Dreamweaverrs Ponderings

 Read this   http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/cbc/081103/canada/calgary_taser_calgary_police_1

The line that stands out the most in this article for me is this:” Lindsay said until there is conclusive evidence that stun guns are dangerous, police will be able to use them.” I don’t know how much more conclusive they need it to be.  A man died.  My humble opinion is that is conclusive.  Man gets stunned. Man dies right after he gets stunned.  Whatever the extenuating circumstances were the final result was that the man died.  Tasers or stun guns can do a lot more than stun someone.  I’ll give you a case in point that I know of personally, a firsthand experience that proves they are dangerous.  I really don’t need any more evidence to know that this weapon and it is a weapon that is often misused just like any other weapon. This is not just a tool. This is what happened.

My second dad, a man who has become a father figure to me, is both rough and tumble and very much a gentleman.  If he sees someone in trouble he will try to help them out.  Unfortunately being a good Samaritan in the city of Winnipeg, Manitoba, where he lives doesn’t always work. It often comes back to kick him in the face, but it never seems to stop him from trying. That is just who he is.One afternoon he heard screaming out in his back alley.  He looked up to see one single woman surrounded by a bunch of men.  She was screaming her head off and knowing the area as well as he does, the normal assumption would be that she was being attacked.  He stepped in to help her. 

 People often come to him for guidance, for advice and for strength of one kind or another. He doesn’t care who it is. If they need help, his sense of honour kicks in. That is a rare breed these days and especially in that city and that part of town. 

In the part of the city he lives in, crime runs rampant.  Most people will just go in and close the door or ignore it and hope it goes away.  The police often ignore what happens in that part of town. They don’t show up. I know that is true too because I have seen that with my own eyes too and I am a law abiding citizen of wherever I am. They didn’t come when I called when something happened to me.

 This time though the group of men going after the woman for whatever reason were undercover police.  Dad saw a terrified woman so he stepped in to help her.  The police thought that he was trying to hurt the woman.  At this point they had NOT identified themselves and they were just a group of men surrounding the woman in the back alley. 

 This particular back alley draws in all kinds of vermin from the area, with everything from drug addicts to drug pushers, gangs to prostitutes and just people looking for a fight. I have dealt with it there myself so I know it is no exaggeration.

As he stepped in to help her they decided he was trouble. They still didn’t identify themselves.  They pulled out the stun gun and shocked him, not just once but a number of times.  He is kind of a big bulldog type or a lumbering bear.  It took a few shocks to get him down.  The problem was the good Samaritan became the victim.

 They stopped his heart with their stun gun and he had to be rushed to the hospital to be resuscitated and get his heart going again.  The doctors were amazed that they could resuscitate him. The taser had not killed him. The doctor’s comment was how mad those make him. Apparently he has treated quite a few people who were brought in to the emergency ward because of being zapped with a taser not all by the supposed good guys obviously, but weapons get used the wrong way no matter what side the user is on.

 Dad’s a bear with a tough hide but their bad judgment almost cost his wife her husband and my husband and me our second dad.  Not dangerous they say?  They stopped his heart.  How is that not dangerous?

I think this is a case of sticking their heads in the sand. They don’t want to see what they don’t want to see because it doesn’t suit their purposes. And there it stands for now.