6 April 2025, El Paso, Texas, Steven Zimmerman – We’ve grown accustomed to seeing police officers with Tasers. These less-than-lethal weapons are used to incapacitate a suspect so they may be taken into custody. The El Paso Police Department is already utilizing the new Taser in Central El Paso.
“It’s a better Taser, the Taser 10,” says an officer in Central El Paso who has already been issued and trained on the new Taser. “This one gives us ten chances to take a suspect down. Our old Taser, it would go through a suspect’s thicker clothing. The Taser 10 can be defeated by a jean jacket, sweater or jacket. It’s useless unless they are wearing a pullover shirt, or a t-shirt. A hoodie can cause this Taser to fail.”
Just what does this Officer mean when he says “ten chances?”
According to the Axon website, the maker of the Taser 10, “When de-esculation fails, TASER 10 can deploy up to 10 individually targeted probes without the need to reload.”
Daily, police rely on less-than-lethal tactics to subdue a suspect without killing them. These tactics include physical holds, hand-to-hand combat, or Tasers. These less-than-lethal tactics can still result in death.
“I can already see where this all is going,” says the EPPD Officer from Central El Paso. “It’s going to hurt someone who didn’t need to be hurt. Why are we not being given better training to talk someone down or doing more community outreach to get the people to know that we are not out there to cause harm? This new Taser 10 is a bad idea.”
Over the last ten years, more than 1,000 individuals have died when police officers used less-than-lethal tactics to subdue them. According to an investigation led by The Associated Press in 2024, it was discovered that hundreds of officers weren’t taught or failed to follow safety practices for physical force and less-than-lethal weapons.
“A Taser can deliver an electrical blow of up to 50,000 watts,” says Dr. David Bedell, MD. “This can cause a cardiac arrest in an otherwise healthy person.”
Cardiac arrest means the heart suddenly stops pumping, usually due to a disturbance within the heart’s electrical system that regulates the beating of your heart.
“There was a study, in 2014, that suggested that Tasers can cause a life-threatening arrhythmia called ventricular fibrillation (VF), even in physically healthy people with no prior heart conditions,” says Dr. Bedell. “What this means is the heart’s lower chambers (ventricles) beat in an atypical rhythm, reducing the heart’s ability to pump enough blood to the body consistently and raising the risk of cardiac arrest.”
Dr. Bedell says he is familiar with the Taser 10 and has reservations about its use.
“The Taser 10 can allow an officer, or a group of officers, to repeatedly use a Taser without having to change charges as frequently,” says Dr. Bedell. “If you have a person who is fighting police, and several police officers use the Taser 10 on them, over and over, you may have set the conditions for cardiac arrest in that person. Even without the person having prior medical conditions.”
“As technology leaders in public safety, we have a responsibility to identify every possible way we can give officers better tools to reduce officer-involved shootings,” said Axon CEO Rick Smith. “We have worked tirelessly to develop TASER 10 because we know that public safety needs better ways to stop imminent threats and protect their communities and themselves without lethal force. TASER 10 ushers in the potential for a less-lethal future, and we are confident it will be a key factor in helping to cut gun-related deaths between police and the public by 50% in the next 10 years.”
Axon says the Taser 10 is safer because”the TASER 10, with a maximum range of 45 feet, creates more distance for officers to de-escalate and resolve conflicts. In the event that de-escalation efforts do fail, officers can deploy up to 10 individually targeted probes without the need to reload for a less-lethal interaction,” according to the Axon website.
14K views · 186 reactions | TASER 10 Firing Range Spotlight | A new era in less-lethal technology has officially arrived. Hear what the very first users have to say about TASER 10. axon.com/TASER10 #TASER10… | By Axon | Facebook
A new era in less-lethal technology has officially arrived. Hear what the very first users have to say about TASER 10. axon.com/TASER10 #TASER10…
Tasers can be a poor police option because they can be unreliable, ineffective, and dangerous. They can also be misused and have been linked to serious injury and death.
Unreliable and ineffective
- Tasers can be ineffective more than 40% of the time.
- Newer models can be less effective than older ones.
- Tasers can fail to subdue someone, who is then shot and killed by police.
- Tasers can be less effective on people wearing heavy winter gear.
Dangerous
- Tasers can cause abnormal heartbeats, heart attacks, and death.
- Tasers can exacerbate conditions such as anger, alcohol or drug intoxication, and mental illness.
- Tasers can cause excruciating pain.
Inappropriately used
- Tasers are sometimes used as a routine force option rather than an alternative to lethal force.
- Tasers have been used on people who aren’t posing a danger to officers.
- Tasers have been used on unarmed, mentally ill, and intoxicated people.
Other concerns
- Tasers are portable and easy to use, making them susceptible to abuse by unscrupulous officers.
- Tasers are less reliable than their maker has claimed.
While the El Paso Police Department trains officers in groups and replaces the current Tasers with the Taser 10, there may be incidents in which the Taser 10 is used. We’ve been told by several officers that it has already been deployed on a suspect without injury.
Tasers are a good tool for officers to have but remember, two years ago, the El Paso Police Department Tased a suspect who was in mental distress in the Northeast and, while in custody, stopped breathing.
“Training to deal with people who have a mental illness and the like is what we need,” says the Officer from Central El Paso. “We don’t need the Taser 10 or ‘mental health’ officers who can’t do their job.”