The Chronicle reported on the death of a naked Conroe man who fought the police and was tased. At the very end of the article the Chronicle tried to slip in their usual opinion on the subject of tasers.
The Houston Police Department started using Tasers in 2004. A Houston Chronicle analysis showed that HPD officers deployed their Tasers 1,724 times between December 2004 and May 2008, triggering 69 internal affairs investigations.
Wow! At first glance, 69 internal affairs investigations sound like a lot. The Chronicle has long been against the use of tasers, especially on people who resist police officers. The Chronicle fails to reveal if any of those IAD investigations were found to be sustained against the officer. The Chronicle had a story in 2008, revealing the results of an audit of taser use. While the archive link isn’t working, KPRC had the same story. A blog post shows the faults of reading these numbers to fit a particular agenda. Even though I couldn’t get the original Chronicle article to link I did find this quote:
The report noted 55 complaints filed against police officers for using their Tasers, only three of which resulted in discipline.
Hmmm . .. originally 3 out of 55 complaints resulted in any disciplinary action. Nice try Chronicle!
