Taser and XREP

Everyone’s going wireless — and that now included Taser, the company that makes the stun gun that’s been in the news so sadly of late. We don’t usually blog about technology here if it’s used to convey something other than information, and legal information at that. But I thought that those of us in the world of law should have a certain degree of familiarity with the tools that are used by (the other?) forces of social control. So here’s a quick note about Taser’s newest product, XREP, or eXtended Range Electronic Projectile. This small projectile is fired from a 12-gauge shotgun and is effective at 100 feet, delivering 50,000 volts of neuromuscular incapacitation (NMI in the jargon). The victim is down for twenty seconds.

There’s an article in the Toronto Star on this development, containing some opinion from local coroners on the danger of Tasers. And, of course, the Taser website has the technical details all done up in fetching camo.