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Ketamine that's injected during arrests draws new scrutiny

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Re: Ketamine that's injected during arrests draws new scrutiny

#201

Post by Natsu »

tehwebguy wrote: post #158

Police should never be permitted to direct medical professionals to do anything to a person in their custody unless it is to save their life. Medical professionals should be hyper-trained on how to tell police “hell no” and to report their requests to an independent agency for investigation. There are other types of scenarios where out of control cops bully doctors and nurses into doing illegal things, two that I hav…

It's used as a treatment for drug overdoses ("excited delerium") which appears to be why it was used here. Of course it's a catch-all term, there's no way to tell offhand just what street drugs someone is on. There has to be a reason it took half a dozen people to hold him down.

Also, there's no mention in this article of police directing the paramedics to do anything. Can you point me to what gave you that idea?

Re: Ketamine that's injected during arrests draws new scrutiny

#202

Post by kgin »

mortehu wrote: post #103
axaxs wrote: post #3

Why are we injecting people during arrests, which by definition are not yet guilty people? Even if nobody had died, this is absurd.

If you are resisting arrest, you may still be presumed innocent of the original crime. However you're almost certainly guilty of resisting lawful arrest, which is usually a misdemeanor. There's no exemption that allows innocent people to resist lawful arrest. This is not to say that injection sounds like a great solution for everyday arrests.

I don't love the government-owns-your-body aspect to this.

Re: Ketamine that's injected during arrests draws new scrutiny

#203

Post by Stupulous »

quadrifoliate wrote: post #173
GhostVII wrote: post #132

Pretty much everywhere in the world, paramedics are allowed to inject sedatives when treating a patient. Ketamine is used in many places (the US, UK, Canada, Australia, Austria) by paramedics, because it is very safe relative to other sedatives. So the main concern should whether or not police are ordering EMS to administer it when it is not actually required (police do not administer it themselves), since I don't th…

8 cases across three years in one city, where some of those cases were just paramedics asking for a second opinion, does not seem to indicate a very widespread issue across the US, especially when the city being investigated is know to have a bad police department. First of all, it's a big jump from "the article only mentions 8 cases across the US" to "there were only 8 cases across the US". The case of Elijah McClai…

I agree that this is something that should never happen at all, but you're hyperbolizing the parent's statement. They didn't say there are only 8 cases in the US, they said it's uncommon.

Taking Minneapolis as an average (parent believes they are worse than average), it happens to .00063% of the population there per year or 1890 Americans per year. I'm having trouble finding the arrest rate in Minneapolis, which would help get to a more accurate estimate.

Re: Ketamine that's injected during arrests draws new scrutiny

#204

Post by Natsu »

quadrifoliate wrote: post #173
GhostVII wrote: post #132

Pretty much everywhere in the world, paramedics are allowed to inject sedatives when treating a patient. Ketamine is used in many places (the US, UK, Canada, Australia, Austria) by paramedics, because it is very safe relative to other sedatives. So the main concern should whether or not police are ordering EMS to administer it when it is not actually required (police do not administer it themselves), since I don't th…

8 cases across three years in one city, where some of those cases were just paramedics asking for a second opinion, does not seem to indicate a very widespread issue across the US, especially when the city being investigated is know to have a bad police department. First of all, it's a big jump from "the article only mentions 8 cases across the US" to "there were only 8 cases across the US". The case of Elijah McClai…

> First of all, it's a big jump from "the article only mentions 8 cases across the US" to "there were only 8 cases across the US".

The parent does not make that jump, it merely cites 8 cases over 3 years in one city and asks if there isn't more evidence. And that does not even allege police directing paramedics to do things (as claimed in another thread here), just people discussing the situation with each other.

Re: Ketamine that's injected during arrests draws new scrutiny

#205

Post by esperent »

notassigned wrote: post #197

I don't think it's helpful to assume the police were racist.

Absolutely true. However, there is not much assuming being done. The absolutely stark, clear, and unassailable fact that many police in the US are violent, racist thugs has been repeatedly shoved into my face over the last few months. Not all of them are, by any means. But even the good cops are part of a system that enables and rewards racist, thuggish behavior.

Re: Ketamine that's injected during arrests draws new scrutiny

#206

Post by mindslight »

JohnBooty wrote: post #157
p0llard wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in a country where we don't inject people with ketamine on the street, nor do "criminals run amok". We also don't have armed gangs imposing "their own idea of a justice system", and we have fewer police killings in 25 years than the US has in 25 days. I imagine your comment is probably symptomatic of the major societal issues within the US; it certainly worsens the image of the US to those fortunate enough to…

I live in a country where we don't inject people with ketamine on the street, nor do "criminals run amok". We also don't have armed gangs imposing "their own idea of a justice system", and we have fewer police killings in 25 years than the US has in 25 days. As an American, the parent poster is an unfortunate and common example of the sort of attitude that is common here. It is at least partially the result of Americ…

> most Americans have never been to a place where there is low crime and low police brutality and thus literally cannot even imagine it.

nit: They haven't been to a place where there is low crime, low police brutality, and high population density. To most observers, most of the US is low crime and low police brutality. From this perspective, violent police are a city problem where things are so out of control that the police have no choice but to act that way.

(I don't why this is getting downvoted. I'm certainly not condoning the state of affairs, just trying to elaborate on the perspective that keeps supporting the uniformed criminals)

Re: Ketamine that's injected during arrests draws new scrutiny

#208

Post by vorpalhex »

TeaDrunk wrote: post #195
hansvm wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There's no exemption that allows innocent people to resist lawful arrest. It's a bit murkier than that in the US. In some states you can't even resist unlawful arrest, but in all states you're allowed to defend yourself against _excessive_ force. In practice that's probably a bad idea, but if you survive the retaliation from somebody who's armed and who has already proven themselves prone to excessive use of force…

It says that on the books that you’re allowed to defend against excessive force, but they’ll still charge you for assault for bleeding on their uniform. (And then only retract this when the media outcry becomes too difficult to ignore.)

Being charged is not the same as being found guilty. Cops are not lawyers or judges.

Re: Ketamine that's injected during arrests draws new scrutiny

#209

Post by aazaa »

> Police stopped Elijah McClain on the street in suburban Denver last year after deeming the young Black man suspicious. He was thrown into a chokehold, threatened with a dog and stun gun, then subjected to another law enforcement tool before he died: a drug called ketamine.

From the very beginning this story makes no sense. Suspicious is not a crime.

An earlier story makes things seem even worse:

> While McClain was making his trip to the store, someone had called 911 to report a suspicious person. Referring to McClain, the caller described him wearing a mask said he looked "sketchy" but added that "he might be a good person or a bad person." When asked, the caller told the operator that there were no weapons and that no one was in danger. The operator advised him that officers were on their way to check it out.

https://abcnews.go.com/US/happened-elijah-mcclain-protests-b...

Wearing a ski mask in public during the summer, although odd, is not a crime, either.

Re: Ketamine that's injected during arrests draws new scrutiny

#210

Post by [deleted] »

mortehu wrote: post #103
axaxs wrote: post #3

Why are we injecting people during arrests, which by definition are not yet guilty people? Even if nobody had died, this is absurd.

If you are resisting arrest, you may still be presumed innocent of the original crime. However you're almost certainly guilty of resisting lawful arrest, which is usually a misdemeanor. There's no exemption that allows innocent people to resist lawful arrest. This is not to say that injection sounds like a great solution for everyday arrests.

[deleted]
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