Archive for September, 2007
CLAY COUNTY, Fla. — A Clay County woman’s family said it’s seeking justice after their loved one died shortly after being shocked 10 times with Taser guns during a confrontation with police.
In April 2006, officers with the police department said they were called to a disturbance at a home in the 400 block of Harrison Street just before 5 p.m. In a 911 call made to the Green Cove Springs, Delafield can be heard telling a dispatcher that she believed she was in danger:
Dispatcher: And what’s the problem?
Delafield: My sister is waiting on my property.
Dispatcher: Your what?
Delafield: My sister (inaudible) is on my property trying to harm me.
Officers said they arrived to find Delafield in a wheelchair, armed with two knives and a hammer. Police said the woman was swinging the weapons at family members and police. Within an hour of her call to 911, Delafield, a wheelchair-bound woman documented to have mental illness, was dead.
Family attorney Rick Alexander said Delafield’s death could have been prevented and that there are four things that jump out at him about the case.
“One, she’s in a wheelchair. Two, she’s schizophrenic. Three, they’re using a Taser on a person that’s in a wheelchair, and then four is that they tasered her 10 times for a period of like two minutes,” Alexander said.
According to a police report, one of the officers used her Taser gun nine times for a total of 160 seconds and the other officer discharged his Taser gun once for a total of no more than five seconds. A medical examiner found Delafield died from hypertensive heart disease and cited the Taser gun shock as a contributing factor, the report said. On her death certificate, the medical examiner ruled Delafield’s death a homicide.
The family said it plans to sue the Green Coves Springs Police Department now that it has all the reports regarding their loved one’s death. “We’re going to try to compensate the estate and the family and try to get justice,” Alexander said.
He said he believes the evidence weighs heavily in favor of Delafield’s family and that justice will be served. “I think that this evidence is going to show, along with some of the evidence we’ve collected outside of here, that there is no reason Emily Delafield should have died that day,” Alexander said. He said he plans to file a notice to sue sometime before the end of the year.
Read it here. WJXT-TV
WARSAW (Reuters) – A Polish computer programmer could face up to three years in jail for linking a Polish word for penis to the presidential Web site.
Marek W., 23, created a programme that caused the official home page of Polish President Lech Kaczynski to rank first in the list of results on the Google search engine when “kutas”, a vulgar term in Polish, was typed in by an Internet user.
The computer programme did something similar to a practice known as “Google bombing” that links the Web sites of politicians and companies to insulting words or phrases.
He has been charged with insulting the president and prosecutors said on Friday he could face up to three years in jail if convicted.
“This is not a matter of freedom of speech,” said Andrzej Holdys, a regional prosecutor in the southern town of Cieszyn, where the programmer lives.
“If somebody uses a derogatory word to libel the head of state than it’s a clear insult which violates the law.”
Police said the suspect confessed to writing a programme to test his skills at creating a Google bomb. Police and prosecutors did not give the programmer’s full name, as is usual when someone faces charges in Poland. He has not been detained.
President Kaczynski and his twin brother, the prime minister, have been popular targets for jokes and caricatures both in Poland and abroad. They are referred to as the “ducks” because their name is related to the Polish word for the bird.
Jacek Bialas of Amnesty International in Poland criticised the charges against Marek W.. “If the president felt insulted, he should have sued as a private person,” he said
A Venezuelan man who had been declared dead woke up in the morgue in excruciating pain after medical examiners began their autopsy.
Carlos Camejo, 33, was declared dead after a highway accident and taken to the morgue, where examiners began an autopsy only to realize something was amiss when he started bleeding. They quickly sought to stitch up the incision on his face.
“I woke up because the pain was unbearable,” Camejo said, according to a report on Friday in leading local newspaper El Universal.
His grieving wife turned up at the morgue to identify her husband’s body only to find him moved into a corridor — and alive.
Reuters could not immediately reach hospital officials to confirm the events. But Camejo showed the newspaper his facial scar and a document ordering the autopsy.
A woman is admitted to the Sacramento mental hospital, after trying to drive off with a fire engine, half-naked.
Fire officials say the attempted theft happened when they were on a first aid call. The driver of the fire engine says he was at the back of the truck, when he heard the accelerator. He found Schilicia Griffin in the driver’s seat, and pulled her out.
Officials say Griffin was just released from the mental hospital shortly before she tried to steal the truck. She has been re-admitted for evaluation.