According to a study conducted by both Drexel and Arizona State University, a taser is deployed in the field on average more than 900 times a day in the United States. The study also claims that the rate in which stun guns are being used within police forces has gone up steadily in recent years, possible due to the increasingly negative view the American populace has on lethal force with handguns in light of the current tragedies stemming from the deaths of both innocent citizens and police officers alike.
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This usage of a seemingly less innocuous weapon brings up a unique question; what are the effects of a direct 50,000 volt shock to the human brain? And even more intriguing, what possible effect could this have on a suspect while being questioned by police officers after being tased and detained? In my humble opinion, each individual has a right to their full cognitive ability when being questioned by police and being read their Miranda Rights, and if the use of a stun gun impairs cognitive function — further measures must be put in place to protect individuals tased by police so they may adequately defend themselves from self-incrimination.
The effects on the brain after being subjected to the high voltage shock of a stun gun has been relatively unstudied in the weapons history of use. The particular study predominately being analyzed in this blog was a journal published in Criminology and Public Policy, and was appropriately named TASER Exposure and Cognitive Impairment. Conducted in collaboration with Drexel and Arizona State University, the study first establishes the requirements in which a suspect must be in while being questioned and read their Miranda Rights by an officer of the law. The main aspect of their argument rested within the fact that cognitive coherency and the ability to have an equal chance of defending themselves and their rights is imbedded within the ruling of Miranda v. Arizona (1966). So, if the voltage from a taser does in-fact impair cognitive ability, should a suspect be given more time to appropriate their thoughts and responses and be thoroughly placed in a situation where they can best defend themselves?
In order to answer the question of how a taser effects the human brain temporarily and the extent in which damage caused by a taser could impair a subjects cognitive ability, researchers conducted a randomized control trial (RCT) in which healthy college participants were subjected to voltage from a taser and then had their cognitive functions tested in the form of various tasks such as memory and verbal examinations, alongside other auditory and visual assessments. The study also includes a statistic that 500 have died from a taser stun, though they also note research is consistent that the voltage of a standard taser poses a relatively low threat to the overall health of a physically healthy human adult and generally proves a valid alternative to lethal force.
While a taser may pose a small threat of serious injury to the average healthy adult, that does not necessarily answer the question as to whether it imposes cognitive dysfunction or impairment when a suspect is being read their Miranda Rights. The study utilized several scientific elements when testing to see the effects of a taser and how it could potentially alter one’s ability to respond to a police officer, extensively screening 800 healthy college students and placing them into several different groups that they could contrast and gather data with. These groups were then prescribed several tasks, with some just preforming exercises, some being singularly tased, and others being tased and then asked to preform exercises. This variability would allow the researchers to fully access the magnitude of problems that tasers could potentially impose.
(Slow-mo of a taser being deployed, courtesy of “The Slow-Mo Guys”.)
After analyzing the results, researchers found that subjects who had been subjected to the five second taser shock did in fact preform worse than their counterparts on objective physical tests, and also reported higher measures of cantankerousness, difficulty concentrating, and overall feelings of anxiety within an hour of being shocked. With these statistics now being considered significant and measureable, the researchers sugguest that a detainee of the law may be more likely to impede an investigation of an officer by providing inaccurate information or by simply foregoing their Miranda rights in the first place. The study also made a special note of the people who were used in this study, namely healthy college students not currently inebriated by drugs or alcohol and with no mental illnesses. Since many who commit crimes are desperate and in one of these categories and are potentially not of the same mental ability as healthy college students, the researchers assume that taser effects may be even worse when applied to someone that in lies in one of these various groups. In order to reduce potential inaccuracies and to keep the viability of an officer reading someone their Miranda Rights after being tased, the scientists suggest that police forces implement a sixty minute waiting period in which the convict would be able to stabilize from their recent exposure to such voltage and to best comply with law officials in way that does not work against them. The study also encourages other scientists to directly observe the effects of a taser on a wider variety of subjects in order to find out the full extent in which a taser debilitates a suspect and impairs cognitive ability.