Kristian White was sentenced to 450 hours of community service and placed under the supervision of a corrections officer for two years for manslaughter.
“Mr. White made by what any measure was a terrible mistake,” Justice Ian Harrison said in the New South Wales state Supreme Court.
Prosecutors had called for a prison term in the killing of Clare Nowland, a great-grandmother who suffered dementia, but the judge said such a punishment was disproportionate.
“It is … at the lower end of seriousness of crimes amounting to wrongful death,” Harrison said.
Ugh. I’m going to get downvoted … but I kind of agree with the ruling.
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We don’t know the whole story. A 95 year old dementia patient with a butcher knife hits her head and dies after being tazed… that’s the summary. The courts had all the details and likely made the best decision.
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One dumb unfortunate mistake should not put an officer in prison for 10+ years. This man served his community for years only to make one regretful split second decision … his years of service have to count for something and balance out the mistake.
Here’s what happened. It was a steak knife (not a butcher knife), she was using a walker, and she was 5’ 2" tall.
A 95-year-old woman is in critical condition after police in Australia shocked her with a stun gun as she approached them with a walking frame and a steak knife at her nursing home.
At the time, "she was approaching police, but it is fair to say at a slow pace,” he said. “She had a walking frame, but she had a knife.”
After responding to a call about a patient having a knife in her possession, Cotter said Nowland was found in a “small confined” treatment room by two officers who arrived at the scene.
“Negotiations commenced for her to drop the knife. For whatever reasons, Clare did not do that,” he said, adding that the senior constable activated his stun gun, which are widely known as Tasers after a major manufacturer.
The 5-foot-2 woman, who weighs 95 pounds, fell to the ground and struck her head.
Given that the whole point of a device like that is they incapacitate without doing permanent harm, that sounds entirely reasonable at first glance.
Tazers and other less lethal means can still kill, and old people are fragile as hell. If you tazed 100 95 year olds I would bet money on more than half of them dying directly or shortly thereafter.
I definitely wouldn’t put money on 50/50.
Also, it was falling that hurt her, not the actual shock.
it was falling that hurt her
Is that not a direct and normal consequence of being tazed?
Often, yes. But the TAZER didn’t directly kill her, which is a subtle difference, but worth pointing out.
Yep plus people with dementia can have a lot of strength and speed. It depends on how close they were, furniture in the room, other people there etc.
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Let me guess, he felt threatened by the 95 year old woman.
Could have easily used one hand to keep her at a safe distance risking only some cuts to his hand.
Or you know, just slowly walk in a circle or whatever.
But no, fun is fun, and having fun at work is a nice perk I guess. /s
The 35-year-old officer said “nah, bugger it” before firing the Taser’s barbs at her chest
“It is … at the lower end of seriousness of crimes amounting to wrongful death,” Harrison said.
Explain to me how electrocuting a frail 95 y/o demented woman to death ranks ‘on the lower end’ of crimes involving fatalities. Seriously, explain it to me like I’m 3, because I can’t believe that this statement was issued by a judge.
The whole point of a TAZER is it incapacitates without killing, are you seriously suggesting this was intentional?
Remember, it wasn’t the shock that killed her, it was the subsequent fall.
Because that’s not what he did.
The woman was holding a steak knife and refused to drop it, he shot her with the taser which caused her to fall - as tasers are designed to - but she hit her head and died a week later in the hospital. That’s an injury that is always a risk when using tasers against anyone.
Should they be used against 95 year olds with walkers even if they do refuse to drop the knife and continue menacingly inching towards you, that’s an entirely different issue.
i dont think it justifies it. a trained cop can easily wrestle a knife from a 95-yr old.
Easy for you to say.
So a peice of data for y’all. My Dad was 80+ and pretty frail with alzheimer’s. When he had an episode of paranoia, he was alarmingly strong, and suddenly could walk and move like he was 50 again. I’ve been told this is common and apparently is due to extreme adrenaline. But I observed that it can’t last all that long, 40 minutes was the max. I don’t think we should count out the 95 year old granny being dangerous. Now knowing that though, I would have attempted to avoid and delay. And really, I would do that no matter who it is. But I don’t know if the cop knows all that or if it was a realistic option. Most of the staff at memory care didn’t understand the concept, and this was a higher end facility.
I heard about an aussie officer serving a few years for shooting a running suspect in the back with a taser.
I’d like to see a source for that, because that definitely sounds like nonsense.
Fucking bullshit, but entirely unsurprising that a cop gets away with a slap on the wrist for something that would put anyone else away behind bars. NSW has never truly moved on from the Rum Corp
There was this one time that a guy on a wheel chair was gonna run me over. I was totally afraid of getting run over like that. I kept being afraid for a little while, waiting for inevitable death. A few minutes later as the guy approached at velocities I couldn’t comprehend, I kept thinking several tomes of a novel I was gonna write about the incident. So I began typing away and he kept approaching, closer and closer, any day now. I went home for the night, but I’ll be back tomorrow and the day after unit the day I hue). In the end I had to defend myself, so I beat him up. Lol not true.
