Fusion Investigation of Teen’s Death by Taser
How does an unarmed 18-year-old aspiring artist, who simply tagged a building with graffiti, wind up dead? One year later, an emotional Fusion documentary investigates the little known story of the weapon that killed Hernandez: The Taser. “Tasered: The Israel Hernandez Story” airs August 6 at 8:00 p.m., ET on Fusion.
Fusion’s full report is now live online can can be found here: http://fus.in/1oA6JNX
Tasers have been promoted as a non-lethal weapon that helps law enforcement officials subdue suspects. But are they really non-lethal? Fusion’s investigation examines questions about efforts to suppress information about how deadly the weapons can be, and reveals that the federal government doesn’t keep track of deaths caused by this supposedly non-lethal weapons because they are “highly controversial.”
As a part of Fusion’s reporting it found Taser International has been sued for product liability a total of 225 times since 1998, according to the company. The majority of the cases have been settled out of court or dismissed by judges. Six cases went to trial, and Taser won four.
In addition, Taser has also brought cases to court. In 2008, Taser successfully sued a medical examiner in Ohio who listed their weapon as the cause of death in three cases. The judge ordered the medical examiner to remove any mention of Taser as the cause of death in the disputed cases.
“It is dangerously close to intimidation,” Jeff Jentzen, then-president of the National Association of Medical Examiners, said at the time of the Ohio ruling. “At this point, we adamantly reject the fact that people can be sued for medical opinions that they make.”
It’s nearly impossible to track Taser-related deaths at a national level. The Bureau of Justice Statistics does not track such deaths, in part because the subject is so controversial.
“[Controlled Energy Deaths] deaths are highly controversial…most medical examiners/coroners (ME/C) do not attribute the cause of death to CEDs,” a Bureau of Justice official said in a statement to Fusion.