The final report was produced on June 14, 2005. It too is published on our website in its entirety, including a couple of letters by some experts, some doctors—an emergency room physician, and Dr. John Butt, who is not only a coroner but a forensic pathologist.
That report, in my respectful view, is a very thorough one, which made recommendations that, in conjunction with the interim recommendations I've just bulleted for you, if implemented, may well have prevented some of the problems that have subsequently arisen. If you look at the fact patterns of some of the anecdotal reporting of incidents that have happened since, had some of these recommendations been followed, it is speculative on my part, but my guess is that we may not have had the frequency of them.
They said:
There will be situations, particularly in areas where back-up officers may be distant or unavailable
—and let's face it, not everybody is in a large centre—
where multiple applications are necessary to control violent subjects. Training protocols, however, should reflect that multiple applications, particularly continuous cycling of the TASER for periods exceeding 15-20 seconds, may increase the risk to the subject and should be avoided where practical. Conventional use-of-force theory dictates that officers abandon any particular tactic after it has been employed several times without achieving the desired result.
In other words, don't keep using it.
Conversely, recognizing that a prolonged struggle heightens the risk to both the officer and the subject, it may be appropriate to use a TASER as soon as it becomes clear that physical control will be necessary and that negotiation is unlikely to succeed.
And here is the caveat:
A single TASER application made before the subject has been exhausted, followed by a restraint technique that does not impair respiration, may provide the optimum outcome.
The report makes a number of recommendations, along with the reasoning behind them, but briefly stated, they are summarized on pages 34 and 35 of the report.
1. With respect to CED's, including the TASER, we are recommending, subject to the situational factors, that they not be used against subjects who are demonstrating only passive resistance.
Many of you will have heard the anecdotal reports of, “Drop the beer, sir.” “No?” Zap. Those are passive resistance things. They ought not be used in those situations.
2. For subjects who are displaying active resistance, those who are resisting an officer's efforts to take them into custody without attacking the officer, where an officer believes the use of a CED is appropriate we [believe] the CED's [should] be used in a push stun mode only.
I suspect you're pretty alive to the issue that the taser can be used both in the stun mode, which is sort of a cattle prod situation, and the probe, which fires up to 21 feet with two prongs that insert in the skin.
3. In situations where officers are confronted by active resistance, assaultive resistance, or the threat of grievous bodily harm or death, where an officer believes that the use of a CED is appropriate we are recommending that CED's be used in either a push stun or probe deployment mode.
So they're setting out some guidelines for use along what I would call and what has been known as the use-of-force continuum. You've probably seen that with the police use.
In my view, one of the most significant aspects of this report was the fact that it had been subjected to peer review by a medical review panel. That was one of the things that Chief Battershill and I discussed. I didn't want just a police-initiated report. I wanted whatever came out of this to have been subjected to peer review that included a multi-discipline panel. So a multi-discipline panel of experts reviewed this report.
They included a forensic pathologist, an exercise physiologist, a cardiologist, a forensic psychiatrist, the vice-chief of emergency medicine, a neurologist, a trainer with the Ontario Police College, the district superintendent for the British Columbia Ambulance Service, the executive director of the Canadian Police Research Centre, and an advanced life support paramedic.