There was the case of a pregnant Black woman tasered in Ohio in 2007. Then, there was 17-year-old Darryl Wayne Turner who was killed while at work after an argument with his supervisor at a grocery store. Also, 21-year-old Barron Scooter Collins, who was killed after being tased nine times over the course of 30 minutes in Louisiana in 2008, as well as Otis Anderson, who WTCD in Fayetteville, N.C., reported as being tasered to death by Fayetteville police after flagging police down to ask them for help. And even more appalling was the death of a 59-year-old black veteran, Sammy Baker, after a spinal cord fracture suffered after being tasered by police in Quitman, Ga., in 2007.
Now, in DeKalb County, Ga., another such death at the hands of police is being investigated. Results of an investigation into the taser death of 29-year-old Audrecas Davis last May suggest that the device was used improperly because he had done nothing wrong and wasn’t resisting arrest. Police initially were called in when paramedics had difficulty with Davis when he was suffering from an epileptic seizure. According to the lawsuit, “The officers used the [Taser] to intimidate and coerce Mr. Davis into submission and compliance with their requests so they could restrain him with the use of handcuffs.”
Taser is an acronym for a fictional weapon: Thomas A. Swift’s Electric Rifle. Tasers uses 50,000 volts of electrical shock to immobilize a person and have been responsible for the deaths of almost 100 people across the country. Historically, the use of electric shock as a method of torture was first documented in Nazi Germany.
In the U.S., tasering has become acceptable and, unfortunately, using the device that has resulted in the deaths of many African Americans from Seattle to Wichita. Just when we start to deal with DWB — Driving While Black. Now, the African American community has another threat to deal with – TDWB, Tasered to Death While Black.
–torrance stephens, ph.d.
Torrance Stephens authors the blog rawdawgb.blogspot.com. Find him on twitter.com/rawdawgbuffalo.
