17-year-old Derrick Jones of Martinsville was pronounced dead at a local hospital following an encounter with a police officer that ended in a Taser blast and immediate attempts to revive him by the officer, and later paramedics.

Jones, 15-year-old Justin Gregory and three others spent the day roughhousing in Jones' duplex apartment, according to Gregory. Alcohol was involved, and altercations between Jones, at one point laying down in the middle of the street, and Gregory, resulted in neighbors calling the police. Officer R. L. Wray found signs of forced entry and blood on a wall said by Gregory to be caused by the teens over the course of the day, and leaned into the living room of the apartment with his Taser drawn. Jones, who had been drinking, was said to have "moved rapidly" towards the officer while making unspecified "not too kind" comments.

Jones was immediately unresponsive after being Tasered halfway into the living room, according to Gregory, who disagreed with the officer's account and said that regardless of the situation, "too much force" was used on the 130-pound teen, who stood at 5'7". He told his mother that Jones "just melted" on the floor. "It was the last time they saw him move."

A five foot seven, 130 pounds drunk kid, and the cop had to use his effing taser to "take him down?"

I'm not to worried about a cop shooting me. Cops know they get in a world of hurt when they pull that weapon out of the holster and shoot an unarmed person. But tasers? Hey, they have a built in excuse to use and abuse them. They're not lethal. That's what they (Taser International?) told us when we were trained on them.

Yeah. Non-lethal. Except when, ya know, they aren't.

A CBC study has shown that the Taser has killed at least 400 people in the United States and Canada since 2001. The research showed that a person hit with a Taser could face as high as a 50 percent chance of cardiac arrest.

All denied by the manufacturer, of course. Which makes it a helluva lot easier for a cop to justify using them. Too damn easy.

"You have people who are often in custody, and when they are in custody and it's being used repeatedly on them, it's hard to describe it as anything else but torture," Amnesty International USA's executive director Larry Cox told CBS' Early Show in November 2007.

And these are just your garden variety tasers we're talking about. Wait til you see what the good folks at Taser International have in store for you next. The Taser shotgun, oh my! Because who wants a wimpy little hand held taser when you can have one that can zap a perp from 20 yards or more away:

Introducing the TASER™ XREP™ – eXtended Range Electronic Projectile. The XREP projectile is self-contained, wireless, and fires from a 12-gauge shotgun. It delivers the same Neuro Muscular Incapacitation (NMI) bio-effect as our handheld TASER X26 Electronic Control Device (ECD), but can be delivered to a distance of 65 feet (20 meters), combining blunt impact with field-proven TASER NMI.

The core technology that made the XREP projectile possible is its electronic "engine." A stunning engineering achievement, the XREP engine provides the same bio-effect as our field-proven X26, but from an electronics package that weighs only 3.4 grams and consumes less than one tenth of a cubic inch. In order to achieve a wireless projectile, the battery is fully integrated into the chassis and provides the power to drive the XREP projectile engine for its full 20-second cycle. [...]

Another innovative and unique feature of the XREP nose is the reflex engagement electrodes. An anticipated reaction to the pain of a projectile impact is for the subject to grab at the impact site. If the subject tries to grab or disconnect the XREP projectile, the reflex engagement electrodes complete a circuit allowing TASER NMI to discharge from the nose, through the subject’s body, out to the hand that grabbed the projectile. This reaction creates a significant spread that allows the XREP projectile pulses to affect a large body mass, causing overpowering NMI.

Bet that sends a tingle up the spine (of both the shooter and the shootee). I also bet that too many of our local law enforcement officers can't wait to use it either. As often as they can. Against some smart ass little punk, for example, who weighs only 130 pounds but has a bad attitude and isn't showing them the proper respect. Or a person suffering from a diabetic seizure. Or someone whose home they bust into by mistake. Or a mentally ill person. Or an old lady at a nursing home. Or someone who just looks at them funny. Or some of them liberal hippie type protesters who cause so much trouble. Or a scared autistic runaway boy. Or anyone who's black.

Because, it's a "non-lethal" law enforcement tool. Much safer than a gun. Unless, you know, it kills you. You being the bad guy trying to run away, of course.

"The penalty for resisting arrest should not be death," [Amnesty International USA's executive director Larry] Cox said.

Well, he's entitled to his opinion. Just not around a cop with an itchy taser finger.