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By the time someone's running around on a bridge half crazed waving sharp implements at people and cops, the outcome's generally going to be bad. Personally I'd rather see people injected than tortured via tazer even though we all know that no vengeful cop has ever continued to administer tazing after a person has been subdued, right?

In the case of diabetics not bringing blood chemistry under control can result in death or otherwise serious impairment but this would be an issue whether or not tranquilizers were available as a restraining measure.

Last edited by isaly (2008-07-12 8:44 pm)

A bad reaction is not as unlikely as you think. There is a reason docters ask about what medicines you are on what medicines you are allergic to and sometime even conduct bloodwork before administering medicine. They are supposed to limit shooting to life or death situations the injection idea is because many cops can't keep from abusing the baton or taser. The restriction of movement serves a number of purposes including reducing injury (though it is still possible to injure one's self if you try hard enough).

And it is easily possible that it interacts with another medicine to cancel each other out or intensify the effect. Out in the field you don't alway have the info to make that call. I'm intimate enough with ER staff members at a couple of hospitals to know what I'm talking about.

ScifiterX wrote:

And it is easily possible that it interacts with another medicine to cancel each other out or intensify the effect. Out in the field you don't alway have the info to make that call. I'm intimate enough with ER staff members at a couple of hospitals to know what I'm talking about.

Agreed. Use in a hospital as a medical necessity is one thing, but as an assist for an arrest is another.

Metacell wrote:

Farmerkev wrote:

ScifiterX wrote:

True but that doesn't mean we should knowingly consider an especially crappy option either.

OK, come up with a better and safer option.

Dartgun full of PCP!

Doesn't PCP make people violent and reduce the pain reception?

Jdude wrote:

[
Agreed. Use in a hospital as a medical necessity is one thing, but as an assist for an arrest is another.

What arrest?

He was detained in this case (rightfully so), then released later on.

Also, I would venture so far as to say the majority of cops are decent people. But you just hear a lot of about the many douchebag cops. Just because you hear mostly about the douchebag ones doesn't mean these ones are douchebags as well.

And pepper spray can have side effects and interactions with the wrong person, that doesn't mean it's not a useful and valuable tool. And on top of that, even if they did take this guy to a hospital, i'm somehow doubtful he would have been able to recite his medical history and drugs he was taking. There's nothing a hospital could have done to calm him down that the EMT they called in woudn't have been able to do.

ScifiterX wrote:

You can't really tox screen in the field. Blood tests in the field are problematic as well. Hospitals OTOH are setup to do those things. They can also more effectively monitor the effects of a reaction and have restraints designed to minimize injury while allowing for safer injections on unwilling individuals.

The danger is not limited to drug interaction there are complications related to need breakage, hitting the wrong spot, etc. In short so much can go wrong in this sort of situation that it's anything but a good idea.

Those things can go wrong in ANY emergency situation, and even hospitals regularly get it wrong.

This was an emergency situation, and the risk of those things are know to be minimal, and are a worthwhile risk for the benefit.

I would think it would be VERY necessary to calm down a crazy man dancing through traffic with sharp objects in his hands.

And, I wasn't saying hospitals get it wrong because they screw up. I was saying there are many situations where neither a hospital nor an EMT can sit around waiting for lab tests to come back. If there is only a 2% chance a drug will have an interaction (especially one that would be non-lethal), you wouldn't risk people's safety based on that.

resedit wrote:

If they sedate them, then how does the water boarding have any effect?

Waterboarding is just that good.

ScifiterX wrote:

Lemme spell it out for you.

To inject said blade wielding whackjob they will have to disarm, subdue, and restrain the person in order to even give them a drug which may or may not be effective or may or may not cause them  harm beyond the reported memory loss.

This is kind of misrepresenting the situation. The drug very likely will be extremely effective, and very likely won't cause them any harm.

Phrasing it your way is like saying "intelligent design may or may not be a valid scientific theory."

and then continue to restrain them until it becomes effective. The disarming process could end up with someone getting injured anyway and the cops won't hesitate to get in their shots while subduing and restraining the person for the shot. Add to that the possibility of complications. Still think that's an improvement?

Continuing to restrain a crazy person until an injected drug becomes effective is a far shorter time than continuing to restrain a crazy person until they decide to cooperate on their own. I personally don't want my tax money going to paying police and EMTs to wait for crazy people to stop acting crazy. Disarming a crazy person and then leaving them to flail about restrained is a worse solution than disarming a crazy person and then calming them down.

In theory, but theories in the nonscientific definition aren't worth a plug nickel.

If it takes like 5 minutes or less a guy to manhandle into the back of a car but take a couple minutes to hold a person securely enough to dope the up another minute or two for the drug to kick in and ten another minute to get the sedated one in how much time have you really saved?

You certainly haven't saved money cause you increase the number of people to do the same job and are increasing the number of resources to accomplish the same task.

It's not demonstrably safer, faster, or cheaper and in some situations it's riskier. It's just another way to knock someone out in order to drag them and a less efficient one at that. The only "advantage" of it is when it's done right their less evidence it happened.