggle. He also declared that tasers are safe against unruly people who may be a danger to themselves or others. “We didn’t use the Taser to punish the child — just to bring the child under control so she wouldn’t hurt herself or somebody else,” Noggle told the press.
Anthony Medlock, the girl’s father, told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette that his daughter has emotional problems, but that she didn’t have a weapon and shouldn’t have been Tasered. “My daughter does not deserve to be tased and be treated like an animal,” said Medlock, who is divorced from the girl’s mother and does not have custody.
“We don’t want to do things like this,” Police Chief Noggle said. “This is something we have to do. We’re required to maintain order and keep the peace.”
There are ten year olds, and then there are ten year olds.
ReplyDeleteThis is a little bizarre! Was it really necessary? I feel like this is Police brutality, or use of unnecessary force. Does the child have the right to sue the police department? Tasers are being used by Police Departments more and more when realistically we don't know the long term effects of their use. I think they are pretty extreme and dehumanizing (for wild criminals and ten year old girls alike). Shouldn't Police officers be capable and trained to deal with children and people resisting arrest in a more traditional manner? I hope the family sues the Police Dept. but I suspect she doesn't have any rights since she was resisting arrest, which is sad.
ReplyDelete"Her mother told me to tase her if I needed to"
ReplyDelete