How can we make Tasers safer?

1 point

9 years ago

I saw this article today on Reuters, which talks about incidents in which an individual died during or following a police response when the police used a Taser to subdue the individual. The article asserted that mentally ill individuals, frequent drug users, pregnant women, and individuals with heart problems are all at higher risk for serious injury following a Taser shock. Another cause of serious injury following Taser deployment is trauma resulting from the subject falling and hitting the ground.

https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-taser-911/>Reuters

Further reading about how Tasers work and affect the body here: https://spectrum.ieee.org/consumer-electronics/gadgets/how-a-taser-works

So, to prevent needless deaths and give police an even better tool, how can we make Tasers safer?

My thought is that the shock of the Taser could be improved by tailoring it to the recipient of the shock and the location of the probes, using computer control. The device could decrease the power of the shock for at-risk groups or when the probes are close to the heart. The device could also increase the power for larger subjects, or those who are more resilient. If the device detects that a Taser shock could be lethal to the subject, it could emit a warning of some sort, allowing the user to proceed or abort the shock.

In this line of thinking, would it be possible to use the Taser probes as sensors to briefly analyze the subject? The probes would need to have good contact with the subject to get any results. And in most cases this analysis would have to be very quick, I would say 1 second or less. Would useful information be gained from such an analysis? Many factors, such as mental illness, cannot be assessed this way. But perhaps others, like proximity to heart, can be? Perhaps the device can determine the distance to the heart based on the perceived strength of the electrical signals the heart generates?