NSW police are drawing their Tasers much more often than two years ago – and experts warn they come with risk
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Roberto Curti was having a bad LSD trip when he stole two packets of Tim Tams from a Sydney convenience store in 2012. After a witness called police, the operator mistakenly logged it as an armed robbery. A coroner would later describe the police officers’ response as “like schoolboys in Lord of the Flies”. The 21-year-old from Brazil died after police shot him with a Taser up to 14 times, hit him with batons and pepper-sprayed him at close range.
The case put a spotlight on use of force by the New South Wales police. Since then, more safeguards have been added into the procedures, including outlines of “exceptional circumstances” in which a Taser shouldn’t be used.