Handheld electromagnetic weapons
September 21, 2004 -
Last update: September 15, 2005
"Metro", Monday, September 20, 2004, page 9.
Terribly effective electric weapons that you can buy over the Internet. They are described as "Less lethal weapons". Legally, they are sold freely, require no gun permit and are simply not considered weapons. Anyone can acquire them in most American states and their success is considerable.
Source: http://www.taser.com
London - Should electric weapons be authorized within law enforcement? Supposedly protecting the lives of the suspects who are subjected to them, these weapons are nonetheless cruel according to many human rights associations.
The taser gun, do you know it? In any case, in the United States, suspects know it. Manufactured in Uncle Sam's country, this weapon has become commonplace in prisons and courtrooms. A simple press on the trigger of your electric pistol and there you have an individual thrown to the ground and paralyzed for at least 10 minutes after receiving a high-intensity discharge. The weapon remains "almost" never fatal. Unless perhaps you are a heart patient, or you fall badly while being thrown a few meters. In any case, this weapon interests the English, who have put it to the test, as well as the French of the RAID and the GIGN, who are waiting for the green light to use it.
But the Taser gun is not the worst. The Stun-belt - an immobilizing belt - is even more terrifying. Attached around a suspect's waist, it can be activated remotely and send a discharge of 50,000 to 70,000 volts for eight seconds. Enough to paralyze a man for at least 45 minutes. In the United States, prisoners are moreover warned of the fate that awaits them by wearing this belt. The program after triggering: immobilization that makes you fall to the ground, possible defecation, possible incontinence.
Originally designed as a weapon of last resort, the use of such a weapon has sparked quite a few claims from human rights associations, particularly because of the burns caused by this type of belt and the daily stress generated in the prisoner who wears it.
Source: http://www.taser.com
The $999 model
Its two-shot reload
A cheaper version of the weapon:
The economy model at $599.95
All these weapons are guaranteed for one year. The company offers training courses in handling these weapons, indicating the available slots. Big success. 2,500 points of sale. Built-in battery charge indicator. Much more effective than sprays, less dangerous than bullets.
How does it work?
How the Taser works
Benefiting from a laser aiming system, the weapon sends, at distances of 5 to 7 meters, using a compressed nitrogen cartridge, two needles capable of piercing a layer of clothing 5 cm thick. These are connected to wires capable of delivering an HT pulse of 50,000 volts. This creates paralysis by spreading its effect to the entire central nervous system. The HT pulse delivered by the weapon is configured so as to resemble as closely as possible those carried by the central nervous system so that the human being controls his gestures and actions:
On the left, the shape of a signal delivered by the brain. On the right, that of a "T-wave". These "T" waves put the human body's central nervous system out of service ("to jam"). The target loses control of his muscles and falls like a stone, where he is, instantly. These weapons are described as EMD (Electro Muscular Disruption).
The videos visible on the site show the effectiveness of such a weapon, with examples of neutralizing suspects.
To access the video presentation, when you have entered the site via:
and you arrive at the home page, go to the window at the top right and click on MORE in the one showing the X 26 model
You will notice that a police officer, wearing a hat, uses his weapon by shooting a suspect in the back whom he is directing toward his vehicle.
The press is already reporting deaths from the action of Tasers, although the company claims that this "less lethal" weapon is non-dangerous, even for individuals fitted with pacemakers. Four thousand American police stations are already equipped with them and soldiers already use them in Iraq. In the USA, forty thousand units have already been sold and 41 countries are currently testing these incapacitating devices. In France, forty units of this weapon would be in circulation and would have been the subject of 25 uses "in situation". It is obvious that this gadget can be used in many situations. To evacuate demonstrators occupying a link, to neutralize and discreetly remove someone who wants to speak in a manner deemed "untimely".
October 21, 2004.Source: "Le Monde" of October 19, 2004:
In April, an investigation by the American television channel CBS revealed that the use of the Taser gun, an "electrical energy transfer weapon," had allegedly caused at least forty deaths since its launch in 2001. To which the company incriminated replied that, as far as investigation went, it was they who had provided CBS with the list of deceased persons. With, in a good number of cases, the indication of the official causes of these deaths, which never point the finger at Taser's direct responsibility. If it is to be believed, these people died, for the most part, of heart attacks due not to their electrocution but to a cocaine overdose. In July, an investigation by the New York Times revealed that the figure of fifty deaths had been reached and that the effects generated by the gun had never been the subject of independent studies (but paid for by Taser, or by the police forces). Worse: the company had contented itself with testing it on a pig and four dogs before marketing it. Which Taser did not dispute, preferring to cite more than five hundred testimonies from police officers according to whom Taser had allowed them to save lives, or else the fact that, Taser or not, arrests always bring their share of deaths.
In September, the Arizona Republic, an American daily, published a list of 73 people who died shortly after being hit by a Taser. Eight of them allegedly died partly because of the discharges. The same day, Taser launched the "general public" version of its electric gun.
While the British Home Office has just authorized its bobbies to equip themselves with Taser guns, and they have recently been tested by the French police, one must note that, lethal or not, its success augurs dark prospects. Questioned by Le Parisien, Richard Trinquier, mayor (UMP) of Wissous (Essonne), who has just equipped his municipal police with Taser guns, speaks of it as "an ideal weapon insofar as the officers are no longer inhibited by the fear of killing someone." On September 12, a police officer from the anti-crime squad in Lyon warned a young man, before electrocuting him: "I'm not going to kill you, but it's going to hurt."
A report by the American army revealed, for its part, last year that hundreds of Tasers had been entrusted to American soldiers sent to Iraq. And that they had been all the more effective during prisoner interrogations as they opportunely recalled the use of electric torture under Saddam Hussein.
For its part, the company XADS (Xtreme Alternative Defence System) is developing for the American army a gun projecting ionized gases (or plasma) capable of electrocuting several people in a row, in the manner of a submachine gun. Even stronger, XADS is also working on a bazooka allowing a laser to be projected more than 100 meters to electrocute entire crowds. And these are only a few of the "derivative" products that Taser's success has generated.
November 30, 2004.Amnesty International and deaths due to the action of Tasers
http://web.amnesty.org/library/index/fraamr200022004
In English, an article on the BBC, today:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4053221.stm
January 4, 2004:
The Era of the "Non-Lethal"
The company Taser presents the invention as a great step forward insofar as such weapons, "non-lethal" or, let us say, "barely lethal," can replace the systems for prohibiting approach and crossing that are anti-personnel mines. A little further on, in red, it explains how this new type of "non-lethal" mine will present itself: in a very visible manner, to dissuade individuals. Who will believe that? If these mines are "clearly visible," then to protect oneself it would suffice to advance through a minefield with a special garment or a simple plexiglass shield, on which the needles of these projectiles connected to high-voltage wires would break. It is indicated that these mines would be triggered by sensors. If they are thermal sensors, what could be easier to "clear a passage" than to use thermal decoys, already used by aircraft to decoy missiles. The same goes for movement or any other triggering system for these mines.
The solution that will ultimately be adopted will be simply to warn intruders with a simple sign: "no entry, area protected by tasers." In the literal sense of the term "touch it and it stings." The systems will then be totally camouflaged, in the most varied, most innocuous objects. The taser projectile can be the size of a 5 mm diameter cartridge, be housed in walls, in ... tree branches, in ... anything. Since these systems are not handguns, the problem of the generator's weight no longer arises. One could imagine buildings designed from the outset with integrated Taser protection, the cartridges (rechargeable systems) being connected to a single high-voltage generator.
Beyond the Taser, the novelty .. on a planetary scale is the development of the "non-lethal." The Taser represents only the very beginning of these techniques, inspired by UFO testimonies. Men can be neutralized with microwave brushes modulated at low frequency. These frequencies can be adapted to bring about an appropriate "encephalic response," ranging from unconsciousness to paralysis, from pain to death. These systems will moreover be inexpensive. they are instruments of torture completely trivialized, very effective instruments of coercion:
- If you step out of line ....
The Taser leaves only two tiny pinpricks as a trace. Who would go and file a complaint saying "I was electrocuted, look....". A judge would reply "you show me mosquito bites and you try to make me believe that you were odiously assaulted?". Microwave weapons will leave no visible trace, except, possibly, much more damaging internal traces.
*- Do you want us to turn you into a vegetable, a chronic depressive, an aboulique, an insomniac, a man who suffers from headaches"? Do you want to die in five years from a brain tumor? *
All these techniques are already perfectly refined. Soon, to deal with demonstrators, more helmeted CRS will be sent, armed with shields and batons. This crowd will be hosed down with a microwave weapon and all these people, having become unconscious for a more or less long time, will let themselves be gently handcuffed and taken away. Vehicles equipped with emitting antennas already exist. These can moreover be placed in... unmarked vehicles. Thus people will collapse without even knowing what is happening to them or where it comes from.
Keep in mind that with these modern tools one will be able to arouse in the brain ... anything. Unbearable pain, for example. Let us imagine that these acts leave after-effects. How will one be able to prove anything. Which court will receive a complaint, devoid of the slightest physical trace, linked to an attack by microwave beam?
I am sometimes dismayed to see concretely come true what I foresaw ten or twenty years earlier. It is the hallmark of the scientist who sometimes plays the role of Cassandra. These weapons are making their appearance. We must then say what they lead to. Formerly it was said that there were two kinds of individuals, depending on which side they were on in relation to the rifle, the barrel of the revolver. Soon it will be said "which side of the microwave weapon are you on. In the ranks of those who use it or among those who suffer it?"
Technology is in the process of overturning our lives to a degree that few people imagine. And now, here is the text:
TASER, GENERAL DYNAMICS and SENTECH embark on the elimination of deadly Anti-personnel Mines.
The Pentagon has awarded a contract to accelerate the development of a non-lethal anti-personnel mine that stops, but does not endanger the life of, intruders. Such a mine can be used to secure the perimeter around an ammunition depot or a military base, and protects potential terrorist targets, such as nuclear power plant equipment. Taser international, which possesses the most reliable non-lethal technology and which had launched a plan to develop non-lethal anti-personnel mines using EMD (electro-muscular disruption) technology to immobilize a person in order to replace deadly explosives, has just signed an agreement with General Dynamics and Sentech in order to complete and accelerate the development of these new weapons.
This important step is a great success for the teams of Taser, General Dynamics, and Sentech (a manufacturer of optical sensors) who have been working together on this project for 18 months. With the support of the Pentagon a decisive stage of final development and future production is being put in place.
Conventional, buried mines can kill and maim civilians long after a conflict is over. Estimates from "Land Mines Actions" are 20,000 dead and wounded each year. Approximately half die and half remain crippled.
As early as 1997 at the Ottawa convention the United Nations banned buried anti-personnel mines. The United States had announced that they would sign the agreement if an acceptable alternative was found.
The TAPM (Taser Anti-PERSONNEL Munition) is an acceptable non-lethal replacement for current explosive land mines.
The TAPM is based on the TASER (EMD) technology identical to that embedded in the X26 Tasers, now in service in more than 6,000 police departments worldwide and which receives day by day the support of high independent scientific and ethical authorities such as the Human Effects Center of Excellence (HECOE) which confirms that TASER technology is generally safe and effective.
A TAPM is round in shape, 10.2 cm in circumference and 7.5 cm thick.**Intended to deter intruders, it is painted in a bright color so as to be incontestably seen and placed obviously on the surface of the ground (instead of being buried)**Like the Taser pistol, each TAPM will contain several cartridges, oriented in different directions with angles of 90°. Inside each cartridge there will be two probes. The motion sensors on each TAPM can detect movement up to 8 meters away and trigger the device. On firing, compressed nitrogen fires the probes up to 8 meters away, at a speed of 55m/s. The probes are connected by an insulated wire to the TAPM. When the probes come into contact with clothing or directly on the body an electronic exchange immobilizes the person for 5 seconds. Our body communicates by sending electrical signals from the brain to the muscles through cells of a particular type called neurotransmitters. When the muscle receives the signal it contracts entirely. The TAPM disrupts this communication by producing with an electronic signal of very low amperage: (2 milliamperes with no danger to the body.)A more powerful muscle contraction effect.
Pr. Robert BUNKER, former member of the National Security Studies Program at the University of San Bernardino, California, expert on the influence of new technologies and currently advisor for the Maintenance of National Order Technologies Corrections Center, states that combat is changing and movements in urban areas require the presence of non-lethal weapons to protect non-combatants.
Contact: TASER France 55, Av Marceau 75116 PARIS
Tel 01 46 94 67 85 fax: 01 56 89 26 27
E-mail: info@taserfrance.com
January 13, 2005:A letter from the representative of the Taser company for France:
Hello,
I am Antoine di ZAZZO, General Manager of Taser France.
I read what you publish about the Taser (I have also read your books).
The Taser was created to be an intermediate step toward the ultimate reduction of death. The concept will prevail because, as Sun Tzu stated in "The Art of War" in 440 BC, "To subdue an enemy without fighting is the rule of the art." In this philosophy, the Taser is a step.
Regarding anti-personnel mines; The USA had not signed the OTTAWA agreements because of the void that this removal would leave and, from their point of view, this was not acceptable. Taser, General Dynamic, and Sentech have therefore filled this gap by offering an alternative solution that should allow the USA to sign the agreement to eliminate anti-personnel mines. The system is not 100% perfect, but it would still spare 20,000 deaths and people maimed for life each year…
We are very open to any suggestion/prospective (despite appearances, we talk a lot with Amnesty International); we have set up think tanks worldwide, precisely in order to find solutions to the possible deviations that could occur with the TASER. The latest is the integration of a camera and an audio recorder into our products. (cf. attachments).
We have other product announcements that will take place shortly. I am ready to inform you of them in advance in order to get your reaction. Which, given the information you have, seems particularly relevant to me.
Kind regards.
Antoine di ZAZZO
My reaction to this letter: Since 2002, ten people have died in Canada following the 50,000-volt impulse delivered by a Taser
May 25, 2005:Electromagnetic pistols are already being issued to the French police.
During a recent police operation, gypsies considered dangerous were neutralized by "electromagnetic pistols." The news goes completely unnoticed in this article from Le Nouvel Observateur:
http://permanent.nouvelobs.com/societe/20050525.OBS7749.html
but this one indicates that these gadgets, potentially lethal and which can become instruments of torture, are now being issued to our police forces.
Simple information.
June 6, 2005.Arrest of a young woman of 22 in the United States for a simple speeding violation.
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/content/news/video/taser_video3a.html (archive of 05/19/2012)
Go through all the videos in order. A woman, having committed a speeding violation, parks along the street. The officer first carries out registration checks. He asks the woman not to leave her vehicle. Then he orders her to get out, after having opened the door. He immediately tries to grab her and pull her outside. Frightened, she pulls away and refuses to comply, saying "don't touch me." The officer then draws his weapon and points it at her, saying:
- If you don't get out I'm going to "taze you". I'm not going to repeat that.
And, very quickly, without there being any threat whatsoever, he fires. The woman (of color), hit by the needles delivering 50,000 volts, starts screaming and falls from her seat onto the ground. The officer, shouting, tells her to put her hands behind her back so he can handcuff her. She screams in pain. The officer is completely beside himself:
- Put you hands behind your back or I'm going to taze you again. Do it now! - I can't - Put you hands behind your back or I'm going to taze you again.
He then sends her a second discharge while she is lying on the ground.
These scenes could become very commonplace in the months or years to come, all over the world. The American authorities estimated that the officer had reacted correctly (let us specify that the Taser is already issued to the French police).
What is striking in such a scene is that the police officers, apparently, did not stop the vehicle of a woman driving like a madwoman, drugged or armed. They do not shoot at a person who threatens them or who has aggressive behavior, but at a woman who, having committed a speeding violation and whose vehicle is stopped, simply refuses to comply in the very second after an officer has put his hand on her. The 22-year-old driver is apparently simply afraid. Note the speed of the reaction of the man "of the forces of order," behavior that could in the future become a standard. The Taser then becomes a simple instrument of authority, even an expression of useless, sadistic violence, completely disproportionate in the hands of an officer who is obviously completely bad-tempered. Also note the complete indifference of his deputy.
September 15, 2005:
The death of a Nova Scotian rekindles the debate on the Taser stun gun
In Nova Scotia, the death of a man from the Digby region adds even more weight to the arguments of people demanding the withdrawal of Taser guns. This paralyzing weapon is used by police forces to subdue suspects. Paul Sheldon Saulnier, 42, died Friday evening after police officers used cayenne pepper as well as a Taser to prevent him from escaping from the police station where he had recently been detained. An investigation is underway. The three Royal Canadian Mounted Police officers present during the drama have been suspended pending the investigators' conclusions.
In Canada, since the beginning of July, three deaths have been reported in similar circumstances, in British Columbia, Ontario and Nova Scotia. More than 110 Taser-related deaths have occurred in North America over the past three years.
The Taser is an electric gun that fires two small barbs between which a 50,000-volt current flows. The discharge lasts five seconds.
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police station in Digby
The manufacturer of the Taser, an American company based in Arizona, denies any causal relationship between these deaths and its gun. This reaction is hardly surprising, because the Taser represents *a market worth several billion dollars.*Amnesty International opposes the use of the Taser,which according to it serves as an instrument of torture in a certain number of countries. The organization is calling for the withdrawal of this weapon until the unveiling, in August, of the results of the study commissioned by the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police. Amnesty International fears, however, that this study will merely recycle old data
September 20, 2005
Sarkozy intends to distribute the Taser widely, a non-lethal paralyzing gun
PARIS (AFP) - Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy, who will attend a demonstration of the Taser X 26 in Paris on Tuesday, wants to distribute widely to the forces of order this non-lethal paralyzing gun, which subdues the person hit by removing all control of their muscles with an electric discharge. Several units (GIPN, GIGN, Raid, Bac) have already received "a few hundred" Tasers. In 2007, the ministry plans to deliver about 3,000 of them, particularly to the Anti-Criminality Brigades (Bac), like the one Mr. Sarkozy is visiting.
"In the long term, we would like there to be a Taser in every intervention vehicle," notes the ministry. That would represent several tens of thousands of guns at a cost, according to the manufacturer, of a thousand euros each. A European call for tenders is soon to be launched for this gun, whose American manufacturer is in a situation of near-monopoly.
According to the manufacturer, this weapon has made it possible, where it is used, to reduce injuries to suspects by 67% and those to police officers by 82%. Whereas a shot with a conventional weapon hits the mark six times out of ten, the Taser, used by about fifty police forces, reaches its target almost certainly (94.7%) thanks to its laser sighting system. "The Taser makes it possible to subdue violent and armed individuals without using a lethal weapon. It lowers the general level of violence. Today, to subdue a drunk guy who has just beaten his wife, you have to go in with your bare hands," explains a police official. In sensitive housing estates, the Taser "will allow officers to stop losing face, by having a means of making themselves obeyed," adds a police officer.
Effective up to 6.50 meters, the Taser sends two darts at the suspect, administering a 50,000-volt discharge that acts on his nervous system and tetanizes him for a few seconds. He then suffers no side effects, it is assured. According to the Interior Ministry, the risk is a heavy fall, hence the precautions to be taken by users who will receive specific training. It is a matter of ensuring that the target is not above a building or a staircase. The red beam of the laser and the noise of its electric arc are also dissuasive, it is noted. For the union of commissioners and senior officials of the national police (SCHFPN), the Taser is an "anti-paperwork weapon." But several human rights organizations have expressed reservations, such as Amnesty International, which has called for an independent study on its effects. The use of the paralyzing gun by Miami police officers against children or by soldiers during interrogations at Abu Ghraib (Iraq) has sparked controversy in the United States.
But, according to the Interior Ministry, such slip-ups are to be excluded in France because it will "not be possible to use it without leaving a trace." The Tasers of the French police are equipped with a "black box": each use (date, time, duration of the discharge) is recorded in the device.
A micro-camera and an audio recording system are triggered as soon as the pistol is used. The images, like those from the on-board cameras tested for several months in BAC vehicles, will be used in the event of an accusation of police misconduct. After the flashball (firing rubber bullets), the Taser is another of these non-lethal pieces of equipment with which the French police intends to equip itself, and which is also considering a device to immobilize a vehicle.
Sixty Tasers, but also twenty on-board cameras, will be delivered at the end of 2005 to the gendarmerie units operating in peri-urban areas, according to the Directorate of the Gendarmerie in Paris.
September 22, 2005
Taser test for qualification in France.
Source: http://www.prefecture-police-paris.interieur.gouv.fr/documentation/dossiers/bacncs2005.pdf
It is forgotten to mention that the "uncontrollable muscle contractions" are atrociously painful and last several seconds. What a temptation for sadists to exercise their fantasies with impunity. Moreover, the object currently being subject to no regulation, the crooks will also equip themselves with it. We see France simply evolving like the United States, practicing a supposedly deterrent brutality. The only alternative would be social justice and respect for the established power. Yet neither the one nor the other is developing in our country, as in the rest of the world. One has the impression of running toward a world that is a mixture of "Soylent Green" and "Matrix".
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