How anyone could possibly justify tasering a restrained human being nine times is a mystery to me.
WINNFIELD, Louisiana (CNN) — A police officer shocked a handcuffed Baron “Scooter” Pikes nine times with a Taser after arresting him on a cocaine charge.
Baron Pikes, 21, was Tasered nine times by a police officer in January in Winnfield, Louisiana.
He stopped twitching after seven, according to a coroner’s report. Soon afterward, Pikes was dead.
Now the officer, since fired, could end up facing criminal charges in Pikes’ January death after medical examiners ruled it a homicide.
Dr. Randolph Williams, the Winn Parish coroner, told CNN the 21-year-old sawmill worker was jolted so many times by the 50,000-volt Taser that he might have been dead before the last two shocks were delivered.
Nine times for what? The man was not actively in the process of committing a violent crime when he was arrested. Nine times. He was handcuffed. Even if he was struggling and spitting, cursing and biting, or acting out violently I cannot imagine he was moving after nine taser shocks.
Nothing really shocks me anymore – I’ve seen too much of what humans are capable of. The longer I study our legal system though, the more I realize it is not designed to help citizens and protect us from one another. The legal system enables and encourages an us against them mentality between the bureaucrats who support the system and the segments of society who have decided that our system of rules is not for them.
While some of the lawbreakers are violent people who need to be put down like dogs that is the exception to the rule. In the case of Baron “Scooter” Pikes we have the typical legal authoritarianism against criminal anarchist scenario. The legalcrats tell us that Pikes got what was coming to him because he was being uncooperative. Death seems like a pretty harsh penalty for being uncooperative.
Williams, who ruled Pikes’ death a homicide in June after extensive study, said Nugent fired his Taser at Pikes six times in less than three minutes — shots recorded by a computer chip in the weapon’s handle. Then officers put Pikes in the back of a cruiser and drove him to their police station — where Nugent fired a seventh shot, directly against Pikes’ chest.
Folks, if you support this kind of behavior by your peace officers, then damn you to hell. No one needs to be tasered seven times in a row. If this guy was resisting after being tasered six times then he was superhuman, which I don’t believe for a second.
You think this could never happen to you? Just keep supporting the growth of the police state and roll the dice. In the mean time, I hope Mr. Pikes family sues the hell out of Winnfield. I hope the town goes bankrupt and the officers involved are convicted of felonies so they can never “serve and protect” anyone like this again.