Stun guns possible for state prison officers

Some state prison officers soon could be allowed to use stun guns when dealing with disturbances among inmates, which has drawn concern from prison reform advocates as well as families with incarcerated loved ones.

While corrections officers have had access to other shock devices, their use was limited and none could be shot at distances like the “dart-fired electronic immobilization device” the Florida Department of Corrections has proposed adding to officers’ equipment at a majority of state prisons. The devices are commonly known as Tasers.

FDC spokeswoman Michelle Glady said officers’ access to the new weapon will help decrease violence in prisons. FDC saw “remarkable” results from a pilot program that introduced the devices at Columbia Correctional Institution in Lake City, she said, including significant drops in how often officers used force, as well as a drop in allegations of improper force.

“Based on the results of that program, FDC expects the widespread fielding of this capability to result in greatly increased safety and security for both inmates and correctional officers,” Glady said.

But advocates object to arming corrections officers with another device that can harm prisoners, especially given pervasive abuse issues inside Florida’s correctional institutions.

“It think it’s very troubling and very alarming to see the FDC contemplating bringing in tasers to the prison system, particularly in this moment in time,” said Sumayya Saleh, a staff attorney for the Southern Poverty Law Center. “There’s this pattern of officers … [using] force in ways that’s really inappropriate, really excessive. To introduce another weapon for them to use is really terrifying.”

Saleh listed off examples: a man held down and beaten by officers, leading to criminal charges; a woman beaten by officers so badly that she became paralyzed, and a man who was allegedly locked in a scalding shower until he died.

Saleh and other prison reform advocates said prisons should not be lost in the national discussion

about law enforcement brutality that’s currently taking place, in the wake of the Minneapolis killing of George Floyd last month. Floyd died after a police officer knelt on his neck for nearly 9 minutes during an arrest.

“I don’t think that in this environment, when we see what happened to George Floyd, we should be adding violence to the prison system,” said Denise Rock, the executive director of the nonprofit Florida Cares.

‘Quell a disturbance’

FDC published a notice on its website May 29 of a proposed alteration to its use-of-force policy, which added “dart-fired electronic immobilization device” for use by some corrections officer teams “primarily for the purpose of supervising inmates within the general population setting.”

All current FDC use of electronic shocking devices — which includes handheld devices, electronic shields and restraint belts — are limited, per the use of force policy, and are used primarily for transportation and supervision of inmates outside of prisons, at court appearances or for “high risk” prisoners.

The proposed stun gun could be used more broadly, during “reactionary use of force incidents” and “to quickly quell a disturbance.”

While the initial text of the proposed rule sent out last week said tasers could be used to simply “quell a disturbance,” an updated version FDC officials sent to the Sentinel on Thursday clarified that it could be used in a disturbance “involving active physical resistance” when an inmate “has the apparent ability to physically threaten an officer or another person.”

The devices would not be used on prisoners in confinement, medical staff should be consulted before their use and the tasers should be used only in concert with a body-worn camera, the proposal said. Glady said the body cameras would activate automatically when the device is drawn from its holster.

The taser proposal is still in its early stages and could be tweaked, and it could be months before it’s adopted into policy, officials said.

FDC plans to start using the devices at 35 prisons — 70% of the state’s major institutions — where some “specially-trained” officers would carry them, replicating the 18-month pilot program at Columbia CI, which had seen a rash of violence in recent years.

At Columbia CI’s main unit, which houses about 1,400 men, FDC found “reactionary” uses of force — unplanned force in response to prisoners — decreased by 55%, while allegations from inmates of improper force dropped by 57%, and inmate assaults of staff dropped 61%, according to Glady.

The prison’s annex, which houses about 1,500 men, saw similar decreases for reactionary force and prisoner assaults on staff, but saw an almost 90% decrease in allegations of improper force.

“Reducing violence within our correctional institutions and creating a safer environment to foster rehabilitation is key in achieving our mission,” FDC Secretary Mark Inch wrote in a statement.

While prisoner advocates were glad body cameras would accompany the tasers, they questioned who would review the footage, and if it would ever be made public — especially if an interaction turns fatal.

Though corrections agencies consider Tasers “less-lethal” weapons, an investigation by Reuters documented more than 100 prisoner fatalities involving their use. The news agency reported that Florida is one of 27 states that allows taser use in prisons, in some form.

“We should be entitled to see what is happening with this taser,” Rock said. “Someone’s gonna die from that taser, and then what?”

Greg Newburn, the director of Florida policy for Families Against Mandatory Minimums, said he worries adding tasers is just the latest patch for a larger problem: a system with severe staffing shortages tasked with handling overcrowded prisons and a ballooning population.

“I’m afraid that it could do more harm than good,” Newburn said.

While officers at Columbia have told Jimmy Baiardi, the president of the corrections union, that they think the prison has become safer since the introduction of the tasers, he wants to review the numbers for himself. He said he’s also still waiting to hear from FDC officials exactly which tasers and cameras they plan to buy and how officers will be trained.

“If it reduces physical confrontation between officers and inmates, that’s better for everybody,” Baiardi said.

‘The better way’

Don Stanton, a retired corrections officer in Winter Garden whose son is now incarcerated, said he does not want to see tasers brought into state prisons.

“In the environment we’re in right now, you have to look at corrections officers as a smaller version of a police department,” said Stanton, who previously worked at Marion and Lowell Correctional Institutions.

He said there are too many young or overly aggressive officers who could abuse or misuse the shocking device. He worried they might use it on pregnant women or when people are wet, especially in the summer months when prison temperature soar and prisoners are sweating.

“I don’t think they thought it through enough,” Stanton said.

Angie Hatfield, whose daughter is incarcerated in Florida, echoed many of Stanton’s concerns. She questioned why this is the solution FDC has chosen to address the violence in prisons, given the potential harm, especially to people with medical issues.

“We don’t even know the voltage on this,” Hatfield said. “We have an older, aging population.”

Many of the prisoner advocates called for deescalation or crisis intervention training, rather than another method of using force.

“The better way to be able to quickly quell a problem is to know the prisoners,” Rock said.