Revisiting non-lethal weapons

Last week's column, 'Cops should have non-lethal weapons', received a barrage of comments. The article was meant to highlight the need for our police to have a choice of weaponry when faced with a variety of situations. Instead, as incredible as it seems, many people seemed to believe that the piece was advocating that our cops be armed solely with non-lethal weapons to confront our heavily armed criminals.

I, more than most, am very cognisant of the heavy-duty firearms available to our criminal underworld. In about mid-1986, one of my patients - from Central Village - explained why she missed her scheduled appointment. She related that she was trapped indoors because 'war' had broken out between two community gangs. She described how one gunman placed a large gun on a 'stand' outside her front gate. She said that he "turned it on" and that "it spin and give off nuff-nuff smoke".

High-powered guns

As I listened to her fantastic story, I thought that she must have been scared out of her wits; surely, no such hand-held weapon existed. I was, therefore, shocked when I saw a weapon (that looked like the one that she described) in the 1987 Arnold Schwarze-negger movie, Predator. One of the actors (Jesse Ventura) used a GE M134 Minigun - a 7.62mm, hand-held, rotating-multibarrel, Gatling-style, externally powered, machine gun that shoots up to 6,000 rounds per minute. This elderly lady could never have known about this extremely deadly weapon unless she saw it for herself.

Furthermore, my medical practice allows me to interact with people from all walks of life and all levels of society. I often hear about heavily armed, roving gangs of wayward youth that patrol openly with assault rifles in many underprivileged communities. They demand access to any and all properties, hide their weapons and force terrified residents to shelter them whenever the law arrives. Surely, with this knowledge, I could never suggest that our police be armed only with non-lethal weapons.

My push for the issuing of pepper spray and stun guns to the police is to give them a choice of weaponry so that they will not feel forced - or have any excuse - to resort to a deadly weapon every single time the need arises to defend themselves, other police or innocent citizens against hostility.

Self-defence

As things stand, if someone resists arrest by fighting the police, the officer must defend him/herself and the service weapon (lest he/she be overpowered and the weapon taken). Such a confrontation could escalate and cause the cop to claim justification in using deadly force to stop a fist fight. It must be noted that the same applies if the person resisting arrest is of unsound mind. Several mentally ill individuals have lost their lives because cops had no choice but to employ deadly force to prevent harm to themselves or others.

Firearms must never be drawn just to threaten or to wound someone. The crux of the matter is this: a gun should only be used if a situation exists wherein the user has determined that he/she must kill another human being. I submit that, since most of our cops have no effective weapons except guns, this poses a danger to anyone that they plan to detain, arrest or subdue. The two, highly publicised, videotaped fatal shootings in Buckfield, St Ann (July 2010), and outside the Alexandria Police Station, also in St Ann (May 2011), may have ended differently had those cops had pepper spray and/or a stun gun at their disposal.

Garth A. Rattray is a physician with a family practice. Email feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com and garthrattray@gmail.com.