It has to be unsettling that the actions of a few misguided Mounties can place an entire police force under scrutiny and leave many Canadians questioning the need to use tasers to subdue an out of control person.
A report from a public inquiry into Robert Dziekanski's death, released Friday, has concluded that the officers who confronted the Polish native were not justified in using the Taser and that their explanations for their brief and tragic confrontation with him where "patently unbelieveable."
In concluding what many Canadians thought all along, inquiry commission Thomas Braidwood could find no reason how officers could have reasonably perceived Dziekanski as a threat when he picked up a stapler during a confrontation at Vancouver's airport in October 2007.
In his report, Braidwood said the officers responded to the incident as if they were "responding to a barroom brawl" and failed to lower their response when they realized they were dealing with a distraught traveler who only wanted to see his mother.
It wasn't unreasonable for RCMP to use the energy weapon to bring Dziekanski under control, but to continue using it after he was on the ground and in obvious distress should be considered an abuse of authority, if not a cruel and inhuman action.
This incident, and a series of others across the country - including the death of a man in custody in Halifax - has left many wondering if these weapons should be included in the law enforcement arsenal.
If anything we can hope what took place in Vancouver serves as a wake-up call and an important educational lesson for law enforcement officers. While these weapons do have a place in policing, there's no room for abuse and as much as they should be used as an alternative to a firearm, that doesn't mean police should become trigger happy when it comes to bringing a situation under control, because although not as deadly as a firearm, it has been proven time and time again that tasers can kill.
