Should Campus Security even be allowed to carry tasers??

Since this recent event happened where, i believe his name is mike, got tasered, i've searched through youtube about college taserings, and there's quite a bit, in which many believe to be use of excessive force.

so a question the the ATS community....

should campus security even be allowed to carry tasers?

Absolutely. I'm not sure whether you're talking about the UCLA guy or the Florida guy, but both were completely out of control and deserved to get tased.
Tasers are a humane way to control people who are totally out of control.

I agree. Pepper spray is not good enough for a security guard that could be overpowered by some big campus thug.

Granted you would probably run into the one off cases where the guard gets overzealous with his taser and lets some drunk 20 year old have it.

But in the whole scheme of things, I think that it would be most valuable to empower the secutiry with a deterrant that is effective 99.9% of the time.

Campus police face the same dangers on the job as municipal police, but perhaps on a smaller scale.

Often, the departments must work together when perps cross jurisdictional boundaries.

When we have Columbine and Virginia Tech like incidents, it's not unreasonable that campus police must be armed with whatever weapons help to maintain law and order.

It's a shame it's come to this, especially like here where Albuquerque Public Schools has its own armed police force.

[edit on 2007/9/27 by GradyPhilpott]

As previously mentioned, Campus Security often have to deal with many of the same issues that regular police forces must contend with. Whether we want to face the truth or not, crime does exist on College and University campus'.

Often, Campus Security officers are graduates of Police Academies. For the most part, these officers are considered to be regular law enforcement officers with many of the same legal powers as police. The only thing that is different is that Campus Security have a smaller area of jurisdiction.

Of course, some Campus Security officers are nothing more than glorified security guards. Regardless, these officers require some protection other than their badges and flashlights! It might be pepper spray or tasers. Either way, these men and women do need to be armed with something.

Because Campus Security officers might night have the same training or experience as regular police, it is only prudent to supply these men and women with tasers. Yes, tasering someone isn't the most pleasant thing to do or, conversely, experience, but at least it's not deadly force.

You guys are confusing alot of things:

1) Most colleges and universities and even some public school districts now have full service police departments (sometimes also called public safety departments). The days of the simple security guard are long over, the 1960s proved that the simple security guard was useless.

For example, SUNY Stony Brook Police Department has about 70 sworn officers; they have their own SWAT team, detectives, K9 unit, bicycle unit, etc.

2) Not all of them carry guns due to various reasons; the most common is that the college/university administrators are living in la la land and think nothing will ever happen at their college/university.

Ex. most private colleges and universities in NY (St. Johns, Cornell, Dowling, Long Island University/CW Post, Brooklyn Polytech, etc) have unarmed public safety departments while the state run State University of New York (SUNY) colleges and universities has been an armed full service police department since the late 1990s although some like SUNY Geneseo, SUNY Fashion Institute and NY's 30ish community colleges have so far resisted efforts to arm their forces.


I personally believe its time to get out of the la la land mentality an arm all school, college and university police/public safety/security officers.

[edit on 27-9-2007 by ChrisF231]

Originally posted by ChrisF231
I personally believe its time to get out of the la la land mentality an arm all school, college and university police/public safety/security officers.

I think it's time we got out of la la land and started disciplining kids so that police departments on campus would be as absurd a concept as it was in my youth.

reply to post by GradyPhilpott

If someone commits a violation of the penal code then let the law handle it. Slapping your kid or sending them to their room is one thing but beating them half to death is another. The prison inmates LOVE to meet people who abuse defenseless kids under the guise of "discipline", that is if the cops dont give them a little nudge next to an staircase first.

Forgive me for being a bit harsh but whenever someone talks of disciplining kids the Puritan punishment system comes to mind.

as though you may think tasers are non-lethal...

you can do searches to find that they could in fact kill a person...

i believe there needs to be a change of who can carry a taser when it comes to campus security because it seems like they'll taser anyone for just anything.

i.e. just for disobeying an order...

i think i've heard that before only the supervisor, or the head of the force was able to carry and use the taser after being called upon if needed.

what do you think?

Yes, that is how it is in my local agency; only first line supervisors (sgts and lts) and SWAT (which we call ESU). I dont think there are any police forces that issue every officer a Taser in the same way they are issued real guns.

If it works fine for us in a major metropolitan area then it should be good enough for the rest of the country.

I feel that it's proper for any person in a security position to carry a taser, provided that it's not simply handed out, that any who carries one needs to complete an indepth instruction course first, and use the taser only as the last resort.

Seems that lately we've heard a lot about police/security etc. carrying tasers who were not first fully trained in their use, who have used the tasers with a hair trigger. I've seen on the news several instances of where the police/security has a suspect standing there in front of them a few feet away, the suspect was seen and heard on the videos simply standing there, not resisting arrest or anything resembling that. In one instance, Police gave an order and when the suspect didn't immediately react (within like 2 seconds) by dropping to the ground, he was tasered with no warning given. I see this as excessive use of a taser. Am thinking this isn't what the taser was supposed to be used for. Of course if the police/security was outnumbered by a mob and in danger of being taken down themselves, then I could understand the use of a taser.

It just seems to me that most of what we've seen and heard about on the news has involved the use of a taser when it was not appropriate in the first place. And this, I believe, is wrong. Putting the one who used the taser wrongly on 'paid administrative leave' for doing so, is nothing but a slap on the hand too. That's another term for *vacation*. Am thinking that if a taser is used with a hair trigger, instead of what it was meant for -- a last resort -- in physical danger, then that person should not be allowed to carry a taser again. At least not until a full instruction course in its use is taken and sworn to uphold.

NOMW

[edit on 10/4/2007 by NotOnMyWatch]