TASERS PROPOSED FOR METRO POLICE

Mayor, Chief Pitch Plan

Metro Mayor Jerry Abramson announced plans yesterday to equip all
Louisville police officers with Tasers, weapons designed to subdue
suspects with a nonlethal shock.

Abramson said he wants to spend more than $1 million on the
state-of-the-art weapons and plans to present the proposal to the
Metro Council at the end of the month. Police Chief Robert White
joined Abramson in the announcement yesterday, saying he hopes to have
half of his force armed with Tasers by October.

"This will give officers another weapon," White said. "This will put
us in the position to apprehend suspects. ... This will totally
immobilize you. As soon as you are hit, you feel the impact of it."

Shaped like a gun, the Taser would be carried on an officer's belt on
the opposite side of the firearm. Using a laser beam to aim, it acts
like a stun gun, shooting two probes attached to 21-foot wires that
send 50,000 volts of electricity into the suspect.

Each Taser would cost $935 and the department plans to purchase 1,100
so each patrol officer and sergeant has one. Federal grants and money
from drug seizures would cover more than 90 percent of the cost, with
metro government having to come up with an additional $60,000.

In the past, officers have had only less potent alternatives to using
a firearm, such as pepper spray and collapsible batons.

Civil-rights activists in Louisville have complained for several years
that police officers have used lethal force when less-lethal weapons,
such as Tasers, would have been enough.

Since 1998, 11 men have been fatally shot by police in Jefferson
County. Seven were black.

In the most recent case, Louisville Metro Police Detective McKenzie
Mattingly was indicted on charges of murder and wanton endangerment in
the death of 19-year-old Michael Newby, who was shot in the back three
times in January in what police described as an undercover drug deal
gone bad.

Abramson and White said the decision to pursue the use of Tasers is
not a direct result of the fatal shootings, although the incidents
pointed to a need for additional less-lethal options.

Activists contacted yesterday said they hope that White now will
implement a use-of-force policy that will help decrease the number of
injuries.

"In some locations, police have used Tasers more frequently than they
would have used guns," said Beth Wilson, director of the local
American Civil Liberties Union chapter. "The bottom line is we
certainly support any effort by the Louisville police department to
minimize risk to human life, but what's important here is that the
use-of-force policy doesn't increase the injuries to the citizens of
this community."

The Rev. Louis Coleman, who has often led protests over police
shootings, said he favors police using Tasers, but also said the
community will be at "square one" if the department does not change
officers' mind-sets about the use of force.

White said he has not written a policy for the Tasers but foresees the
weapons being placed just before or after pepper spray in the
recommended order of use. According to the standard operating
procedures that officers must follow, verbal commands and hand contact
are used at the start of a confrontation, with shooting firearms at
the end.

In Kentucky, 50 law-enforcement, security or military agencies are
using or testing Taser technology, according to Taser International,
the company that supplies the equipment. Of those, 26 agencies have
deployed the equipment into daily operations.

The Jeffersontown police force, second in size in Jefferson County
only to Louisville's department, became the first in the county to use
Tasers -- starting with testing last May. All 46 patrol officers in
Jeffersontown now carry Tasers on their belts.

Officer Mike Holston said he's glad to have another choice on his
belt, along with his Mace, baton and gun. "It's gotten to be the best
option," he said. "It's a lot easier than to go to hand-to-hand combat
with someone."

At least one Metro Council member, Madonna Flood, D-24th District,
said yesterday that she is in favor of acquiring the new weapons.

"I think that anything we can do to make this community safer and to
make police officers safer so they go home to their families at the
end of the day is a positive step," Flood said.

Shortly after White became chief in January 2003, he and his command
staff reviewed the use-of-force policy, along with the "less lethal"
weapons available to officers and past incidents.

"When the mayor and I walked in the door, we made a commitment to look
at use of force," White said yesterday. "We needed to have a clear
understanding of use of force, when we are doing it and what's a
better way of doing it."

He said the department waited to pursue Tasers "so technology could
catch up with the need to some extent."

Since 1999, Taser units have become smaller and better able to handle
suspects who are using drugs, said Steve Tuttle, spokesman for Taser
International.

The Tasers designed for law enforcement cannot be purchased by the
public. There is another model, which delivers less voltage, available
to the public for $600 through the company's Web site www.taser.com