Department of Public Safety Director Kevin Williams’ support of Tasers recently prompted talk on the issues the weapons would raise should they be brought to campus.
On Tuesday, more than 50 students, faculty and staff attended what was initially meant to be a meet-and-greet with Williams and turned it into an hour-long discussion about their concerns about the possibility that the weapons may someday come to campus. Williams has no intention of bringing Tasers to DPS in the near future, but the possibility is being considered.
Before he came to the University, Williams served as the corrections division commander at the Lane County Sheriff’s Office, where he introduced Tasers to the jail.
“Injuries to employees went down, injuries to inmates went down, and the inmates’ compliance went up,” Williams said. “As such, I completely support the use of Tasers.”
Tasers, the electroshock weapons some enforcers use to temporarily incapacitate violent or potentially violent people, were introduced in the 1990s as an alternative to lethal weapons such as guns. Several law enforcement bodies, including many public safety units on university campuses nationwide, embraced the Taser, believing it would reduce the amount of fatal injuries innocent people sustained. The University has never discussed the use of Tasers on campus until now.
ASUO President Emily McLain said the ASUO has taken a firm stance against the use of Tasers because they have been responsible for hundreds of unintentional deaths and injuries since they were introduced to law enforcement.
“DPS interacts with students on a daily basis,” said McLain. “When Tasers are employed, students are immediately put in a position where Tasers could be used on them at any time.”
Should DPS be granted the right to use them on campus, the laser devices would be the most powerful weapon in their arsenal – under state law, DPS officers are not allowed to carry firearms. Sgt. Chris Phillips said he has encountered 32 armed criminals in the past year on whom the use of pepper spray and a baton would have had no effect.
“I caught a guy stealing a bike, and before I even had a chance to identify myself, he screamed, ‘I’m going to kill you if you come near me’ and swung his bike at me,” Williams said. “I couldn’t reach for my pepper spray, so I had to hit him with my baton. I hit him five times and still he screamed at me and tried to attack me.”
Williams said pepper spray also has no effect on people who are under the influence of drugs like methamphetamines, which are often linked to crimes in Eugene-Springfield. Only Tasers could potentially contain them, he added.
Law student and ASUO graduate/law student advocate Jim Cleavenger argued that Tasers could also kill any of those victims.
“There have been at least 200 deaths in the last seven years that have been due to the use of Tasers,” said Cleavenger.
The safety of Tasers has been questioned and debated worldwide. The U.N. declared in November last year that the use of Tasers was a form of torture. Although the weapons are too recent an invention for scientists to study their long-term effects, Cleavenger said some who have been struck have reported heart tremors.
“I don’t think you should be able to use a lethal weapon unless you’re in a lethal situation,” said Cleavenger.
Neither DPS nor University administration has seriously considered the use of Tasers on campus yet, but Kevin Williams said they may be a hot topic in the future.
“I am committed to bringing Tasers here at the right time, but it’s not a decision for me to make,” Williams said.
If the administration begins to discuss the possibility of Tasers, they will have many decisions to make, such as whether they should buy the weapons with cameras attached, how often and in which situations DPS officers will be allowed to use them, and the number of weapons they would need.
McLain said the final decision may seem far away, but if administration received a formal proposal soon, a resulting decision could emerge in a matter of months.
“The timeline isn’t as slow as it seems,” McLain said. “This would be a very immediate action.”
Williams pointed out that he wasn’t considering writing a formal proposal in the near future.
“Tasers are important, but they’re not that high a priority to me,” he said. “I’ve got so many other things on my plate.”
Had the discussion about Tasers not been interrupted by a class coming in at the end of the hour, “we could have gone on for six hours,” said law student Brook Meakins.
“I have a feeling this is the first talk in a series of many,” Meakins added.
[email protected]