Report: Stun guns used on more minorities than whites

A Stamford Police Officer holds a Taser X26 Stun Gun on April 1, 2016. Blacks and Hispanics are shot with stun guns more often in Connecticut, while whites are given the benefit of a warning far more often, a Hearst review of state data from 2015 shows. Stamford police, however, only shot three people with a stun gun last year. less A Stamford Police Officer holds a Taser X26 Stun Gun on April 1, 2016. Blacks and Hispanics are shot with stun guns more often in Connecticut, while whites are given the benefit of a warning far more often, a ... more Photo: Matthew Brown / Hearst Connecticut Media Photo: Matthew Brown / Hearst Connecticut Media Image 1 of / 8 Caption Close Report: Stun guns used on more minorities than whites 1 / 8 Back to Gallery

In Bridgeport, Connecticut’s largest city, police fired stun guns 21 times in 2015, mostly at Hispanic residents.

In Danbury, police fired an electronic stun gun at a 14-year-old African-American boy.

And up in Hartford police stunned 46 people — including a 14-year-old Hispanic boy — the most uses of the devices in the state.

Yet, in Stamford — the state’s third largest city — police only used stun guns on two black suspects and one Hispanic.

A Hearst Connecticut Media analysis of hundreds of reports of stun gun deployments during 2015 found that 57 percent of suspects hit with an electronic dart were either black or Hispanic.

Last year marked the first time police departments were required to report each use to the state.

The data also shows police warned whites far more often than blacks and Hispanics before firing. The warning was carried out by pointing a harmless red targeting laser beam — visible as a brilliant red dot on clothing — to induce compliance.

Activists were quick to seize on the data as evidence police are using the stun weapons too often — and unfairly targeting minorities.

“We have to get a grip on how Tasers (a brand of stun gun commonly used by police) are being used in Connecticut,” said Scott Esdaile, president of the Connecticut NAACP. “It’s out of control. Tasers were sold as an alternative to lethal force. It’s lazy policing.”

Police departments defended the stun-gun use, saying deployments are closely reviewed and controlled.

Stamford’s Assistant Chief over patrol Thomas Wuennemann, said it was difficult to compare Stamford with the other big cities such as Bridgeport, New Haven and Hartford, because the crime rate is so much lower.

But he said since 2006 when the department began using them, they have gained a certain amount of respect in the community.

“After a while, they know the reputation of the Taser out on the street. People don’t want to be tasered. They have seen it happen before,” he said. Possibly, because Stamford has been using them for 10 years, their power has become known and people shy away from forcing police officers to use them.

“When we first got them, we used them a lot more out on the street,” he said.

Now, all the 120 or so Stamford officers who carry the Tasers have to do is unholster them or go one step further and “red dot” someone who is not obeying officer commands, and compliance begins to occur relatively quickly, Wuennemann said.

“We don’t choose to go out every day and use force. I think people are obeying verbal commands,” he said.

Training Division commander Capt. William Mullin agreed that when it comes down to it, people want to avoid being shot by a stun gun.

“It is another tool and hopefully you don’t have to deploy them. The officers are showing a lot of restraint,” he said. In Stamford, officers have to go through an eight-hour training class and take another one-hour class to be re-certified to use them every year.

He said the extensive training that well over 100 of the department’s 280 officers have received in crisis intervention may be helping to defuse situations before they escalate.

Thousands of volts

The taser reports analyzed by Hearst were mandated in 2014 after state lawmakers, concerned over an increasing use of stun guns and mounting deaths, passed a law requiring police to fill out a one-page form each time a taser is deployed as a warning, fired directly at someone or applied by touching a person with a stun gun.

Tasers emit thousands of volts of electricity, enough to shock or stun a person into temporary paralysis or submission. Taser use is not tracked nationally, although there is ample evidence suggesting minorities are targeted more often than whites.

Hearst found Connecticut police fired their stun guns 403 times during 2015. Whites were tased 42 percent of the time, compared to 34 percent for blacks and 22 percent for Hispanics. Of the total incidents, 57 percent involved black or Hispanic suspects while 43 percent involved white suspects.

Connecticut has 3.6 million people, of which 81 percent are white, 15 percent Hispanic and 11 percent black, according to census numbers.

The taser reports also show that a laser warning was deployed 165 times, with whites receiving the harmless warning 64 percent of the time, compared to 43 percent for Hispanics and 22 percent for blacks.

Also, two people died in 2015 after being stunned by a taser: a 41 year old white man in Branford and a 26 year old white man in Hartford, the reports show.

In all, 18 suspects since 2005 have died in Connecticut after being tased, including an Ansonia man who died earlier this year after being shocked for resisting rescue efforts while trapped inside a car following an I-95 accident.

David McGuire, legislation and policy director for the Connecticut ACLU, said the fact that whites were warned more often than blacks and Hispanics is troublesome.

“That’s concerning,” McGuire said. “The trend is troubling. White people are getting the benefit of a warning. That is a pattern I didn’t think would be in the data. Warnings can deescalate the situation. Some of this may be unconscious bias.”

Dennis Kenney, a professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City, said the racial breakdown of Connecticut’s taser use is not surprising given the state’s mix of wealthy white suburban towns and poor urban centers with large minority populations and high crime rates, such as Bridgeport and Hartford.

“My guess is they don’t deploy [tasers] in Greenwich an awful lot,” Kenney said. “In Bridgeport, where there are higher levels of crime, and you have a higher minority population, its more expected.”

Greenwich fired tasers twice last year at two white suspects. The town’s population of 62,141 is 77 percent white, 11 percent Hispanic and one percent black, according to 2014 census projections.

Stunning kids

In March 2015, a Danbury officer confronted a 14 year old, six foot tall, 182 pound black teenager at an educational facility in the city. The boy was threatening, hostile, non-complainant and combative, had previously been hostile to police and was emotionally disturbed, according to the incident report.

The Danbury officer fired his taser twice, striking the boy with an electronic darts. A taser was also twice applied directly to the boy’s body for additional, although lower voltage shock, which is known as a drive stun, according to the incident report.

The boy, who is not named, suffered puncture wounds from the darts and abrasions.

Lt. Christian Carroccio, a spokesman for Danbury police, said there are no age restrictions on who can be tased.

“In regards to the 14 year old, both uses of force were found to be justified,” Carroccio said, adding the department reviews all taser deployments.

“It is the policy of the department that all officers will only use the level of force necessary to accomplish lawful objectives,” Carroccio said. “The force must be reasonable under the circumstances known to the officer at the time the force was used. The department examines all uses of force using this standard.”

Carroccio added “The department is aware of the greater potential for injury when deploying a taser against persons of small stature, irrespective of age, or those who the officer has reason to believe are pregnant, equipped with a pacemaker, infirm or in obvious ill health.”

Hartford Deputy Police Chief Brian Foley, whose department also stunned a 14 year old, said officers don’t always know the age of the person they are trying to take into custody.

“We agree with avoiding tasing kids,” Foley said. “But when an officer is in a high stress situation it’s difficult to determine age. They look to avoid it if possible. We do not want to tase a youth.”

McGuire said laws passed by the General Assembly over the last few years instructed police to avoid tasing children, the elderly and visibly pregnant women.

“We have seen reports of young people being tased at schools,” McGuire said. “But we only see what the media reports. That’s the power of this reporting. We intend to go deep into the data.”

The ACLU and the NAACP are both pushing lawmakers to require cameras on taser guns so incidents can be recorded for future review.

Taser capitol

Hartford officers stunned 46 people during 2015, by far the most in Connecticut, and one died after being tased. The Connecticut State police fired a stun gun at 32 people and Norwalk police stunned 23 suspects.

Bridgeport and East Hartford each stunned 21 suspects, the reports show.

Foley said Hartford, like Bridgeport, has high crime rates and a large minority population, and said those factors drive police interactions. “We are one of the largest departments and we are in a large minority city. I would expect the numbers to be what they are,” he said.

Asked about the man who died last year after being tased by Hartford police, Foley said a low voltage direct stun was used on the individual, who was than sedated by medical personnel. Foley said the man was emotionally disturbed but declined further comment because the case remains under investigation.

“Our goal is to have all uses on video for the protection of our community and our officers,” Foley said, referring body cameras on officers and cameras on stun guns. “We will not buy another taser until there are cameras.”

Foley took issue with the reports, calling them an “incomplete record,” because they do provide information about how many tasers a department issues, how many times the firing cartridge is replaced or information about the neighborhood in which they were deployed.

In Norwalk, officers fired tasers 23 times, and 39 percent of the suspects were black, 33 percent white and 30 percent Hispanic. Norwalk’s population of 87,214 people is 56 percent white, 21 percent Hispanic and 15 percent black.

Terry Blake, a Norwalk police spokesman, said his officers were justified in firing tasers. “The tasers are never deployed unless a suspect is aggressive, resisting or fighting with the officers,” he said.

Held their fire

By comparison, Stamford police hardly used their tasers, firing three times, at two black suspects and one Hispanic. Stamford’s population of 125,301 people is 50 percent white, 27 percent Hispanic and 13 percent black.

“I was surprised when I saw the numbers,” said Stamford Police Chief Tom Wuennemann, adding at first glance he thought the statistics were too low.

“I think it’s because we have had [tasers] longer,” Wuennemann said, explaining the department first began using stun guns in 2006. “Tasers get a reputation out on the street. Our usage has dropped dramatically. Once an individual sees someone tased, or knows about someone who was, they want no part of it.”

Asked if Stamford’s taser policy is different than in Bridgeport or Hartford, Wuennemann said it’s the same for all departments.

“Everyone is trained the same way,” Wuennemann said. “Bridgeport is more violent. Their murders are always in the 20s; we have two or three a year. But it’s the individual who decides to comply or not.”

State Police spokeswoman Kelly Grant, whose department tased 32 mostly white suspects last year, said the state police numbers show restraint. State police cover 81 towns and 7,000 miles of roadways.

“State police issued tasers to over 750 troopers and just 32 discharged their taser last year,” Grant said. “No other law enforcement agency policed such a large population and used the taser so infrequently.”

Overreaction

Kenney said it’s hard to justify tasing teenagers and elderly people.

“Generally, most departments are constrained from deploying against kids and the elderly,” Kenney said. “It’s difficult to imagine an 83 year old man is resisting to the point it’s the only resource. That says something about the police you are recruiting.”

“The real question is whether the level of force is justified,” Kenney said. “The issue is wheen there is disproportionate representation. Tasers are designed to stop an incident from escalating to deadly force. The idea is to tase rather than use lethal force. It’s not to overcome resistance and it’s not for compliance. It’s to prevent the escalation of force.”

Kenney added officers “get in trouble when using [tasers] as a compliance tool. Police like them because when they are fearful it’s a tool they can rely on and don’t have to worry about a person overpowering them.”

The taser reports most frequently cite failure to comply with an officer’s instructions as the reason a person was stunned. Other reasons cited include threatening, hostility, intoxication, previous hostility to officers and emotional disturbance.

john.nickerson@scni.com