Police Taser Musician For ‘Playing Tambourine Too Loudly’

[Rainman]

The Musician was playing the tambourine in church. She'd been requested not to play the offending instrument as loudly as she was doing but she didn't comply. So cops were called to deal with her. But what would be the best way to stop someone playing a tambourine?

Well, you taser her.

Oklahoma County Sheriff’s Department Spokesman Mark Myers told local KFOR News, that “Nobody could pay attention to the sermon or what was going on so that’s when our deputy was able to take care of the situation.â€

Excessive force?

Police Taser Musician For ?Playing Tambourine Too Loudly? During Church Service

 

[stevesxs9]

Only if the confrontation puts the Police in harms way. And if they've used every other non-violent method they have. If she had been asked not to ply the tambourine so loud then she should want to comply with that instead of possibly starting trouble.

 

[missbishi]

What an odd story! It seems that she had already been asked to quieten down and started causing a little trouble with the police, eventually resisting arrest before getting tasered. To be honest, this sounds like standard practise and we shouldn't really let the fact that she was a 50 year old woman cloud our judgement.

 

[mrsbright]

What an odd story! It seems that she had already been asked to quieten down and started causing a little trouble with the police, eventually resisting arrest before getting tasered. To be honest, this sounds like standard practise and we shouldn't really let the fact that she was a 50 year old woman cloud our judgement.

Cloud our judgment? Really? Seriously? Are you for real? I mean come on.

Maybe there should not be a standard practice if then people come up with this kind of crap. Are you also gonna shrug if they taser kids, pregnant women or elderly because "hey it's all equal even if some of these people could have some serious physical repercussions from it whereas a strong young adult would have less?"

So she broke free from the officer and went back inside. From my friends who worked as security around, there would be many ways to deal with this without employing excessive force -- but the cops have a license to, and so they do it because it's easier.

 

[Shimus]

Why am I not shocked the majority of these stories involve southern/mid-western cops? I'm not saying it's due to region at all; anyone can be an idiot. But they seem to be in spades down south. You'd pepper spray or mace her first if she was uncompliant. Taser should be used last, in place of a gun.

 

[pandabear1991]

Wow. In a CHURCH of all places!

Was there ever the consideration of mental illness or too much coffee? Why didn't the preacher just close the Sunday Worship early to tend to his sick sister? She was showing signs of sickness she was already in a place of Worship and Spiritual Healing!

There were definitely other ways to help control this situation. To taser a sick woman in front of friends, family, and children is UNCALLED for. Especially when she had not committed a serious crime, she just wasn't doing her church service to others liking. Why couldn't they just send out a Mental Health Officer to control the situation if the responding officers could not be compassionate/skilled/creative enough to do so? I would have resisted arrest if someone was trying to arrest me for "Worshiping too loudly," or at least called my attorney to let them handle it.

 

[Shimus]

I just feel we readily use violence and our tasers/guns too frequently here in the USA. We get to using them so much, so quickly that we forget about talking people down. About handcuffing, Miranda rights.. the whole nine yards. It's like they immediately skip to seeing red and want to neutralize the situation without first taking into account the scope and magnitude of the situation.

 

[Gabe]

Someone should have taken it off her and told her that they didn't need it anymore. The priest could have handled it better and asked her to stop. Calling the police was a bit drastic so there must be more to the story, that she resisted and none of the congregation wanted to get involved. Clearly there are other issues and they wanted her removed and knew she wouldn't go quietly.

 

[Gelsemium]

For me it's excessive force for sure, I mean, he was playing music, he wasn't a menace to anyone, so why use the taser on him?

 

[Kamarsun1]

I think they could have found a better way to deal with that. It doesn't seem like she was hurting anyone. She may of had a mental disorder for all we know.

 

[OMGnoWAY]

This sounds like a mental illness-type thing. I can't imagine someone would go through all this confrontation with the church members and the police just because they really like the tambourine. I think the right thing to do would be to talk to the woman after the service and if she won't agree to stop, ban her from the church.

I think it's atrocious that someone could get tasered by the police just for playing the tambourine. Cops need to learn how to de-escalate situations and how to deal with people with mental illnesses more.

 

[mrsbright]

Someone should have taken it off her and told her that they didn't need it anymore. The priest could have handled it better and asked her to stop. Calling the police was a bit drastic so there must be more to the story, that she resisted and none of the congregation wanted to get involved. Clearly there are other issues and they wanted her removed and knew she wouldn't go quietly.

Yeah, I can imagine that she probably had a character that the church people did not want to push, so that if they kicked her out, they probably expected some drama to ensue and thought it'd be easier to just have a strong policeman usher the woman away, no harm no foul.
And the policeman obviously could not be bothered much and just tasered her when she proved to be resisting more than he'd hoped. That way, she'd shut up and be good and could be pushed around.

Basically a story of people who don't know how to deal with someone, so they call the next authority and they use violence.

I hope the church community feels bad about this and tries to sort out next conflicts with tact instead of just calling the police for "playing too loud". This is worse than kindergarten.

 

[Shimus]

Totally agree. Calling cops over noise ordinances in a Church does seem relatively picky. But on the other hand if you've ever been to a Church or Church in general you know all those "Fake Nice" people showing up to put their face out there. They may have been one and this just tipped balance over. There's always a reason for the stuff we do, even if we think there isn't.

It's still Kindergarten-ish though, I definitely agree. And to use force - a Taser no less.

 

[tanker]

Maybe the guy was a really bad tambourine player. Or maybe the rest of the church tried to convert the cop. Sometimes these relgious fanatics can be down right annoying. Confess if you had a taser, you wouldn't be tempted to taser someone ? I feel like tasering mormons and jehova witnesses all the time.

 

[pandabear1991]

@Shimus I completely agree. Someone else did mention that perhaps there was more to the story, but even so- the officers sound like they were just looking for a reason to do it. Officers do not like having their authority questioned, and something tells me she did (just a feeling).

The story sounds suspicious. I still feel that with the situation that is stated, their actions were unjustified. Unless she pulled a gun on one of them, or someone in the church, or showed evidence of potential danger to herself/someone else, a mental officer should have been called- even if it meant cuffing her and babysitting until the mental health officer could clear her.

 

[GemmaRowlands]

Well, I am not entirely sure of what the correct way to respond would be, but I certainly would not have used a taser. If anything, if it is a legal offence to be playing an instrument this loudly, I think that I would much prefer to arrest the person than cause physical harm to them. Obviously if they resisted arrest then you might have to try and do something else about it, but this just really seems to be a little bit excessive with no real cause to me. It is a shame because the majority of our police do a wonderful job, yet it always seems to be the stories that are like these that get all of the attention, and it portrays the police force in a very bad light indeed.

 

[mrsbright]

@tanker :
Er, no. No, not at all. I do not feel inspired to harm people just because they don't behave in the way I would prefer they do or believe what I would want them to believe.

@pandabear1991:

Well, she did not have a gun or anything. What the article states is that she got out of the policeman's grip (so she probably wrestled away) and ran back in the church. Obviously a case of "this person did not obey me!" but nothing that indicates dangerous behaviour or anything illegal, either.

 

[Shimus]

@tanker :
Er, no. No, not at all. I do not feel inspired to harm people just because they don't behave in the way I would prefer they do or believe what I would want them to believe.

This entirely. I would not hurt someone just because their views are different, and it definitely did not warrant the punishment it got. Perhaps crowd control police should just be allowed tranquilizer guns. Neutralize a situation easier with less hassle. One small prick and you're down for the count. This of course has ethical implications, but no more then electrical taser burn marks or the shock that goes through your system. Imagine if you have metal plating in your body and you get tasered. You're going to feel it a lot worse. Tranqs just drop you.

 

[mrsbright]

This entirely. I would not hurt someone just because their views are different, and it definitely did not warrant the punishment it got. Perhaps crowd control police should just be allowed tranquilizer guns. Neutralize a situation easier with less hassle. One small prick and you're down for the count. This of course has ethical implications, but no more then electrical taser burn marks or the shock that goes through your system. Imagine if you have metal plating in your body and you get tasered. You're going to feel it a lot worse. Tranqs just drop you.

Yeah, it would be less harsh on the system, but I imagine that you'd have to go through clothing and have a good aim, on a moving subject this could be complicated and would be reason to reject the solution.

Though on the ethical part, I think that to systematically try to get less hassle could be a bad mentality -- I mean, this story is an example of it. Did she obey orders? Nah, not really. But ... playing loud tambourine. This is not a crime. So the cop did not make an arrest, more than likely, he was just used as a security doorman or something, from my understanding. And I do think that if someone is not under arrest, then not staying in place/struggling away would not be illegal.

So now I'd really want to know what intentions the cop stated himself to have -- if he told the woman she was under arrest for playing too loud (and can we contemplate how silly that would be) or if he simply manhandled her out and then got pissed that she did not accept that.

 

[Shimus]

So now I'd really want to know what intentions the cop stated himself to have -- if he told the woman she was under arrest for playing too loud (and can we contemplate how silly that would be) or if he simply manhandled her out and then got pissed that she did not accept that.

What I bolded is what I imagined to happen as well.