Dozens of deaths reveal risks of injecting sedatives into people restrained by police

[Stevicus]

Dozens of deaths reveal risks of injecting sedatives into people restrained by police

The medical syringe has become a tool of control during police encounters, a practice that quietly spread based on questionable science.

apnews.com

Jackson’s 2021 death illustrates an often-hidden way fatal U.S. police encounters end: not with the firing of an officer’s gun but with the silent use of a medical syringe.

At least 94 people died after they were given sedatives and restrained by police from 2012 through 2021, according to findings by the AP in collaboration with FRONTLINE (PBS) and the Howard Centers for Investigative Journalism. That’s nearly 10% of the more than 1,000 deaths identified during the investigation of people subdued by police in ways that are not supposed to be fatal. About half of the 94 who died were Black, including Jackson.

Behind the racial disparity is a disputed medical condition called excited delirium, which fueled the rise of sedation outside hospitals. Critics say its purported symptoms, including “superhuman strength” and high pain tolerance, play into racist stereotypes about Black people and lead to biased decisions about who needs sedation.

The use of sedatives in half these incidents has never been reported, as scrutiny typically focuses on the actions of police, not medics. Elijah McClain’s 2019 death in Aurora, Colorado, was a rare exception: Two paramedics were convicted of giving McClain an overdose of ketamine, the same drug given to Jackson. One was sentenced last month to five years in prison and the other was sentenced Friday to 14 months in jail and probation.

It was impossible to determine the role sedatives may have played in each of the 94 deaths, which often involved the use of other potentially dangerous force on people who had taken drugs or consumed alcohol. Medical experts told the AP their impact could be negligible in people who were already dying; the final straw that triggered heart or breathing failure in the medically distressed; or the main cause of death when given in the wrong circumstances or mishandled.

While sedatives were mentioned as a cause or contributing factor in a dozen official death rulings, authorities often didn’t even investigate whether injections were appropriate. Medical officials have traditionally viewed them as mostly benign treatments. Now some say they may be playing a bigger role than previously understood and deserve more scrutiny.

It seems irresponsible to dispense medications to total strangers on the street without knowing their medical history, or whether they have other drugs or alcohol in their system.

Time and time again, the AP found, agitated people who were held by police facedown, often handcuffed and with officers pushing on their backs, struggled to breathe and tried to get free. Citing combativeness, paramedics administered sedatives, further slowing their breathing. Cardiac and respiratory arrest often occurred within minutes.

The actions of the paramedics should also be scrutinized if they're improperly sedating people.

Paramedics drugged some people who were not a threat to themselves or others, violating treatment guidelines. Medics often didn’t know whether other drugs or alcohol were in people’s systems, although some combinations cause serious side effects.

Police officers sometimes improperly encouraged paramedics to give shots to suspects they were detaining.

Responders occasionally joked about the medications’ power to knock their subjects out. “Night, night” is heard on videos before deaths in California, Tennessee and Florida.

Emergency medical workers, “if they aren’t careful, can simply become an extension of the police’s handcuffs, of their weapons, of their nightsticks,” said Claire Zagorski, a former paramedic and an addiction researcher at the University of Texas at Austin.

Jokingly saying "Night, night" just before killing them.

We need a serious overhaul in law enforcement practices in this country. Besides, don't they have to have a doctor's order to dispense medications?

Supporters say there are some situations where sedation might be warranted, such as in drug-related behavioral emergencies and psychotic episodes.

Supporters say sedatives enable rapid treatment for drug-related behavioral emergencies and psychotic episodes, protect front-line responders from violence and are safely administered thousands of times annually to get people with life-threatening conditions to hospitals. Critics say forced sedation should be strictly limited or banned, arguing the medications, given without consent, are too risky to be administered during police encounters.

But even an early proponent of the practice has since changed his view after seeing it being abused as it has been:

Ohio State University professor Dr. Mark DeBard was an important early proponent of sedation, believing it could be used in rare cases when officers encountered extremely agitated people who needed rapid medical treatment. Today, he said he’s frustrated officers still sometimes use excessive force instead of treating those incidents as medical emergencies. He’s also surprised paramedics have given unnecessary injections by overdiagnosing excited delirium.

Others say the premise was flawed, with sedatives and police restraint creating a dangerous mix. The deaths have left a trail of grieving relatives from coast to coast.

“They’re running around on the streets administering these heavy-duty medications that could be lethal,” said Honey Gutzalenko, a nurse whose husband died after he was injected with midazolam in 2021 while restrained by police near San Francisco. “It’s just not right.”

It's bad enough that they can shoot people and get away with it, but giving them the discretionary power to inject people with potentially lethal drugs is too much. This should stop.

 

[☆Dreamwind☆]

Why are people so horrible to each other?

 

[Shadow Wolf]

It seems irresponsible to dispense medications to total strangers on the street without knowing their medical history, or whether they have other drugs or alcohol in their system.

Extremely so, as well as unethical and immoral.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

Why are people so horrible to each other?

American policing is based on hunting run away slaves.