Stats show police using less force
Chief touts changes in training, hails ‘good news’ despite recent shootings
While two recent police-involved shootings have some members of the public questioning the use of force, the chief of police said new statistics show Edmonton police officers are using less force overall and are turning to techniques with fewer lethal consequences in “volatile situations.”
“I think the public is safer as a consequence of that,” said Edmonton police Chief Rod Knecht.
A report on use of force presented to the Edmonton Police Commission Thursday showed officers had to use force 2,291 times in 2016, a five per cent drop from 2015.
That being said, the report also showed a 26 per cent increase in the use of conducted energy weapons (CEWs) — known as Tasers — in 2016 over the year prior. At the same time, the number of occurrences where officers had to keep their firearms at “low ready” dropped by 10 per cent and incidents where officers had to point their gun at someone dropped by nearly 43 per cent.
Knecht says this is “good news” as officers are pulling their CEWs rather than reaching for their gun.
Part of this increase, Knecht said, could be connected to changes in officer training regarding people suffering from mental illness or in the throes of excited delirium.
Excited delirium is a state usually brought on by illegal drug use or mental illness where a person exhibits violent and bizarre behaviour and who is seemingly impervious to pain while capable of almost superhuman strength.
Knecht said training in 2016 encouraged officers to use CEWs in such cases as a means of bringing the person under control as quickly as possible so they can receive emergency medical treatment.
Knecht attributed two policeinvolved shootings within days of each other earlier this month — Vitaly Savin, 55, was fatally shot on March 9 while Glenn (Occo) Ironchild, 36, was taken to hospital after being shot by an officer on March 13 — to little more than coincidence, saying in reviewing police shooting statistics going back to 2001 there is no obvious pattern.