Her son never should have been shocked and didn?t have to die, says the mother of the sixth Marylander killed this year by a police stun gun.
“From what I?ve been told, he didn?t do anything to provoke anyone,” said Tanya Thomas, mother of Jerrell Grey, 20, who died early Saturday morning after being shocked a by a Frederick County sheriff?s deputy trying to break up a fight.
“It wasn?t even really a fight; it was just him and his friends play-fighting,” Thomas said.
“There was no reason to shock him.”
Cpl. Jennifer Bailey, a Frederick County Sheriff spokeswoman, said the officer stunned Grey after he refused to take his hands out of his pockets.
“The investigation is preliminary, but it is my understanding he had his hands in his pockets and he was standing,” Bailey said.
“The officer was concerned for his safety and for others.”
Bailey said she did not know how many times Grey had been stunned.
Before Grey?s death, five people had died after being shocked by police stun guns in 2007 ? three in Baltimore city, one in Baltimore County and one in Prince George?s County.
Criminologists said a record number of deaths linked to stun guns may be in part attributed to a lack of training.
“An officer may be turning to the tool prematurely,” said Sheldon Greenberg, associate dean of the division of public safety leadership at Johns Hopkins University?s School of Education.
“Other steps in the continuum of dealing with force may be skipped as they go to the Taser first,” Greenberg said, referring to a popular brand of stun gun.
Coroners nationwide have rarely ruled stun guns the primary cause of death.
But the National Association of Medical Examiners recently established a database to allow coroners to share data from stun gun-related deaths.
“It?s just an effort to look at case reports, newspaper stories, whatever is out there and try to formulate some opinions as to what we need to do,” said Dr. Randy Hanzlick, chief medical examiner in Fulton County, Ga., and one of the database?s primary architects told The Examiner.
