Too many Taser questions

Edmonton Sun
Feb. 19, 2006

The Edmonton Police Service's new policy guiding the usage of Tasers comes too little, too late for a number of Edmontonians who claim they have been abused by the overuse of the electronic stun guns.

The most recent example of this came last week from a 23-year-old University of Alberta student who said that he was needlessly Tasered by local cops.

His complaint is a serious one that should be sent to an outside police force to investigate.

And we say that because, frankly, we don't trust the EPS to do a proper and thorough investigation of Ranu's complaint after the Randy Fryingpan debacle and other questionable uses of the Taser by EPS members.

Gurpreet Singh Ranu is facing charges of impaired care or control of a motor vehicle, refusing to provide a breathalyzer sample, and assaulting a police officer in connection with the Oct. 2, 2005, incident.

Ranu claims that his car hit a curb as he was coming home from a concert that night. He said he called a tow truck and then fell asleep in the seat, waiting for it to come. He admits to having been drinking earlier in the night, but says he was not impaired at the time.

Whatever the circumstances of how he got there, though, the disturbing part of Ranu's story is that he claims he woke up to find himself on the ground being struck around the head and shoulders by police officers. He says that when he tried to crawl underneath the car, he was Tasered by cops.

Ranu's lawyer, Peter Royal, says his client had "significant Taser scarring." Ranu said the police report of the incident indicated he was Tasered three or four times.

There are disturbing echoes here of the Randy Fryingpan affair, In October 2002, 16-year-old Fryingpan was arrested after being found passed out in a car. He was Tasered at least six times by Const. Mike Wasylyshen in an effort to "roust" him.

Judge Jack Easton later halted Fryingpan's trial for breaching his bail conditions after concluding the teen's charter rights had been repeatedly violated by Wasylyshen, who, the judge declared, had used excessive force on the teen. But Wasylyshen was never disciplined over the incident, as the EPS found insufficient evidence to support charges against him.

Then there's the more recent case of Bruce Guy, who claimed his 20-year-old son, Dustin, was repeatedly Tasered to the point that his back was covered in burns. Guy also claims that the Tasering changed his son's personality, and that it led to him crashing a stolen car - an accident that killed him. Again, the EPS dismissed claims of excessive force, a decision that we thought was shameful and appalling.

And there's the Christmas Eve death of a Alesandro Fiacco, who was Tasered in an intersection by police after behaving erratically.

Last Wednesday, new police Chief Mike Boyd unveiled the new policy guiding Taser usage in the EPS.

Although it's not so much a new policy as a more detailed and clarified one, in terms of not using them on "subjects who are compliant or pose no physical threat."

And there's going to be more accountability, promises Boyd, and zero tolerance for failure to report the use of a Taser or for violating any of the deployment policies.

That's all fine and good, but why wasn't that the policy all along?

And isn't this a tacit admission by Boyd that the EPS has, in fact, been using Tasers improperly in some circumstances? Certainly Ranu thinks so, as his complaint is based on the fact that he was face down at the time on the ground and posed absolutely no threat at all.

The clarified Taser policy came down the same day that the EPS charged Const. Todd Hudec with assault in relation to the Dec. 24, 2003, Tasering of a 15-year-old boy in police custody.

Having charges laid more than two years after the incident should certainly raise some eyebrows among Edmontonians and bring into question once again the inherent problems with police officers investigating their own colleagues.

It's one more reason why Gurpreet Singh Ranu's complaint should not be investigated by the EPS's internal affairs department, but sent to an outside force.