NEW ORLEANS
A prosecutor in central Louisiana says he will consider criminal charges against a former police officer accused of jolting a handcuffed man nine times with a Taser before the suspect died.
Baron Pikes was repeatedly shocked with a 50,000-volt Taser as he was arrested on a drug possession warrant on January 17th. A coroner ruled the death was a homicide. The Winn Parish district attorney says former Winnfield police officer Scott Nugent has acknowledged using the device on Pikes.
Nugent's lawyer says he's not surprised the D.A. wants a grand jury sort through the facts.
A lawyer for Pikes' relatives says the family welcomes the grand jury's probe which she called "a step in the right direction."
Winnfield is about 40 miles northwest of Jena, the site of a massive civil rights protest last year.
Thousands demonstrators gathered in Jena to protest the cases against six black teenagers charged with beating a white student at a high school.
Pikes was black; Nugent is white.
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