Page 3748 - Week 12 - Wednesday, 29 October 2014
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clear publicly, is in support of what we have put forward here today. I note that he is saying quite strongly—I hope not to misquote him in any way—that he sees a need for tasers to be deployed further as a very important safety measure for his members. We have an increased risk in our community as a result of recent events, but there is no doubt that it is our front-line police officers who are confronted on a daily basis by people who are behaving in a violent fashion, be that because they are affected by drugs, because they are mentally ill or for other reasons.
I have had an opportunity to go through a number of incident reports on the use of force to get an understanding of the sort of incidents that our police are confronted by. I have to say that reading through these—I would encourage people, if they get a chance, to read through this freedom of information request—really is an eye-opener into the very difficult, very complex and very dangerous job that our front-line police have to contend with.
I will quote from a report dated 12 February 2014 on the use of force, quite a recent one. It is quite a detailed report. I will go towards the end of the report. It says:
At 2.04am—
there are names blanked out, obviously—
[X] emerged suddenly from the house and stepped aggressively towards the negotiating police sergeant. [Y]—
a second sergeant—
fearing the defendant was about to violently attack, deployed a single discharge from his Taser … striking and incapacitating [X], [who] was immediately restrained and handcuffed by other police, during which police located a 20cm kitchen knife concealed down the back of his pants.
So he was confronted by an offender armed with a 20-centimetre kitchen knife. The report continued:
… [X] provided a breath screening test of 0.259.
So it was someone who was drunk, who was violent and who was armed with a knife. The report continued:
The TASER cartridge was collected and exhibited at Belconnen Station. The TASER video record was burned to DVD and also exhibited at Belconnen.
And so on. It continued:
The TASER … was an effective tool in the resolution of this incident. However, at this time, they are restricted to substantive Sergeants only. Had only Acting Sergeants been available, a frequent occurrence, the lack of less than lethal options in this case could have significantly increased the likelihood that lethal force may have been necessary. Serious and urgent consideration of the expansion of TASER carriage to senior constables and Acting Sergeants should have high priority for the AFP.
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