Taser history
The Story of the Taser
Where did this gun-alternative come from? Originally, when searching for a non-lethal option for apprehending potentially violent criminals, police forces used cattle prods. However in 1974 a man named Jack Cover developed the electronic technology that was more appropriate for use in subduing humans. Instead of relying on close contact from a baton, Jack Cover invented a weapon that was more like a gun, delivering a charge from a safer distance. His early models of the taser relied on dart-like electrodes to be fired and then embedded in the skin and superficial muscle tissue layers. Eventually, the technology was refined to use a shaped pulse of electricity to disrupt nerve and muscle function without the need of a metal dart to conduct the current. Jack Cover credits his invention to his favorite book character, Tom Swift, who was described as shooting electric ray guns through walls and at people. In fact, he even named his technology after Tom Swift -the name ‘taser’stands for the Thomas A Swift’s Electric Rifle.
However, even with Cover’s brilliant invention, tasers were not in major use until the early 1990s, when Taser International was founded by Tom and Rick Smith under the name of Air Taser. The Smiths were provoked into working with Jack Cover on the creation of a non-lethal weapon after two of Rick’s former teammates in high school were murdered in a parking lot road-rage incident in Scottsdale, Arizona. Together they developed the early commercial version of the taser and by June 1994, they came out with a non-fire arm taser which resulted in allowing the taser to bypass federal and state laws that applied to firearms, such as the anti-felon identification tracking system.
With the intentions of expanding to international markets, the Smith brothers renamed Air Taser as Taser International, and in the same year began heavily marketing their product to police departments and other law enforcement agencies, as well as to regular civilians. The taser became more and more popular with police forces because it offered a non-lethal subduing option and was thought to reduce gun usage.
As time has passed, controversy has risen over the use of the taser. Although tests on police and military volunteers have shown tasers to subdue individuals non-lethally and cause them no lasting harm, there have been a notable number of deaths associated with taser usage. Scrutiny regarding the safety of the devices sold by Taser International Inc. has prompted over thirty wrongful death lawsuits against the company since its inception; raising questions about the early judgment and law-making around the assumption that tasers were a less dangerous option than fire arms. Also, recent scandals around “dry tasing,” or using tasers not to immobilize the nervous system, but rather to subdue subjects by inflicting pain has highlighted the ethical issues surrounding taser usage in the hands of police forces.
In 2006 Taser International received its first huge taser orders from foreign military forces. France reportedly put an order in for for over a million dollars worth of X26 tasers
Recently, Taser International came out with its first long range, wireless taser technology, piloting taser technology onto a whole new level, in the form of the XREP shotgun, which will be available to military forces in late 2007 .
Popularity: 2% [?]