Incapacitation recovery times from a conductive electrical weapon exposure
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ORIGINAL ARTICLE
Incapacitation recovery times from a conductive electrical weapon exposure John C. Criscione • Mark W. Kroll
Accepted: 26 February 2014 / Published online: 26 March 2014 Ó Springer Science+Business Media New York 2014
Abstract Purpose Law enforcement officers expect that a TASERÒ CEW (Conducted Electrical Weapon) broad-spread probe exposure will temporarily incapacitate a subject who will then be able to immediately (*1 s delay) recover motor control in order to comply with commands. However, this recovery time has not been previously reported. Methods A total of 32 police academy students were exposed to a very broad-spread 5 s CEW stimulus as part of their training and told to depress a push-button as soon as they sensed the stimulus. A subgroup also depressed the push-button after being alerted by an audio stimulus. Results The response time after the audio trigger was 1.05 ± 0.25 s; the median was 1.04 s (range 0.69–1.34 s). For the paired CEW triggered group the mean response time was 1.41 ± 0.61 s with a median of 1.06 s (range 0.92–2.18 s), which was not statistically different. Only 2/32 subjects were able to depress the button during the CEW exposure and with delays of 3.09 and 4.70 s from the start. Of the remaining 30 subjects the mean response time to execute the task (once the CEW exposure ended) was 1.27 ± 0.58 s with a median of 1.19 s (range 0.31–2.99 s) (NS vs. the audio trigger).
J. C. Criscione Department of Biomedical Engineering, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX, USA M. W. Kroll (&) Department of Biomedical Engineering, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, USA e-mail: [email protected] M. W. Kroll Department of Biomedical Engineering, California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, CA, USA
Conclusions With a very-broad electrode spread, a CEW exposure could prevent or delay some purposeful movements. Normal reaction times appear to return immediately (*1 s) after the CEW exposure ceases. Keywords Force TASER Weapon CEW ECD ESW CED Law enforcement
Introduction The physiological effects of the CEW (Conducted Electrical Weapon) have been well studied [1–12]. Field studies have shown significant reductions in subject and officer injury [13, 14]. However, there are limited data on the immediate postCEW exposure voluntary movement recovery. Since the goal of a CEW probe application is to capture or control and then obtain compliance with lawful officer commands, we sought to determine how quickly a subject could comply with commands after a simulated probe-mode CEW exposure. We also determined the control or incapacitation effects via measurement of ability to perform a button-press test. Finally, we sought to compare subject impressions to their performance via a structured interview after the CEW exposure.
Methods Study design Participants were CEW trainees from the Austin (Texas) Police Academy (APA) who had previously volunteered to undergo CEW exposure. The CEW exposure was performed by the APA staff per their normal training methods
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