Tasers drop the perp, get the facts

Wednesday, Oct. 17, 2007 | 7:24 a.m.

It's a black and white movie. Metro Police officers are walking toward a busted window, glass clinging to the frame like ragged teeth.

It's a rinky-dink wreck of a house. Through the window, the camera captures a middle-aged bald man, nude and slicing himself with shards of glass.

It's seen through a video camera, attached to a Taser, carried by a cop, that catches every word. And not a word makes sense.

They kick down the door. The man bolts, bleeding severely and wailing gibberish. The camera follows. Into the hallway, down the hall, into the bathroom.

And there he is, lying in the bathtub, water black with blood. Waving his arms and kicking his legs like some kind of displaced lunatic dolphin. More incomprehensible screaming. More slicing.

He won't come out. He's dangerous to everyone, but mainly himself, and so he's Tased, camera rolling.

At the center of most debates over police use of force is a familiar problem: The people questioning the cops weren't there. It's a tiresome exchange that enrages everyone. Police insist their actions were justified, their critics beg to differ, and whatever really happened remains shrouded in the second telling.

Tasers are no different. Every time one is shot, someone's sure to call foul. So the latest development in Taser technology seems simple: Stick a video camera on the thing. Record an officer's every move in the moments leading up to that 50,000-watt jolt, a quick electric kiss that looks for all the world like temporary paralysis.

Metro Police have spent the past year testing 80 Tasers equipped with cameras. They liked what they saw: a reduction in officer injuries (the Taser tends to cut scuffles short) and the promise of solid video evidence should someone doubt whether use of force was justified. To this end, a $240,000 Justice Department grant Metro is to receive this month will go toward the purchase of Tasers equipped with cameras - hand-held sets that will cost the department $399 each.

Plans are to have roughly 600 on the street by year's end.

It's the latest local example of a law enforcement trend: police videotaping themselves to protect themselves, not just from baseless lawsuits, but from scorn.

And if you're a cop who has a problem with having your Taser use recorded, Metro Officer Martin Wright wants to know, what kind of police work are you doing?

This time it's a trailer. There's a woman inside wearing underwear, socks and a tank top, sputtering unintelligible threats. Her boyfriend has called Metro to report that she hacked at him with a machete. He's still in the trailer when officers arrive. So is she. And she won't come out.

Quickly, the Taser camera reveals it's not a machete. It's a samurai sword. And she's sawing her neck with it. Slicing at her throat as if it's a loaf of bread.

An officer tries to force her out the front door by firing a pepper spray fog through the trailer's back window. It doesn't work. The sawing continues. The camera audio picks up an officer's cajoling: Come out. Quit cutting. Calm down.

The front door of the trailer is open and the camera jolts to reveal the woman standing in the doorway, leering and leaning from left to right, samurai sword in hand. She won't drop it. She gets Tased. Two prongs appear to fire from the center of the video screen and lodge into the woman's skin, where they administer the jolt that seizes her muscles for five seconds. She falls down stiff and is carted off screen. End of scene.

Were it not for the Taser, Wright says, this would have been a six-hour hostage standoff, complete with crisis negotiators. Dozens of officers would have been dispatched as tax dollars ticked away.

It's a simple setup. The camera slips into the base of the Taser. Where the Taser points, the camera records.

There is no way to shoot the Taser without filming - the video will begin as soon as the safety switch is released. The accountability cuts both ways - capturing the actions of the suspects and the cops so that nobody is above the law.

Whatever happens on video, Metro Taser coordinator Marcus Martin says, is "indisputable a year later."

But not everyone is enthusiastic about the Taser cam. Although having a video is better than not having one, Gary Peck, executive director of the Nevada American Civil Liberties Union, questions how they will be used. Namely, will they be available to everybody?

"If they are only going to release these videos selectively upon order of a court, then I would view this as more or less a ruse. Not something that is going to be particularly helpful at all," Peck said. "The department will have a self-serving interest in only sharing good behavior."

Metro's legal department is developing what the department release policy will be, spokesman Ramon Denby said. For the time being, all videos are being considered evidence and will not be released.

It's a boxing match, or some other kind of professional fight, and it's winding down. The crowd is full of fans with nowhere to go, so they loiter and look for trouble. Alcohol apparently is involved.

One particularly large man, looming over officers called to intervene in what appears to be the beginning of some kind of grunting, meathead dispute, is squaring his shoulders like someone looking for a fight. The cops tell everybody to back off and break up. Nothing doing.

Then the Taser comes out. Suddenly, man is mouse.

"Please don't Tase me!" he shouts, reaching a squeal that would shame many a man. "Please don't Tase me!" He's begging now, and he backs down.

The camera catches everything, which ends up being nothing, really. Exactly what we want to see.