All
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righty, guys. Welcome back to the
channel. For today, I wanted to do a
video kind of analyzing when to use a
taser against a person who is armed with
a knife. This is going to be a little
bit of a longer video, but it's going to
have a lot of examples, a lot of video
examples and analysis, and it's going to
be a very This video is meant to be
educational, not just to officers, but
also to the public. Because we always
see these incidents where somebody has a
knife. And there's a large contingent of
people in the public saying, "Why didn't
they just tase him? Why didn't they just
shoot him in the leg? Why didn't they
shoot the knife out of his hand? Why
didn't they have magical unicorns come
down from the sky and remove the knife
from this guy's hand and save his life?
Those are a lot of the comments that we
see on these types of incidents. Today,
we're going to be focused solely on when
to use a taser against a person that is
armed with a knife. And and I should be
a little bit more careful with my words
here because it's not really when should
you use a taser against a person armed
with a knife. It's really when can you
use a taser against a person armed with
a knife. Uh this topic came about
because the other day I had a a buddy of
mine who's not a a law enforcement
officer ask me about this very topic.
And here is exactly what I sent him.
Well, not this post, but the graphic
behind me. You'll see. Um these are the
rules that I was taught when I worked
for Columbus police on when I can use a
taser against a person armed with a
knife. These are guidelines. So, if
you've got someone that's armed with a
knife and you're trying desperately to
save that person's life, because
preservation of life is something that
we as police officers should be focused
on as often as possible. Uh, this is a
five-prong test that we were taught to
use when we're thinking about using a
taser against a person who is armed with
a knife. Uh, it says you have to have
appropriate time, distance, barrier,
lethal force backup, and it must be
reasonable. Uh, what does this mean? And
does it mean the funny thing is when I I
I I replied to him with this and then I
posted it on my social media accounts
and I had so many people calling me an
idiot saying I need to go back to
training. Where where is this being
taught? And I also heard people saying,
you know, this is why police officers
are soft these days because they think
that they should tase someone that's
using a deadly weapon against them. And
then I would get a bunch of what if
scenarios. What if he's wearing a baggy
coat? What if he's running at you? What
if he's about to stab somebody? Listen,
this list means that all of your
whatifs, if one of those whatifs is
present, you don't do it. If they're
about to stab someone, that means you
don't have time. If they're running at
you, you don't have distance. If they're
close to you, you don't have a barrier.
Although the other people saying, you
know, um, I'm not going to trust my life
with a taser because a taser fails 50%
of the time, which isn't true. But we're
going to leave that one alone for now,
too. That's why you have lethal force
backup. You're only going to use a taser
against an armed person when you've got
one, two, three, four, five other guys
that have lethal force backup. They're
pointing a gun at that individual. The
individual is standing there. They're
not charging at you. And you have the
opportunity to maybe preserve their
life. So, you're going to attempt to use
a taser to end this situation. And also,
it's reasonable. Is it reasonable to
believe a taser is going to peacefully
resolve this situation? If somebody is
actively stabbing somebody, it's not
reasonable to try to use a taser against
them. If they're actively trying to stab
you, it is not reasonable to try to tase
that person. Uh if there's 10, 15 feet
in between you guys and the guy takes an
aggressive posture with a knife, it's
not reasonable to try to tase that
person. There's a billion other times
where we know a taser is not
appropriate. But if you're in a
situation you think taser might be
appropriate, let's run through this
test. Say, you know what? I think we've
got all the prongs. Let's try to use a
taser in this situation. It's not a
thing that says your first response
should always be to use a taser. Your
first response when you got someone
that's armed with a knife should be to
go with lethal force. Regardless of all
that, I've got a bunch of examples that
I want to show you. And this is kind of
what I replied to people with. Uh the
first one is a very good example. I'm
going to put a screenshot up behind me.
I'm going to put it up on my my screen
in front of me. Uh the first example.
Okay, so these people that say everybody
armed with a knife needs to be shot by
the police. It's an absolutely
ridiculous thing to say, but people did
say it on my Facebook and
Instagram. Here's the scenario. Uh you
got a a person who I don't I want to use
I don't want to use the buzzwords that
will get me nixed from from YouTube, but
you got a person that has a knife and
they want to hurt someone and the only
person they're trying to hurt is
themselves. uh they're in you, you know,
you respond to that home. You find them
in a room um along the back wall of this
house. They've got this knife and
they're threatening threatening to harm
the only person in the room, which is
them. The people that think, "Oh, you
just need to shoot every person that's
armed with a knife. What are you going
to do? You just going to show up and
shoot the guy because he's got a knife
and he's having a bad day and he's
depressed and all these other things."
No. No. You want to try to preserve that
person's life. So this situate, this is
one of my favorite examples of it that's
currently on my channel. This is
Columbus police officers. I think this
incident was in 2021. They responded to
a very similar scenario. Uh I don't want
to break down the whole thing before it
happens. So let's watch the video. I'll
be back. We're going to talk about what
happened.
Go down these stairs. Go down the stairs
for me, please. Huh?
Drop that knife for me, brother. Don't
shoot me. Please don't shoot. Please
don't shoot. Don't shoot me. No, I don't
want to. I want to get you some help,
man. Please don't shoot him. He's He's
not a harm to anybody. Don't Don't do
that, brother. Don't Don't Don't
Stop. Stop. Shoot him. Put it down.
Please don't shoot him. That's the last
thing we want to do. Okay. But we're not
going to get hurt because he's hurt. You
guys are trying to hurt. Hi, brother.
Put him down, man. I got one. I got one.
I'm going to live here. Okay. I'm going
to live. Okay. Well, that's not going to
do any good. You have your taser? Yeah,
I do. Okay. Don't tag me neither.
Don't tag me, dude. We don't want to tag
you. We don't want to do anything to
you. All right. All we want you to do is
drop the knife. Okay. Don't go in there
with him yet. Okay.
We don't want you to hurt yourself, man.
We want to get you some help.
Put the light in his eyes. Never see us.
There you go.
I can't see you. Put the kn Put it down,
man. I can't see. I cannot see. Huh? I
can't see.
over there. All right, I got him. I got
his hands. Okay, I got him. So, they
responded to a call about a person with
a knife that wanted to hurt the only
person in the room, which was him. Uh,
what they found when they arrived. Did
they have appropriate time, distance,
barrier, lethal force, backup, and did
it appear to be reasonable? Yes. All of
the prongs were met. You'll notice that
the first officer that arrived on scene,
what did he present to the subject?
Lethal force. Because he was the only
person there. When another officer
arrived, the the first officer said,
"Hey, I'm going to put my gun away. I'm
going to get my taser. Let's blind the
guy. Get a little closer so the taser
will work and we'll pop him." They had
plenty of stuff in between them. They
thought that they had time. They had
lethal force
backup. They ended up saving the guy's
life. 100% appropriate time to use a
taser against a person that is armed
with a knife. Let's look at the next
scenario. And I I will say also in this
video, I'm going to have multiple
scenarios where it was appropriate to
use a taser against that person who was
armed with a knife. I'm also going to
have a couple of instances where it was
not appropriate and the officers did the
right thing and they use lethal force.
Uh this particular one, this is another
good one. says officers were dispatched
to a call about an elderly man walking
down the street, appeared to be high and
out of his mind, had a knife in his
hand, and was acting threatening towards
people. The officers arrived on scene.
The officer that you're going to watch
from his perspective, he's got his gun
on the guy. The guy is closing the
distance. He's got his gun. The the
officer is actually going to start
trying to back up, use a barrier, get
some distance, use that time to his
advantage, giving this guy loud verbal
commands to drop the knife. The guy's
not cooperating, but there's a second
officer on scene. The driver of that
cruiser realizes that he's got
appropriate time, distance, barrier.
It's reasonable. He uses his taser
against this guy. You don't need to
shoot everybody that's got a knife
that's closing within that 20 foot rule
uh that a lot of people believe. This is
a time where it's 100% appropriate
because look at the situation that
they're in. I I'm sorry I spoiled the
inning for you, but let's watch the
video now.
Hey, partner. Drop the knife. Drop the
knife. Put the knife down. Drop the
knife.
Put the knife down.
Put the knife down. Drop it. Drop it.
Drop the knife.
Drop the knife.
Roll over. Roll over. Get on your back.
84 84.
All righty. This one is one of my
favorite videos I've ever posted to the
channel. And it's a shame that it
doesn't have a million views, but this
is a situation where officers responded
to a call about a man who was armed with
a knife. He was threatening to harm
himself and he had climbed up on the
bumper of a fire engine that was driving
down the road. Fire engine is driving
down the road. He gets in front of it.
They stop. He jumps up there. He's
trying to get them to hurt him. He
starts taking all the hoses off the the
fire truck and all the other stuff.
Officers arrive on scene. Here's how
they responded.
Hey guys, I'm going to probably have to
tase him, but he's going to follow a
little bit. So, we're going to have to
get ready to catch him right after. So
guys, get some people ready to get ready
to catch him. Hey, I'm going to have to
tase you if you don't drop the
knife. Don't do it. Taser. Taser. Taser.
Help him. Help him. Help him. Help him.
Help him.
Cuff him. Go ahead and cuff him. You got
him. He'll get you. Again, they had all
the prongs. They might not have had a
barrier, but this is kind of an elderly
guy. he was in an elevated position. The
elevated position kind of acted as a
barrier because it was going to take him
a moment to get down off of there and
and get to them. They they felt that
they confidently had the opportunity to
defend themselves if he were to become
violent and attack them. They were good
to go. Another interesting thing about
this video is, you know, one of the
things that we're taught when we're
being taser trained is don't tase
someone that's at an elevated position.
uh they felt that even under these
circumstances, you know, uh the risk of
tasing him was less severe than having
to shoot him or use some other kind of
use of force. So, they did use a taser
against a person that was in an elevated
position. But what did they do? They
warned their buddies and they all ran in
and they literally caught the guy and
guided him down to the ground. Uh
textbook, perfect. This is what um
well-trained officers are going to do.
Uh, here's another situation where you
got a guy, he's in a kitchen, he's got a
knife, he's holding it to himself. He's
threatening nobody but himself.
Um, this is how these officers treat the
situation. Put it down or I'm going to
tase you. Put it down. Put it down.
Taser. Taser. Taser.
I'm going to double double shot. Taser.
Put it down. Taser. Taser. Taser.
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Go, go, get him. Get
go. Get out.
I got it.
Grab arm. Grab arms. Grab arm. All
right, that was another great example
because we actually had a taser failure
in this particular video. The reason
there was a taser failure in this this
particular incident is because the guy's
crouched down. Uh, when you fire a
taser, the top probe is actually going
to go straight. The bottom probe
actually goes at a downward angle. Uh
because this guy was crouched down, I
think the bottom probe went between his
legs or something like that. So, they
had to re-engage with a taser. And I
also believe that there were on the
second approach, there was actually two
officers that popped their tasers. It's
a little bit hard to tell there, but
this guy was down kind of a long
corridor. They were outside of the room.
They had a barrier. They could they
could get some space if he were to come
out there. They had lethal force backup.
you know, this this seemed appropriate.
This is not a guy that's charging at
them with a knife. He's not an immediate
danger to them. They they saved his
life. They preserved his life. This is
what we want our officers to do. Um, now
we're going to move into cases where uh
use of a taser was not appropriate or a
taser was not used. And you know, it's
very clear why because the the five
prongs of that test that I've showed you
before, and I'll probably show it up to
you here again, were not met. Uh this
this video is the Micaia Bryant
incident. This is where an officer
responds to a call about a fight. When
he gets there, um all hell is broken
loose and the first thing he sees is one
girl about to stab another girl. Does he
have the five prongs? Does he have time,
distance, barrier, lethal force, backup,
and is it reasonable? No, he doesn't.
Uh, this is not an appropriate time to
use a taser. So, unfortunately, he has
to use lethal force in this situation.
Hey, hey, hey. Get down. Get down. Get
down. Get down.
No. You want to shoot my [ __ ] baby?
Another situation where uh the taser was
not the appropriate way to use force
against an individual. Uh, this is an
individual who was out on I'm going to
call this like a country road. Uh the
officers responded because he was out
there walking along the road acting
strange and the officer arrives. Um he
clearly uh was going to force the
officer to harm him. Uh that was his
intent with what was going on here. I
don't know if he was high, if he's just
mentally ill. This is a very unfortunate
situation, but he's armed with a glass
bottle. Glass bottle is a dangerous
deadly object. Uh the officer did
everything he could. Um, I'm not going
to show you the whole video because
that's not the point of this one, but he
tried to negotiate with this guy for, I
think, 6 or 8 minutes. It took a really
long time for more officers to arrive on
scene. He did everything he could to
preserve this guy's life. Unfortunately,
uh, his time, distance, and barrier were
eliminated, causing him to fire his
service weapon. It would have been great
if he could have tased this guy, but if
he tried to tase this guy and the taser
failed, you now have a guy that's armed
with a glass bottle who's on top of you
causing serious physical harm. That's
not what officers that's that's not why
officers exist. He did what he had to do
in order to um protect himself in this
situation.
Highend road. Hey, stop. Don't do
it. Do not do it. Okay. Okay. One more.
Stop. Get
back. Shots fired. Shots fired.
Suspect's down. And then this is going
to be the last example of the day. This
is an example where initially the
officers thought that they had time,
distance, barrier, lethal force backup,
and it was reasonable. Uh this is a case
where there was a guy, this is a um it's
like a housing community for people with
mental illness. They responded because
he was causing some kind of scene. I I'm
not sure if they knew at the time that
he had armed himself with a knife or
not, but first officer arrives on scene.
Uh guy comes running at him with a
knife. The officer starts to back up
trying to find some cover. Draws his
firearm on the suspect. Uh second
officer arrives on scene. He's got good
cover. He's got lethal force uh
presented to the suspect. He tells the
other officer, "Hey, get your taser.
Tase him. Tase him. Tase him. Tase him."
Uh the the officer that attempted to
tase him, this was a brand new taser uh
that was rolled out to the department
literally days before this happened. It
operates kind of different than the way
the uh the tasers that we used to use.
Uh he was fussing with the taser. The
guys started to very quickly close the
distance and they lost their time
distance barrier.
Um they lost their time, distance and
barrier. They still had lethal force
backup and unfortunately the reasonable
use of force became deadly force in this
scenario.
[Applause]
He's got a knife in his
hand. Drop the knife.
Back up. Back up. Back up.
So, there you have the full explanation
from from my training on when you can
use a taser against a person that is
armed with a knife. Is this a you shall
use a taser against a person that's
armed with a knife? Absolutely not. If
if you arrive on scene and you think in
your mind, in the situation, the way you
see it, that deadly force is the
appropriate thing to do and the person
is armed with a knife and you use deadly
force, that's between you and the court
system to figure out. Uh, a lot of the
time the courts are going to probably
side with you because it's it's you and
your seat and the way you felt, the way
that you felt threatened. Um, I would
also say the way the courts are going, I
would encourage guys that when you start
arriving on these scenes and it's not a
highpace, fast, quickly evolving
situation, if you've got the time, just
stop and think for a moment, hey, is it
possible that we can preserve life here?
Um, is it possible that maybe we can
safely end this situation by using a
taser? If you arrive on scene and you
don't have any time, first of all, you
don't have any time. you have to use the
your first reaction should always be
using deadly force against the deadly
force instrument. But if you got the
time, start to think about your options.
Um, if you got the five-prong test, you
know, it might be appropriate to use a
taser. And also, the way, you know, uh,
the court systems are going and officer
indictments and trials and and all that
other kind of stuff is something that
you should probably really have on your
mind. Um, because it's not worth the
repercussions of having a bad call. I
know that's that's my perspective on it.
You can do what you want. It's your
life. Uh you're rolling the dice with
the court system. But those are my
thoughts. So that's it for me today,
guys. Thank you for watching. I'll talk
to you soon.
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