7 ms·

Why are we injecting people during arrests, which by definition are not yet guilty people? Even if nobody had died, this is absurd.

by axaxs 6y ago

burfog 6y ago
Feel free to propose a method, and we'll all object to that. Stopping an uncooperative person is guaranteed to be upsetting to somebody. That is fundamental to the problem. Every method tried so far has been objected to by squeamish people who refuse to understand. If we let criminals run amok, then we get a failed state, and then armed gangs form to impose their own idea of a justice system. I assure you, those armed gangs will be far more brutal than our fancy westernized police system. So we medicalized the problem. That appeases more people than the cheap standardized billy club. We'll just ignore the needle-stick biohazard problem, because at least it won't look like a replay of Rodney King.
- anon9001 6y ago
  I agree that all restraint methods are upsetting, but "inject with dissociative drugs" should really be a lot further down the list than "hit with stick". Personally, I favor hitting people with billy clubs, because it leaves evidence of what happened and it requires the police to actually take physical action against another human. Giving cops needles full of magic compliance juice seems less responsible to me. The reason people were upset about Rodney King was because it was brutal and easy to understand. Injecting ketamine is also brutal but it's less visible. I cannot imagine anyone ever getting over the fact that they were restrained by authorities and injected into a k-hole. They won't be visibly harmed in any way, but that will absolutely mess someone up for life.
  - mr_spothawk 6y ago
    > Personally, I favor hitting people with billy clubs, because it leaves evidence of what happened You make a decent argument.
  - collyw 6y ago
    If I was being restrained, I would far rather be given a hit of ketamine than a hit of a bat. (From people that seem to know a bit about restraint techniques Joe Rogan and Jocko Willink discussed the use of choke holds on Joe's podacst. They both agreed that it was far better than a smack with a baton. https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=8&v=iUhdc1GAddk&feature=emb_logo https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=8&v=iUhdc1GAddk&...).
    - wonderwonder 6y ago
      I guess the argument against this is how many people in the US have died from being struck by a police club vs from a police chokehold. I cant recall a single instance of death by police bat.
  - caskethopper 6y ago
    From the article, it sounds like it is on a completely different list altogether. "Most states and agencies say ketamine may be administered when someone exhibits “excited delirium” or agitation, which is typically associated with chronic drug abuse, mental illness or both." In that scenario, the police would be beating the culprit into compliance and we would all be looking at videos on youtube shaking our heads. I'm not saying cops should be carrying hypodermics in their utility belt, but how many non-lethal options do you remove before you have to accept more lethal outcomes?
    - NotSammyHagar 6y ago
      This is yet another scenario where the US can't seem to avoid violent actions when arresting people and other countries don't seem to have this problem. So what's going on here? I can only see it as another case where violent actions are significantly increased by police behavior.
      - Igelau 6y ago
        > other countries don't seem to have this problem It would help to be more specific about which other countries and when. There are a lot of reasons why things happen in one place and not another.
  - JohnBooty 6y ago
    Personally, I favor hitting people with billy clubs, because it leaves evidence of what happened and it requires the police to actually take physical action against another human Like you say, there's not really a "good" choice, and I am not defending officers' actions during incidents like the killing (murder, IMO) of Elijah McCain. But those police batons break bones. Also, there's evidence of ketamine sedation: they need to summon paramedics to perform the injection, etc. So, I don't know. I'm sure we at least agree that the answer is to avoid letting things escalate to that point so frequently.
- qppo 6y ago
  yikes. "Not injecting people with a drug without their consent" is not the equivalent of "let criminals run amok." I have trouble reconciling the notion that after someone has been restrained to the point where it is considered safe to inject them with a drug, they find it necessary to inject a drug for the purpose of restraint. It's a bit like placing your knee on the back of someone's neck who is already handcuffed and crying for his mother. Unnecessary, cruel, and dangerous.
- tmp538394722 6y ago
  If you've seen the video footage of Elijah McClain you’d know there was no good reason for it to have been administered.
- zwirbl 6y ago
  So there are only 2 options, violence by armed gangs and violence by state-sponsored armed gangs? What is there to understand when it comes to police brutality? Not that western European police is without faults, but this feels just wrong on many different levels
- musha68k 6y ago
  De-escalation skills can be learned. First class psychological training and counselling could be the norm. One gains a lot of respect by showing wisdom and courage. Most scenarios are essentially communication problems to be solved. Not defaulting to the most violent means of "cooperation" is and should be an option for any police force in a 21st century democracy. Look to the best in the past and in other countries. Successful policing actually needs skin in the game.
  - JohnBooty 6y ago
    What's really sobering is that, in my personal experiences as a middle-class American white man in his 40s, police have always been really good at de-escalating things. I haven't always agreed with them, but they have always cooled things down nicely without resorting to violence or even arrests. Training varies widely by locale, but I believe de-escalation is indeed a nearly universal part of their training. It must also be noted that de-escalation certainly is much easier for the police officers themselves: less hassle, less danger, less paperwork, less repercussions. These people generally just want to get through their shift and get home. They are certainly capable of de-escalation and, in most instances, are trained and motivated to de-escalate. So, it's very telling when (nearly always white) officers leap to unnecessarily violent tactics on (nearly always Black) victims.
    - burfog 6y ago
      All of that is seen through the filter of the media. They have a story that they want to sell. They need to grab eyeballs. They are also political, and so they want to push what helps advance their own political goals, even if it tears the country apart. Specifically, every one of these is subject to selection bias: "nearly always white" "unnecessarily violent tactics" "nearly always Black" You won't see a news report when the tactics are peaceful, when a black cop is involved, or when the supposed victim is non-black. Nobody is going to riot over that, so why report it? It goes unseen by you, so you get the wrong impression about reality. A different sort of bias comes into play with word choice, using "victims" to refer to people who typically are violent criminals being apprehended. The word ought to be "perpetrators", "suspects", or simply "criminals".
- Sir_Substance 6y ago
  If it's ok for us to deal with violent people by: a) gunning them down in the streets b) beating the shit out of them c) injecting them with hilarious overdoses of drugs and crossing our fingers then why would we pay for police? If that's ok, we might as well go back to old west times and just have everyone carry revolvers, possibly calling the town apothecary with his bottle of ether if we think we need it. It'll be way cheaper than maintaining a standing police department. The whole point is that police are supposed to be trained and equipped to handle disturbances without harming the person being detained. There are options for this, including that so rarely used tactic, defusal. Like, we pay police overtime. Cordon the person off, give them space but don't let them leave, wait until they get hungry even if it takes 12 hours, and then bribe them with pizza to come quietly. Build rapport with them over the entire incident. How often do we see that strategy deployed before we fall back to injecting ketamine?
  - nemo44x 6y ago
    Almost every police encounter event ends without incident. There really seems to be an issue right now with selection bias of these events. I agree there is always room to consider other ways of handling outlying incidents. Injecting drugs into people violates so many principles of freedom it seems hard to justify it. The pizza idea could work in some cases but I think we also have to realize that some people being taken into custody are irrational either from mental illness, and/or drug use, could be armed and/or violent, and cordoning them off may work or it may not. And then a potentially armed, violent, and irrational person is a threat to innocent people. The police have many objectives and one of those is to take suspects into custody safely so they can have just administrated. However, the safety of the public might be of higher priority and if asked to make a choice between hurting a suspect that appears irrational and violent so as to not risk the liberties of the public or respecting their liberties but putting the liberties of the public at risk, they’ll choose to optimize for the former. Policing will never be perfect and there is a reasonable amount of error we should tolerate. And there should be accountability. I do agree that it would appear, at least from the stories that tend to make the news, that diffusion could be employed more.
- p0llard 6y ago
  I live in a country where we don't inject people with ketamine on the street, nor do "criminals run amok". We also don't have armed gangs imposing "their own idea of a justice system", and we have fewer police killings in 25 years than the US has in 25 days. I imagine your comment is probably symptomatic of the major societal issues within the US; it certainly worsens the image of the US to those fortunate enough to live in a Western nation which isn't actively regressing.
  - JohnBooty 6y ago
    I live in a country where we don't inject people with ketamine on the street, nor do "criminals run amok". We also don't have armed gangs imposing "their own idea of a justice system", and we have fewer police killings in 25 years than the US has in 25 days. As an American, the parent poster is an unfortunate and common example of the sort of attitude that is common here. It is at least partially the result of America's geographic isolation: most Americans have never been to a place where there is low crime and low police brutality and thus literally cannot even imagine it. I would like to point out the America, one's treatment by police varies greatly. I'm a white man in my 40s have never witnessed police brutality firsthand. In all my interactions with police, they have acted properly and de-escalated things nicely, even when perhaps I didn't agree with them. This is the experience shared by many (most?) Americans who, once again, have trouble imagining experiences other than their own. They imagine that nearly all police are just, and therefore victims of police brutality must have done something to deserve the violence. Essentially, it is the "just world" fallacy writ large. People like to think that the world is just, and therefore like to think that those who experience misfortune have done something to deserve it. It is more pleasant than realizing we live in a country where the police sometimes act in shockingly violent and inappropriate ways. I do know many people who have experienced awful treatment by police. And of course in recent years much light has been shone upon this misconduct.
    - mindslight 6y ago
      > most Americans have never been to a place where there is low crime and low police brutality and thus literally cannot even imagine it. nit: They haven't been to a place where there is low crime, low police brutality, and high population density. To most observers, most of the US is low crime and low police brutality. From this perspective, violent police are a city problem where things are so out of control that the police have no choice but to act that way. (I don't why this is getting downvoted. I'm certainly not condoning the state of affairs, just trying to elaborate on the perspective that keeps supporting the uniformed criminals)
nerdbaggy 6y ago
There are some good uses cases . You arrive on scene and the patient is injured and agitated and lashing out. EMT is having a hard time as well. You need to give them something. Basically Benzos or Ketamine, and Ketamine is much safer and can relieve pain
- ak39 6y ago
  Yes, but drugs should only be administered by suitably trained and educated professionals such as EMT and health care professionals. Not police!
  - i_am_proteus 6y ago
    Many (not all) police departments cross-train police officers as EMTs. The two are not mutually exclusive and, in many ways, complement each other.
    - learc83 6y ago
      Full time EMTs aren’t trained enough to make good decisions about when it’s appropriate to administer ketamine and how much to give. A cop who did some EMT training but doesn’t use the skills full time is going to be even worse.
    - hutzlibu 6y ago
      I am very much against the idea of police using ketamine, but I believe all street officers should be fully trained EMT's as well.
  - xtian 6y ago
    Paramedics were the ones who killed Elijah McClain with ketamine. Putting aside that police shouldn’t be utilizing drugs period, there is zero justification for administering drugs to someone who isn’t a danger to themselves or others, as was the case for McClain. It makes more sense when you realize that the Aurora PD is eighth in the nation for police killings per capita.
  - learc83 6y ago
BurningFrog 6y ago
Police use many kinds of violence when arresting people who don't want to be arrested. That's how it has to be. The "but they're considered innocent" argument proves too much. EDIT: I'm surprised by the heavy downvoting. Do people really think arrests should be voluntary and consensual?
mortehu 6y ago
If you are resisting arrest, you may still be presumed innocent of the original crime. However you're almost certainly guilty of resisting lawful arrest, which is usually a misdemeanor. There's no exemption that allows innocent people to resist lawful arrest. This is not to say that injection sounds like a great solution for everyday arrests.
- kevingadd 6y ago
  Of course, the definition of "lawful arrest" is pretty flexible these days and can seemingly include arrests that are blatantly unlawful, like some cops deciding to assault a random passerby on the street because they don't like the look of them or are unhappy about legal conduct like photography. Is it okay to resist under those circumstances? According to a judge or a police officer, probably not, but at the end of the day you'd probably win the case. If you survive.
  - p0llard 6y ago
    > According to a judge or a police officer, probably not I'd naively hope that a judge wouldn't side with a police officer here, but I think the fact that resisting arrest is inherently criminal is a pretty big flaw in the US legal system. I live in a jurisdiction [1] where resisting arrest is not criminalised in the same sense as the US, and the idea that a police officer could unlawfully arrest you and then immediately have lawful grounds if you resisted is very alien to me. [1] : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resisting_arrest#England_and_Wales https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resisting_arrest#England_and_W...
    - projektfu 6y ago
      Since the '70s it feels like law enforcement (and juries to some extent) are informed by two movies much more than the Constitution and case law: Dirty Harry and Death Wish.
      - non-entity 6y ago
        I saw a interesting clip on TV a while back where they played several clips of various popular police dramas in which the main characters use wildly illegal or unconstitutional tricks to get confessions from criminals. Things like physically assaulting them while contained and. turning off cameras in interrogation rooms to do so. The point it was trying to make was that this "desensitized" people to police violence. Of course, the criminals in the clips were things like child predators, serial killers, etc. so it was all justified.
dutchmartin 6y ago
I have no clue, the first time I read about ketamine was in a article [1] about upcoming partydrugs in The Netherlands. In that article they mention that ketamine is generally used as a anesthetic for horses. But having things done to your body while you cannot decide about that is just horrible and should be banned. [1] https://www.parool.nl/nieuws/ketamine-steeds-populairder-grote-zorgen-om-toenemend-gebruik~bf008761/ https://www.parool.nl/nieuws/ketamine-steeds-populairder-gro... (Dutch)
JohnBooty 6y ago
In an ideal world, sedation is more humane than beating or shocking a suspect into submission, when there is no other way to get them under control. If I and other HN commenters are not mistaken, ketamine is commonly used for this purpose in hospitals around the world. However, leaving the theoretical behind... Elijah McClain was murdered by police for the "crime" of acting oddly. There was no reason for them to use force against him whatsoever. He was unarmed and committed no crime. His death hurts me because he was, broadly speaking, "one of us" - an eccentric and intelligent person. Based on all I have read about his life, I think many HN readers would recognize aspects of themselves in Elijah.
honksillet 6y ago
The common scenario is someone being arrested who is also is a state of excited/agitated delirium. Someone in that state will likely be combative but won't be able to comply with directions. Your only options would be to physically restrain the individual (which might be very difficult to virtually impossible depending on what you have on hand and how agitated the person is) or sedate them. The article implies that police are coercing paramedics into giving ketamine. I'm pretty skeptical of this. Any delirious person being treated by paramedics would be on the way to the ER for evaluation. The cops and the paramedics would be working together to ensure that the patient is safely restrained/sedated. But the paramedic would in essence be taking over control of the patient (likely with a police escort to the ER).
pvaldes 6y ago
Police forcing people to do drugs. People that can't refuse it. Is revolting and insane, and distroys any possibility of fair defense of course. What would be next, escopolamine by default in any declaration?

Why are we injecting people during arrests, which by definition are not yet guilty people? Even if nobody had died, this is absurd.

by axaxs 6y ago

Why are we injecting people during arrests, which by definition are not yet guilty people? Even if nobody had died, this is absurd.

burfog 6y ago

Feel free to propose a method, and we'll all object to that. Stopping an uncooperative person is guaranteed to be upsetting to somebody. That is fundamental to the problem. Every method tried so far has been objected to by squeamish people who refuse to understand. If we let criminals run amok, then we get a failed state, and then armed gangs form to impose their own idea of a justice system. I assure you, those armed gangs will be far more brutal than our fancy westernized police system. So we medicalized the problem. That appeases more people than the cheap standardized billy club. We'll just ignore the needle-stick biohazard problem, because at least it won't look like a replay of Rodney King.

anon9001 6y ago
I agree that all restraint methods are upsetting, but "inject with dissociative drugs" should really be a lot further down the list than "hit with stick". Personally, I favor hitting people with billy clubs, because it leaves evidence of what happened and it requires the police to actually take physical action against another human. Giving cops needles full of magic compliance juice seems less responsible to me. The reason people were upset about Rodney King was because it was brutal and easy to understand. Injecting ketamine is also brutal but it's less visible. I cannot imagine anyone ever getting over the fact that they were restrained by authorities and injected into a k-hole. They won't be visibly harmed in any way, but that will absolutely mess someone up for life.
- mr_spothawk 6y ago
  > Personally, I favor hitting people with billy clubs, because it leaves evidence of what happened You make a decent argument.
- collyw 6y ago
  If I was being restrained, I would far rather be given a hit of ketamine than a hit of a bat. (From people that seem to know a bit about restraint techniques Joe Rogan and Jocko Willink discussed the use of choke holds on Joe's podacst. They both agreed that it was far better than a smack with a baton. https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=8&v=iUhdc1GAddk&feature=emb_logo https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=8&v=iUhdc1GAddk&...).
  - wonderwonder 6y ago
    I guess the argument against this is how many people in the US have died from being struck by a police club vs from a police chokehold. I cant recall a single instance of death by police bat.
- caskethopper 6y ago
  From the article, it sounds like it is on a completely different list altogether. "Most states and agencies say ketamine may be administered when someone exhibits “excited delirium” or agitation, which is typically associated with chronic drug abuse, mental illness or both." In that scenario, the police would be beating the culprit into compliance and we would all be looking at videos on youtube shaking our heads. I'm not saying cops should be carrying hypodermics in their utility belt, but how many non-lethal options do you remove before you have to accept more lethal outcomes?
  - NotSammyHagar 6y ago
    This is yet another scenario where the US can't seem to avoid violent actions when arresting people and other countries don't seem to have this problem. So what's going on here? I can only see it as another case where violent actions are significantly increased by police behavior.
    - Igelau 6y ago
      > other countries don't seem to have this problem It would help to be more specific about which other countries and when. There are a lot of reasons why things happen in one place and not another.
- JohnBooty 6y ago
  Personally, I favor hitting people with billy clubs, because it leaves evidence of what happened and it requires the police to actually take physical action against another human Like you say, there's not really a "good" choice, and I am not defending officers' actions during incidents like the killing (murder, IMO) of Elijah McCain. But those police batons break bones. Also, there's evidence of ketamine sedation: they need to summon paramedics to perform the injection, etc. So, I don't know. I'm sure we at least agree that the answer is to avoid letting things escalate to that point so frequently.
qppo 6y ago
yikes. "Not injecting people with a drug without their consent" is not the equivalent of "let criminals run amok." I have trouble reconciling the notion that after someone has been restrained to the point where it is considered safe to inject them with a drug, they find it necessary to inject a drug for the purpose of restraint. It's a bit like placing your knee on the back of someone's neck who is already handcuffed and crying for his mother. Unnecessary, cruel, and dangerous.
tmp538394722 6y ago
If you've seen the video footage of Elijah McClain you’d know there was no good reason for it to have been administered.
zwirbl 6y ago
So there are only 2 options, violence by armed gangs and violence by state-sponsored armed gangs? What is there to understand when it comes to police brutality? Not that western European police is without faults, but this feels just wrong on many different levels
musha68k 6y ago
De-escalation skills can be learned. First class psychological training and counselling could be the norm. One gains a lot of respect by showing wisdom and courage. Most scenarios are essentially communication problems to be solved. Not defaulting to the most violent means of "cooperation" is and should be an option for any police force in a 21st century democracy. Look to the best in the past and in other countries. Successful policing actually needs skin in the game.
- JohnBooty 6y ago
  What's really sobering is that, in my personal experiences as a middle-class American white man in his 40s, police have always been really good at de-escalating things. I haven't always agreed with them, but they have always cooled things down nicely without resorting to violence or even arrests. Training varies widely by locale, but I believe de-escalation is indeed a nearly universal part of their training. It must also be noted that de-escalation certainly is much easier for the police officers themselves: less hassle, less danger, less paperwork, less repercussions. These people generally just want to get through their shift and get home. They are certainly capable of de-escalation and, in most instances, are trained and motivated to de-escalate. So, it's very telling when (nearly always white) officers leap to unnecessarily violent tactics on (nearly always Black) victims.
  - burfog 6y ago
    All of that is seen through the filter of the media. They have a story that they want to sell. They need to grab eyeballs. They are also political, and so they want to push what helps advance their own political goals, even if it tears the country apart. Specifically, every one of these is subject to selection bias: "nearly always white" "unnecessarily violent tactics" "nearly always Black" You won't see a news report when the tactics are peaceful, when a black cop is involved, or when the supposed victim is non-black. Nobody is going to riot over that, so why report it? It goes unseen by you, so you get the wrong impression about reality. A different sort of bias comes into play with word choice, using "victims" to refer to people who typically are violent criminals being apprehended. The word ought to be "perpetrators", "suspects", or simply "criminals".
Sir_Substance 6y ago
If it's ok for us to deal with violent people by: a) gunning them down in the streets b) beating the shit out of them c) injecting them with hilarious overdoses of drugs and crossing our fingers then why would we pay for police? If that's ok, we might as well go back to old west times and just have everyone carry revolvers, possibly calling the town apothecary with his bottle of ether if we think we need it. It'll be way cheaper than maintaining a standing police department. The whole point is that police are supposed to be trained and equipped to handle disturbances without harming the person being detained. There are options for this, including that so rarely used tactic, defusal. Like, we pay police overtime. Cordon the person off, give them space but don't let them leave, wait until they get hungry even if it takes 12 hours, and then bribe them with pizza to come quietly. Build rapport with them over the entire incident. How often do we see that strategy deployed before we fall back to injecting ketamine?
- nemo44x 6y ago
  Almost every police encounter event ends without incident. There really seems to be an issue right now with selection bias of these events. I agree there is always room to consider other ways of handling outlying incidents. Injecting drugs into people violates so many principles of freedom it seems hard to justify it. The pizza idea could work in some cases but I think we also have to realize that some people being taken into custody are irrational either from mental illness, and/or drug use, could be armed and/or violent, and cordoning them off may work or it may not. And then a potentially armed, violent, and irrational person is a threat to innocent people. The police have many objectives and one of those is to take suspects into custody safely so they can have just administrated. However, the safety of the public might be of higher priority and if asked to make a choice between hurting a suspect that appears irrational and violent so as to not risk the liberties of the public or respecting their liberties but putting the liberties of the public at risk, they’ll choose to optimize for the former. Policing will never be perfect and there is a reasonable amount of error we should tolerate. And there should be accountability. I do agree that it would appear, at least from the stories that tend to make the news, that diffusion could be employed more.
p0llard 6y ago
I live in a country where we don't inject people with ketamine on the street, nor do "criminals run amok". We also don't have armed gangs imposing "their own idea of a justice system", and we have fewer police killings in 25 years than the US has in 25 days. I imagine your comment is probably symptomatic of the major societal issues within the US; it certainly worsens the image of the US to those fortunate enough to live in a Western nation which isn't actively regressing.
- JohnBooty 6y ago
  I live in a country where we don't inject people with ketamine on the street, nor do "criminals run amok". We also don't have armed gangs imposing "their own idea of a justice system", and we have fewer police killings in 25 years than the US has in 25 days. As an American, the parent poster is an unfortunate and common example of the sort of attitude that is common here. It is at least partially the result of America's geographic isolation: most Americans have never been to a place where there is low crime and low police brutality and thus literally cannot even imagine it. I would like to point out the America, one's treatment by police varies greatly. I'm a white man in my 40s have never witnessed police brutality firsthand. In all my interactions with police, they have acted properly and de-escalated things nicely, even when perhaps I didn't agree with them. This is the experience shared by many (most?) Americans who, once again, have trouble imagining experiences other than their own. They imagine that nearly all police are just, and therefore victims of police brutality must have done something to deserve the violence. Essentially, it is the "just world" fallacy writ large. People like to think that the world is just, and therefore like to think that those who experience misfortune have done something to deserve it. It is more pleasant than realizing we live in a country where the police sometimes act in shockingly violent and inappropriate ways. I do know many people who have experienced awful treatment by police. And of course in recent years much light has been shone upon this misconduct.
  - mindslight 6y ago
    > most Americans have never been to a place where there is low crime and low police brutality and thus literally cannot even imagine it. nit: They haven't been to a place where there is low crime, low police brutality, and high population density. To most observers, most of the US is low crime and low police brutality. From this perspective, violent police are a city problem where things are so out of control that the police have no choice but to act that way. (I don't why this is getting downvoted. I'm certainly not condoning the state of affairs, just trying to elaborate on the perspective that keeps supporting the uniformed criminals)

nerdbaggy 6y ago

There are some good uses cases . You arrive on scene and the patient is injured and agitated and lashing out. EMT is having a hard time as well. You need to give them something. Basically Benzos or Ketamine, and Ketamine is much safer and can relieve pain

ak39 6y ago
Yes, but drugs should only be administered by suitably trained and educated professionals such as EMT and health care professionals. Not police!
- i_am_proteus 6y ago
  Many (not all) police departments cross-train police officers as EMTs. The two are not mutually exclusive and, in many ways, complement each other.
  - learc83 6y ago
    Full time EMTs aren’t trained enough to make good decisions about when it’s appropriate to administer ketamine and how much to give. A cop who did some EMT training but doesn’t use the skills full time is going to be even worse.
  - hutzlibu 6y ago
    I am very much against the idea of police using ketamine, but I believe all street officers should be fully trained EMT's as well.
- xtian 6y ago
  Paramedics were the ones who killed Elijah McClain with ketamine. Putting aside that police shouldn’t be utilizing drugs period, there is zero justification for administering drugs to someone who isn’t a danger to themselves or others, as was the case for McClain. It makes more sense when you realize that the Aurora PD is eighth in the nation for police killings per capita.
- learc83 6y ago

BurningFrog 6y ago

Police use many kinds of violence when arresting people who don't want to be arrested. That's how it has to be. The "but they're considered innocent" argument proves too much. EDIT: I'm surprised by the heavy downvoting. Do people really think arrests should be voluntary and consensual?

mortehu 6y ago

If you are resisting arrest, you may still be presumed innocent of the original crime. However you're almost certainly guilty of resisting lawful arrest, which is usually a misdemeanor. There's no exemption that allows innocent people to resist lawful arrest. This is not to say that injection sounds like a great solution for everyday arrests.

kevingadd 6y ago
Of course, the definition of "lawful arrest" is pretty flexible these days and can seemingly include arrests that are blatantly unlawful, like some cops deciding to assault a random passerby on the street because they don't like the look of them or are unhappy about legal conduct like photography. Is it okay to resist under those circumstances? According to a judge or a police officer, probably not, but at the end of the day you'd probably win the case. If you survive.
- p0llard 6y ago
  > According to a judge or a police officer, probably not I'd naively hope that a judge wouldn't side with a police officer here, but I think the fact that resisting arrest is inherently criminal is a pretty big flaw in the US legal system. I live in a jurisdiction [1] where resisting arrest is not criminalised in the same sense as the US, and the idea that a police officer could unlawfully arrest you and then immediately have lawful grounds if you resisted is very alien to me. [1] : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resisting_arrest#England_and_Wales https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resisting_arrest#England_and_W...
  - projektfu 6y ago
    Since the '70s it feels like law enforcement (and juries to some extent) are informed by two movies much more than the Constitution and case law: Dirty Harry and Death Wish.
    - non-entity 6y ago
      I saw a interesting clip on TV a while back where they played several clips of various popular police dramas in which the main characters use wildly illegal or unconstitutional tricks to get confessions from criminals. Things like physically assaulting them while contained and. turning off cameras in interrogation rooms to do so. The point it was trying to make was that this "desensitized" people to police violence. Of course, the criminals in the clips were things like child predators, serial killers, etc. so it was all justified.

dutchmartin 6y ago

I have no clue, the first time I read about ketamine was in a article [1] about upcoming partydrugs in The Netherlands. In that article they mention that ketamine is generally used as a anesthetic for horses. But having things done to your body while you cannot decide about that is just horrible and should be banned. [1] https://www.parool.nl/nieuws/ketamine-steeds-populairder-grote-zorgen-om-toenemend-gebruik~bf008761/ https://www.parool.nl/nieuws/ketamine-steeds-populairder-gro... (Dutch)

JohnBooty 6y ago

In an ideal world, sedation is more humane than beating or shocking a suspect into submission, when there is no other way to get them under control. If I and other HN commenters are not mistaken, ketamine is commonly used for this purpose in hospitals around the world. However, leaving the theoretical behind... Elijah McClain was murdered by police for the "crime" of acting oddly. There was no reason for them to use force against him whatsoever. He was unarmed and committed no crime. His death hurts me because he was, broadly speaking, "one of us" - an eccentric and intelligent person. Based on all I have read about his life, I think many HN readers would recognize aspects of themselves in Elijah.

honksillet 6y ago

The common scenario is someone being arrested who is also is a state of excited/agitated delirium. Someone in that state will likely be combative but won't be able to comply with directions. Your only options would be to physically restrain the individual (which might be very difficult to virtually impossible depending on what you have on hand and how agitated the person is) or sedate them. The article implies that police are coercing paramedics into giving ketamine. I'm pretty skeptical of this. Any delirious person being treated by paramedics would be on the way to the ER for evaluation. The cops and the paramedics would be working together to ensure that the patient is safely restrained/sedated. But the paramedic would in essence be taking over control of the patient (likely with a police escort to the ER).

pvaldes 6y ago

Police forcing people to do drugs. People that can't refuse it. Is revolting and insane, and distroys any possibility of fair defense of course. What would be next, escopolamine by default in any declaration?