New Taser Policy for San Antonio

SAN ANTONIO

Citing research that links Tasers to the deaths of drug users, San Antonio Police Chief William McManus announced a new policy banning the use of the weapons on anyone known to be under the influence.

The policy also calls for more training and prohibits more than one officer from using a Taser on one person. The policy on Tasers, which deliver electrical shocks that can disrupt a person's neuromuscular system, is effective immediately, McManus said.

"You have to see them using (drugs)," McManus said in Tuesday's online edition of the San Antonio Express-News. The newspaper had published an investigation into how police have used the weapons since December 2006.

He said the new policy, issued Thursday in an internal bulletin, is in correlation to " excited delirium," a diagnosis described as an overdose of adrenaline to the heart and a possible cause of death among people who were shocked by Tasers.

"The research has connected excited delirium to deaths," McManus said. "Excited delirium is a possibility when drugs are being used."

The policy does not limit the number of times an officer can shock someone, although it requires that police stop using the weapon when a person is in custody. The new policy requires officers to get 16 hours of training, doubling the requirement. The 141 officers who already use the weapons will get the additional eight hours of training.

An audit of the San Antonio Police Department released in July says the department should clarify its use of deadly and Taser force and should make its complaint process more accessible to citizens.

San Antonio city officials hired an outside firm to audit the department after several high-profile incidents in which officers were accused of committing crimes, on and off the job, and activists complained of excessive force and civil rights violations.

McManus, though he denied there were any widespread problems with the department, asked for an outside review, and the city hired Police Executive Research Forum, a think tank, to look over the department.

The audit resulted in 141 recommendations and was released weeks later than expected, but McManus said more than two-thirds were already planned for implementation. Seven, including one to list all complaints in officers' files, are being ignored.