Electro-shock for fun and profit
by digby
There is so much wrong with this I don’t even know where to start:
For the price of a $5 raffle ticket, Van Meter is offering its residents a change to use a police taser on a city official.
City hall is selling the tickets as part of a public safety fundraiser. The raffle winner will get the chance to taser or spare City Administrator Jake Anderson or Councilman Bob Lacy at the Van Meter Fire Association Street Dance July 18.
“I volunteered to be tased,” Anderson said.
A police officer will assist with the tasing, with the proceeds going to help the department purchase a second squad car, add speed radar and possibly expand its six-member part-time and reserve force.
Anderson said the idea came up during a meeting with police about funding.
“The joke was sort of, yeah, let’s tase the administrators. They make all the friends,” Anderson said. “I was like, yeah, that’s funny. Do you think you could raise some money?”
Lacy volunteered to add a little competition, and Anderson was glad.
“I didn’t want there to be a 100 percent chance I’d be tased,” he said.
Anderson said he’s never been tased before, adding, “I imagine it will hurt.”
Police Chief Bill Daggart, a former Waukee officer, admitted he’s never been tased either. But he hopes to purchase tasers for Van Meter’s department once they’ve raised the $5,000 to $10,000 desired to expand the force.
“A taser reduces suspect-officer physical confrontations immensely,” Daggart said.
The police department is also raffling gift cards for Sportsman’s Warehouse valued at prices equal to a number of firearms, including a Ruger AR556 Patrol Rifle.
Daggart said the desire to expand the force isn’t the result of any crime increase in the town of roughly 1,100 residents. Van Meter is hoping to attract a data storage industry from companies such as Microsoft or Facebook.
Though the city has a patch of land suitable for that industry, those companies often require specific response times from police and fire services.
“It’s not a crime issue as much as it is a growth issue, “Daggart said. “It’s a way we can compete with Omaha and West Des Moines.”
A poster created by the police department that advertises the raffle reads, “It is taser time!!!” adding that citizens can “vote to taser Jake or Bob.” The bottom of the poster reads, “Don’t tase me bro!!!!!”
And for 50 bucks, you can waterboard the mayor! Fun!!!!
I sure hope the public officials get a full cardiac work-up and take some strong downers and pin killers before they submit because tasering can kill you if you get too “excited”. Or have an underlying condition. Or they shoot you full of electricity in the chest. Or you fall and hit your head or knock out your teeth when your muscles all seize up and you fall to the ground.
Best take some precautions. Unfortunately, the people who get tasered for mouthing off or failing to submit to an order quite quickly enough don’t have a chance to get a medical evaluation before they are shot through with electricity, but that’s their tough luck.
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