More consumer fun at Best Buy!

[kandrathe]

I didn't ask you if it would be likely to happen or not - I asked you which you would prefer.

The difficulty the police face is that frequently the suspect is incoherent due to some drug cocktail, so rather than kill someone who's merely high and making a public nuisance they would like to just subdue them. I would say that the in this case the alternative that Tal suggested of the woman escaping with her potentially stolen goods is the optimistic scenario, more often in a circumstance like this the perpetrator pulls a gun and takes out the cop and a few innocent bystanders. That is why the officer needs to assess the options given the situation on the ground and make their best judgment. All incidents should be reviewed by an impartial panel to prevent sadists from taking their hostilities out on the populace, but then I would argue that sadists should be never given the badge in the first place. I'm uncomfortable condemning an officer, or a device based on a poor quality store video and some anecdotal evidence.

In the interest of full disclosure, my grandfather was a cop for 30 years before the advent of tazers and never had to shoot anyone. Now, the stories he would tell about when he had to use his billy club would curdle your Wheaties.