North Country Gazette



Death In Pinellas County—Excited Delirium Or Murder?

Posted on Thursday, 8 of May , 2008 at 8:27 pm

COMMENTARY

PINELLAS COUNTY, FLA—A year ago this week, 34-year-old Daniel Bradley Young died after seven Pinellas County sheriff’s deputies attempted to take him into custody—-by tasering him. 

An autopsy conducted by the Sixth Circuit medical examiner’s office said there were several puncture marks on Young’s body that were consistent with marks from a Taser but that Young died as result of “excited delirium syndrome”, a “pre-existing condition” due to cocaine toxicity. Months later, Pinellas-Pasco state attorney Bernie McCabe told Pinellas Sheriff Jim Coats he had cleared the seven Pinellas County sheriff’s officers involved in Young’s death, once again ruling that the victim’s death was an “excusable homicide” and that despite the officers punching Young and tasering him, that the deputies didn’t cause Young’s death, apparently wanting the public to believe that Young would have died anyway, regardless of the police intervention and presence.

In announcing McCabe’s refusal to prosecute the seven officers, the sheriff’s department press release said that Young’s death occurred while the officers, “believing Young met Baker Act criteria, were in the performance of their lawful, legal duties of taking Young into custody”. McCabe and the sheriff’s department claimed that the death of Daniel Young was yet another “excusable homicide”.

The police report said that Young was tasered and as he continued to struggle, a deputy struck him with a closed fist in the face and throat. Another deputy got a handcuff on one of Young’s hands and she then tasered Young in the lower back and then in the stomach.

Four more deputies arrived on the scene and according to testimony, Young was Tasered again on the chest, shoulder, thigh and knees. The officers sat on Young’s chest and legs in an attempt to gain control. McCabe said it was “excusable”. By the time the seven officers handcuffed Young and rolled him on his back, they realized he was in medical distress. Paramedics were called but Young was pronounced dead at the Largo Medical Center.

The medical examiner’s office ruled that “the use of force resulting in blunt trauma, including the use of a Taser or restrain, individually or collectively contributed to but did not cause the death of Daniel Young”.

The ruling by the medical examiner’s office in the Young case is in stark contrast to the Thomas Tipton case.

Thomas Tipton died at age 34 in April 2006 after a violent confrontation with a trio of Clearwater cops in which he was handcuffed, tasered and restrained face down. Thomas Tipton never got up.

The medical examiner’s office ruled Tipton’s death a homicide, listing cocaine and alcohol as contributory conditions. The autopsy findings indicated that Tipton died of asphyxiation resulting from being face down on a patio while officers compressed his chest. The autopsy report said the alcohol in his system could have hastened the asphyxia. The Clearwater police had tasered Tipton following an altercation at a motel on north Clearwater Beach, claiming he was combative.

Between June 2001 and June 2007, nationwide there were at least 245 cases of deaths of subjects soon after having been shocked using Tasers. Of these cases, in seven cases, medical examiners said Tasers were a cause or a contributing factor or could not be ruled out as a cause of death.

In 16 cases, coroners and other officials stated that a Taser was a secondary or contributory factor of death.

In dozens of cases, coroners cited excited delirium as cause of death. Excited delirium has been questioned as a medical diagnosis.

Several deaths occurred as a result of injuries sustained in struggles. In a few of these cases, head injury due to falling after being shocked contributed to later death.

In 2005, a medical examiner ruled for the first time that a Taser was the primary factor in a death.

Earlier this week, officials of Lubbock, Texas, agreed to pay $49,000 to the family of Juan Nunez III. Nunez died in 2006 after a police officer shot him in the chest several times with a Taser during a domestic violence call.

The victim’s family sued the city and Officer Matt Doherty, claiming that Doherty had used excessive force and violated Nunez’ constitutional rights. The lawsuit alleged that Lubbock police had not established adequate policies for the use of Tasers and that they had failed to properly train their officers. Doherty had tasered Nunez four times in less than a minute. Nunez fell backwards, striking his head. The autopsy report said that Nunez had died as a result of the tasering, a blow to the head and alcohol.

Neither side admitted liability in the settlement. Payments of less than $50,000 don’t need approval by the city council.

A Taser is an electroshock weapon which is meant to stun and subdue a subject from a distance. Taser International Inc. of Scottsale, Arizona, is the primary manufacturer of the stun guns.

Tasers were introduced as “non-lethal” weapons to be used by police to subdue fleeing, belligerent, or potentially dangerous subjects but due to numerous instances of Taser use resulting in injury and death, the use of Tasers has become extremely controversial and in fact, symbols of police brutality.

A Taser looks like and fires like a gun but rather than bullets, it shoots two dart-like probes and can travel more than 35 feet. The first jolt will shock a suspect for five seconds. A second pull on the trigger will deliver another five second blast to the person. A continuous electrical shock will be delivered until the battery runs down if the Taser user continuously pulls the trigger.

Taser has admitted in a 2005 training bulletin that repeated blasts of the 50,000 volt Taser can “impair breathing and respiration”. The manufacturer states on its website that repeated or prolonged stuns with a Taser in a state known as the controversial term of “excited delirium”, can contribute to “significant and potentially fatal health risks”.

Taser’s bulletin warned that repeated shocks can cause strong muscle contractions that can injure “tissues, organs, bones, muscles, tendon, ligaments, nerves, joints. Its 2005 training bulletin cautioned police to avoid “multiple discharges” of the electric shock gun and to avoid using it on delirious people.

In such as state of “excited delirium”, experts say that physical restraint by police coupled with the physical exertion of the subject are likely to result in death or injury.

In an effort to attack the adverse perception of the use of Tasers, Taser International has legally targeted, actually intimidated as critics charge, medical examiners nationwide who have issued findings that Tasers contributed to someone’s death, seeking to reverse such findings and apparently attempt to eliminate any finding of Tasers causing death.

Last week in Ohio, retired visiting judge Ted Schneiderman who is long past the mandated retirement age of 70 accommodated Taser International and their co-plaintiff, the City of Akron, in ordering Summit County Medical Examiner Lisa Kohler to change her autopsy findings in the deaths of three people which occurred after altercations with law enforcement officers.

She was ordered to delete any reference that Tasers contributed to the deaths including the 2006 death of Mark McCullaugh Jr. in which five sheriff’s deputies are charged in the death of an inmate. Both the wrists and ankles of inmate McCullaugh were restrained and both pepper spray and a Taser gun were used on him.

In her autopsy report on McCullaugh, Kohler had ruled his death a homicide and that he had died from asphyxiation due to “the combined effects of chemical, mechanical and electrical restraint”.

However, Schneiderman said the county failed to present any expert evidence that the Tasers had impaired McCullaugh’s respiration. The judge, whose biography indicates no medical training and who did not examine McCullaugh’s body, speculated at the cause of death, saying that “more likely, the death was due to a fatal cardiac arrhythmia brought on by severe heart disease”.

Schneiderman also ruled that the death certificates of Dennis S. Hydge and Richard Holcomb must be changed to delete any reference to tasers as being a cause of death. Hyde, 30, died in 2005 after a confrontation with Akron police and Holcomb, 18, also died in 2005 after being hit with a jolt by police officer in Springfield Township.

Retired visiting judges are handpicked with increasing frequency in Ohio to handle all politically sensitive cases, giving serious cause to question the visiting judge system.

A spokesman for the National Association of Medical Examiners said that the repeated lawsuits by Taser International are “dangerously close to intimidation. At this point, we adamantly reject the fact that people can be sued for medical opinions that they make”.

Canada’s medical community is likewise concerned with Scheiderman’s ruling.

Dr. Matthew Stanbrook of the Canadian Medical Association says the decision doesn’t take into account the difficult of determining an exact cause of death in almost every case.

“If we were required to have at the level of scientific and medical certainty that something was the cause of death, before we were permitted to declare it, most of the people who died in North America would have died of unknown causes,” Stanbrook said. “It is a physician making their best judgment given all the facts available.”

In his controversial ruling (which has now been removed from the Summit County website) Schneiderman, cited parts of Kohler’s autopsy report on McCullaugh and said that his death ‘’shall be ruled undetermined and any reference to death by ‘asphyxia due to the combined effects of chemical, mechanical and electrical restraint,’ as well as any reference to ‘homicide’ due to ‘multiple restraint mechanisms with beating and anal penetration’ shall be deleted from both the death certificate and the Report of Autopsy.”

The decision can be read here. http://media.ohio.com/documents/TASER.pdf

Was that to relieve Summit County and its sheriff’s officers from any liability in McCullaugh’s death and to cause the dismissal of criminal charges against the five Summit County sheriff’s deputies?

The trial of deputy Stephen Krendick, charged with McCullaugh’s murder, is scheduled to begin on June 16. The other four deputies are charged with reckless homicide or felonious assault. The Cuyahoga County prosecutor’s office says its proceeding with the case.

Kohler isn’t about to bow down to Schneiderman’s ruling though and said that her staff’s conclusion that the tasering contributed to the deaths of McCullaugh and the two other men was correct. She said the ruling would be appealed.

The Taser manufacturer claims that a condition called excited delirium is the cause of deaths which have been attributed to tasering but the condition is not officially recognized by either the American Medical Association or the American Psychiatric Association.

Medical researchers disagree whether Tasers can trigger heart problems. A Taser spokesperson said their safety has been “documented year after year in medical journals.” But a study published in July, 2006, in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, said the weapons “may have cardiac risks.”

In deaths of individuals in altercations with police officers, McCabe routinely clears the officers of criminal wrongdoing despite the medical examiner’s findings, consistently issuing rulings of “excusable homicide”, whether or not Tasers are involved.

The North Country Gazette will continue to delve into the operations of McCabe’s office, his refusal to bring charges against police officers and in particular, his refusal to bring charges in the boating deaths involving Jimmy Spicer and Joey Turner.

Anyone with information regarding any of the above cases, Bernie McCabe and the operations of the Pinellas County state attorney’s office is asked to contact NCG at news@northcountrygazette.org

Anyone who wishes to help defray the costs which will be associated with this special report or who wish to support the efforts of NCG may do so by using the PayPal button on the home page, www.northcountrygazette.org 5-8-08

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