LIFE IN PRISON STUNNING TECHNOLOGY
Cusac, Anne-Marie
LIFE IN PRISON Stunning Technology Correction cowboys get a charge out of their new sci-fi weapon BY ANNE-MARIE CUSAC Introducing the penal industry's latest toy: It's called a stun belt. An...
...he says...
...the Stun Tech trainer...
...The electrodes are often applied to the most sensitive parts of the body...
...They also let me in on some new ideas: a cannon-like instrument that shoots a sticky net, disorienting lights, sounds that cause nausea, sticky foam, aqueous foam "doped with pepper spray," and a gun that heats its victim's body up to 107 degrees Fahrenheit...
...As I sit talking with Kronke, a second officer walks in...
...In December 1994, Bruce Sons was on trial for the murder of a California highway patrol officer...
...Although a blast of between one and three seconds is enough to paralyze almost anyone temporarily, the manufacturer set the timer at eight seconds in order to account for differences in bodily resistance to the belt, explains Kronke...
...But Jimmy Wood, the Coryell County justice of the peace who conducted an inquiry into Landis's death, has a different story to tell...
...I argued that it was a Nazi torture device...
...Stun Tech advertises that every activation has been "100 percent successful...
...Politicians are more interested in their standing in the polls than in good correctional practice...
...A 1990 study by the British Forensic Science Service came to some rather different conclusions...
...Morgan holds the door as I peer into a narrow, darkened room where an inmate lies motionless on a small cot, a sheet pulled over his head...
...I was worried that they would accidentally stun him into the middle of next week—which proved to be a true prediction," says Eisenberg...
...For Ganger, stun belts, like the chain gangs themselves, are a gimmick...
...He prepared himself psychologically to withstand the belt...
...Meanwhile, John McDermit, president of Nova Products, Inc., the maker of the shield, denied that it had killed Landis...
...The muscles in my stomach clench...
...Sons was forced to wear a stun belt...
...Acts of torture and severe ill-treatment using new electronic devices have been reported in at least fourteen countries, says Brian Wood of Amnesty...
...belt come accompanied by an affidavit signed by a single medical doctor, Robert Stratbucker of the University of Nebraska Medical Center...
...You can't determine the conduction mechanism in a heart...
...They are all quite proud of the newest "less-lethal" technologies...
...We think that just happened to be a timing problem...
...Seven more are considering it...
...Patients who have endured this form of torture report lingering psychological symptoms, "anything from depression to loss of appetite...
...does in other states...
...The medical affidavit, which accompanies advertising materials on the R.E.A.C.T...
...The way electrical torture is used, says Shenson, "is often to inflict maximal pain...
...Kaufman is right: The video is graphic...
...Both come attached to a nine-volt battery...
...He points out that the belt has never caused anyone to defecate or killed anyone...
...It was like a chicken in a fox coop...
...Some are potentially deadly (sticky foam, for instance, can seal a person's lungs...
...Moreover, once the R.E.A.C.T...
...The belt must have been set off by an interfering radio signal, he says...
...Jim Kronke, a Stun Tech distributor and trainer, calls the belt's effect on prisoners "very psychological," adding that, "at trials, people notice that the defendant will be watching whoever has the monitor...
...The belt went off accidentally, shocking Sons...
...Guards frequently use the shield when removing prisoners from their cells...
...McDermit continues to believe that Landis's death was mere coincidence...
...But under the new Wisconsin provision, this is likely to change...
...He had built up a tolerance to electricity by taking "hits" with the electronic restraining device...
...Now comes the problem...
...If there's an attempted escape or an attack on the guard, that's going to be a split-second decision...
...Although Stun Tech limits the R.E.A.C.T...
...The painful blast, which Stun Tech representatives advertise as "devastating," knocks most of its victims to the floor, where they may shake uncontrollably and remain incapacitated for as long as fifteen minutes...
...This is to say that a stun device could potentially kill someone...
...I don't think our defense against an internal enemy is any different from a defense against an external enemy that might be threatening our borders," says Sherman Block, sheriff of Los Angeles County...
...He describes the time when he allowed himself to be shocked with the belt...
...a physician and co-director of the Pelican Bay Information Project (which monitors human-rights abuses at Pelican Bay prison in California), says that stun belts "have the same problems as tasers...
...He asks me if I have received the video...
...The belt can be set off repeatedly, with only a one-second delay between shocks...
...Goodson explains that this is a problem with all pulsed electrical stun technology...
...That wouldn't go over in our society...
...People with seizures have real problems...
...Officers in his training courses generally stun themselves in the large thigh muscle—not the place, it occurs to me, where an officer is likely to shock a disobedient inmate...
...and suggests that documented accidents are the result of operator error...
...Having dealt with the stun gun, I know that that was implemented without a good medical evaluation...
...The use of the stun belt in U.S...
...But human-rights groups are aghast...
...There are about thirty people jumping around like Mexican jumping beans.' he says...
...I round a corner and come face to face with a large elevator door, which immediately opens...
...People who are out in the sun, sweating, with dehydration and electrolyte imbalances—those people are also at risk," says Start...
...He tells me the other officers have nicknamed him 'Fifty...
...Stun Tech's record for accidental activations is even more so...
...Kaufman also blames fear for any potential physical danger...
...It's almost physically impossible to put bunks in some of these rooms...
...Sixteen state correctional agencies currently use the belt...
...To cover the gap, the industry stresses the importance of manipulating the American public's fear of crime...
...The British scientists found that high-voltage, high-peak, short-duration pulses, such as those which the stun belt inflicts, are dangerous...
...According to Jimmy Wood, Landis's autopsy showed that he died as a result of cardiac dirhythmia due to coronary blockage following electric shock by an electronic stun shield...
...Oswald, who appeared in court in a wheelchair throughout his trial, was, according to Eisenberg, unable to walk and unable to run...
...Stun Tech's Kaufman is eager to begin marketing the belt to other countries...
...The door unlatches...
...People who have undergone this kind of torture have reported intense pain, muscle contractions, lost bowel control, vomiting, and urination...
...In one word: adrenaline...
...Two metal prongs, positioned just above the left kidney, leave welts that can take up to six months to heal...
...I talk to less-lethal weapons manufacturers, representatives of the National Institute of Justice, officials of the Rome and Phillips laboratories, and executives of correctional facihties...
...Now corrections personnel shoot from farther away...
...But it is primarily due to overcrowding," he says...
...prisons should be relying on...
...The Stun Tech R.E.A.C.T...
...the sticky net, shot at close range, has knocked the head off of many a dummy...
...Do you see the danger here...
...Like many other Texas corrections workers, Harry Landis was in training to use the electric riot shield...
...The shield worked as it was intended to," says Mark Goodson, an engineer who conducted tests on the shield following Landis's death...
...An electronic shocking device secured to a person's waist, it is the hot new item in corrections gear...
...The fear will elevate blood pressure as much as the shock will...
...The belt may affect prisoners assigned to work crews differently than it does someone who has not recently undergone strenuous physical activity...
...The stun belt and its relatives are supposed to be nonlethal or, at the very least, less-lethal...
...The manufacturer puts in its literature that the shield will not hurt anyone, including people with a heart condition...
...Conference participants thrill to the idea of combating "internal enemies...
...As long as it is not used for officer gratification or punishment, liability is non-existent...
...Bureau of Prisons officially adopts an instrument like the stun belt, "the danger is that this belt—like other U.S...
...The stun belt's popularity is linked to the return of the chain gang...
...His attorney, Troy Childers, requested that the belt be removed...
...Guards love it because they don't have to get near prisoners who wear the belt...
...belt, he warns me that many viewers find the footage graphic...
...belt, advertise its ability to shock from as far as 600 feet away...
...An anesthetized pig is very different from a human being in dread of electrocution...
...I was going to count 'one thousand one, one thousand two.' I never heard the beep...
...Landis was in fairly decent shape as far as physical appearance is concerned," he says...
...A one- to two-second shock, said the scientists, would probably cause the victim to collapse...
...Kronke has me sit in a chair, press the prongs against my leg, look up at him, and pull the trigger...
...If you engage in sane correctional practice, you can set up totally secure work crews without any of the theatrical accouterments that are unneeded...
...The reason is that, if they have to wear it for eight hours, there's a tremendous amount of anxiety...
...Inmates who are considered escape risks or who are deemed dangerous to the public are usually kept off the chain gangs...
...One guard, panicked by the shock, dives headlong into a portable movie screen and a metal cart...
...Despite the pain involved, some officers seem to take pleasure in attempting to defy the belt...
...We don't recommend that it be placed on anyone who has a heart condition...
...Wisconsin may be the first in line, but it is not likely to be the only state with stun-belted work crews...
...Michael Keith, president of MK Ballistic Systems, maker of the beanbag bullet (coarse material stuffed with lead shot), explains how such products develop: "All technology starts low-tech," he says...
...Every time a plane crashes thev blame the plane, not the pilot...
...belt is not equipped with a switch that would allow a guard to end an unintentional activation...
...Even if, as often happens, the belt knocks its wearer to the floor after a half-second, the wearer must endure the entire eight-second stun...
...Yes, says Kaufman, "We can deal with certain countries under the Free Trade Agreement without a problem...
...Though his work is in beanbag bullets, not stun technology, Keith has many ideas for improving the belt...
...I ask if one of the devices is a stun gun...
...The court, not convinced that Oswald's disabilities were real, required both shackles and the stun belt...
...It claims that the R.E.A.C.T...
...It publishes National Defense magazine, and organizes many other conferences with such titles as "Enhancing the Individual Warrior," "Undersea Warfare," and "Bomb and Warhead...
...for 50,000 volts...
...It hurt tremendously...
...If corrections is true to form, they have implemented this the same way...
...You can't predict this...
...Oswald claims he was stunned twice, and was being tortured...
...According to the British Forensic Science Service study, they are more severe by nearly two orders of magnitude...
...A voice comes over the loudspeaker, requesting my name...
...I don't call this a stun gun," says Kronke...
...The stun belt looks to be a weapon which will almost certainly result in cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment," a violation of international law, says Brian Wood of Amnesty International, which will launch an international campaign against electronic stun devices this summer...
...I had it all planned out...
...The teams will wear the R.E.A.C.T...
...During conference break-out sessions, we watch film clips from Star Trek, Robo-Cop, Star Wars, Gunsmoke, and Clint Eastwood westerns...
...Justification for the work crews follows the same line of thinking in Wisconsin as it For officers who test out the belt, a Stun Tech trainer offers pocket calculators and T-shirts...
...In their own way, the Stun Tech representatives acknowledge this...
...An inmate who got away would get a jolt every thirty seconds or so until he was "in need of serious medical attention," Keith says...
...Post-traumatic-stress syndrome describes the reaction to electrical injury as well as to other forms of torture," says Douglas Shenson, director of the Human Rights Clinic at Montefiore Hospital and North Central Bronx Hospital...
...At nine in the evening, I arrive at the Outagamie County jail in Ap-pleton, Wisconsin, and press the rear-door buzzer...
...Since the shock is distributed via electric currents throughout the entire body, including the brain, the chest region, and the central nervous system, the researchers concluded that "anyone in contact with the victim's body at the time of shocking was also likely to receive a shock," and that they "could not discount the possibility of ventricular fibrillation...
...Under the conditions for the new Wisconsin work crews, two guards will supervise twelve inmates...
...We have a tremendous idleness problem in our medium- and maximum-security prisons," says Bob Margolies, legislative liaison for the Wisconsin Department of Corrections...
...I guess I don't believe that...
...That includes the genitals...
...Many countries tend to look to the United States to set standards...
...Stun Tech already sells its device, Ultron II, abroad...
...But on December 1,1995, something went terribly wrong...
...Marshals Service and more than 100 county agencies have employed the belt for prisoner transport, courtroom appearances, and medical appointments...
...Corey Weinstein...
...When he served as medical director of the Texas state prison system, stun guns, closely related to the belts, were being employed...
...Think about the public's concern about crime and translate that concern into a national agenda—into new solutions, new technologies," says Jeremy Travis, director of the National Institute of Justice...
...belt's blast to eight seconds, "that doesn't help a prisoner whose torturer may be setting [the belt] off again and again," says Wood...
...Upstairs, I meet Jim Kronke, the Stun Tech trainer...
...I was down on my back, spinning around...
...Nevertheless...
...Still, even Kronke has his doubts about the accidental activations...
...I wouldn't say it should kill him...
...The judge denied Childers's request, demanding that Sons wear the belt until he testified...
...I don't know what else it could have been...
...It feels like two needles...
...According to two physicians, and a 1990 study by the British Forensic Service, electronic devices similar to the belt may cause heart attack, ventricular fibrillation, or arhythmia, and may set off an adverse reaction in people with epilepsy or on psychotropic medications...
...They can set off the eight-second, 50,000-volt stun from as far away as 300 feet...
...The thing that concerns me most is the public image that is left out there that says this is going to fix something, stop crime and violence...
...No one can even define a safe voltage," When i ask Stun Tech's president to send me a promotional video for the belt, he warns me that many viewers find the footage graphic...
...And it will leave some pretty severe marks...
...And the R.E.A.C.T...
...Remote Electronically Activated Control Technology) belt is "100 percent non-lethal...
...No one appears to greet me, and I am slightly disoriented, but have little choice in direction—there are no turnoffs or stray passages here...
...He would install a tracking device and a timer, and make the belt impossible for the wearer to remove...
...Many nations have shown interest," says Kaufman...
...Advertising brochures for the R.E.A.C.T...
...The study describes stun devices as "capable of causing temporary incapacitation of the whole body: a body-widespread immobilizing effect...
...Like the stun belt, the taser, and the stun . gun, the shield is an electronic shocking device...
...Chain-gang members who wear the stun belt will actually be the least dangerous of prisoners...
...How can we build a public demand, and marry that demand to production...
...Ken Morgan, warden at the Racine Correctional Institution, where the first stun-belt-wearing work crews could start as early as January 1997, agrees that there is an idleness problem...
...Kaufman says an independent, refereed medical studv has never been conducted on the R.E.A.C.T...
...You would not want to wear this belt," he says...
...Start questions Stun Tech's claims that the belt is medically safe...
...His own beanbag bullet had to go through some adjustments when corrections officials discovered that, at close range, it punctured bodies...
...Authorities acknowledge that the belt was accidentally set off once, shocking Oswald...
...During the eight-second blast, all are clearly in pain...
...No, he wasn't...
...But was he going to die this day if he didn't experience an electric shock...
...So I ask if I can shock myself with the stun gun...
...Leaving aside the issue of "officer gratification," the belt seems popular precisely for its punishment potential...
...Stun Tech denies that its belt could cause fatalities...
...The state eventually stopped using them...
...Kaufman tells me it does not...
...A new law in Wisconsin assigns twelve-person teams of prisoners to outside work, clearing brush and trash...
...One of the requirements for the eight-hour course necessary for officers who carry stun devices, explains Kronke, is that "you have to stun yourself...
...Countries with records of electrical torture sometimes attempt to obtain samples of these devices in order to manufacture their own, according to an Omega Foundation report...
...In April 1995, James Oswald stood trial for robbery and the murder of a Wisconsin police officer...
...But they have not done studies on people with heart conditions...
...The guy would be frog-jumping in the backseat...
...Sales have been booming since 1994, when the federal Bureau of Prisons decided to use the belt in medium- and high-security lockups...
...Arhythmia mostly happens in healthy hearts...
...For one thing, some at-risk hearts appear healthy...
...The operator does not have to have physical contact with the victim in order to cause pain (manufacturers of a newer version, the R.A.C.C...
...Kronke informs me that I have shocked myself for, "much less than half a second...
...Many of these devices inflict significant pain...
...It makes great party viewing," he says...
...If this is disturbing...
...The question becomes, how tar Jo we gi> in brutali/ation...
...As part of the training, Landis was required to endure two 45,000-volt shocks...
...Everyone going back to chain gangs is looking at this," says Kaufman...
...You shock someone with 50,000 voltss# electricity and that person has some unrecognized congenital problem or conduction mechanism in their heart, and you put them at great risk for arhythmiasays Ar-mand Start, a medical doctor who runs the National Center for Correctional Healthcare Studies...
...I ask if the shock from the stun belt hurts...
...After James Oswald received an unintended jolt, the Waukesha, Wisconsin, court called Kronke in as an adviser...
...Robert Ganger, the executive director of the Correctional Association of New York, sees the new work crews as "part and parcel of the excessive practices that we've been engaged with all around the country...
...It's a form of political show business...
...When I ask Stun Tech president Dennis Kaufman to send me a copy of Stun Tech's promotional video for the R.E.A.C.T...
...An eight-second stun is not required for officers undergoing the six-hour training for the stun belt...
...Torturers favor the new devices because they are easy to use, and tend not to leave obvious or lasting marks...
...Would Stun Tech willingly market the stun belt to prison facilities in China, Mexico, or Saudi Arabia—three countries known for their human-rights abuses...
...When the U.S...
...We're very sorry this happened," McDermit said...
...He leads me into a large, glassed-in office, where several stun devices lie carefully arranged on a table...
...But it only shows law-enforcement and corrections officers wearing the belt...
...Oswald's attorney, Alan Eisen-berg, objected...
...ommend the belt as a psychological tool, an effective deterrent for potentially unruly inmates, and a humane alternative to guns or nightsticks...
...The overcrowding has extended all feeding periods," he says, and doubling inmates in cramped, one-person rooms is common practice...
...Each guard will monitor six inmates, all connected via the belt to the same radio frequency According to Wisconsin State Representative Tammy Baldwin, this means that "there is a lot of potential for stunning the wrong person, or stunning all...
...At the Law Enforcement and Corrections Technology Conference in Los Angeles...
...Amnesty now has cases of torturers shocking children, as well as men and women, with hand-held, high-voltage devices in the most sensitive areas of the human body: "behind their ears, on their necks, in their mouths, in their reproductive organs and rectums...
...As we increase population-wise, we're going to have to rely more and more on technology" But is this the technology U.S...
...They tell me about products already on the market: mace, pepper spray, beanbag bullets, rubber bullets, plastic bullets, and the stun belt...
...My arm and leg jump apart in reflex...
...stun technology—will find its way onto the international market and into the hands of dedicated torturers," says Amnesty's Wood...
...Many of the people who had responsibility for him were friends of the deceased...
...When activated, the stun belt shocks its wearer for eight seconds, with three to four milliamps, and 50,000 volts of "continuous stun power...
...And it is being used even before defendants are proven guilty...
...But the recent death of a Texas corrections officer, who suffered a heart attack shortly after receiving a shock from an electric shield similar in design to the stun belt, raises serious questions about the belt's safety...
...If someone calls it a stun gun I hand it over to the officer and say, 'Please stun yourself with this.' " He holds the stun device up in the air and presses a button...
...He, like Kronke, is a big man, larger than many prisoners...
...Amnesty, the Omega Foundation, and the Journal of the American Medical Association all suggest that the number of "push-button" torture cases is on the rise...
...It does a number on you...
...I'd like to try it sometime to see if I could outlast it," he says...
...However, many officers, Kronke assures me, elect to try it...
...Torturers have been known to give multiple blasts and to run devices continuously over their victims' bodies...
...Morgan's attitude toward the stun-belted work crews is more resigned than enthusiastic: "It's like anything else...
...I would not recommend it...
...With tasers, people on psych nieds have altered neurological responses...
...The police firearm is more reminiscent of Wyatt Earp than it is of Star Trek's Captain Kirk...
...Chase Rieveland, former assistant secretary of the Wisconsin Department of Corrections, who is now serving as secretary of the Washington Department of Corrections, sees the belted work crews as a "symbolic statement," designed to give the public an illusion of increased safety...
...In the few years that the R.E.A.C.T...
...Kaufman says that the company has already talked with Florida, Alabama, and Louisiana about adapting the stun belt to their chain gangs...
...But there certainly was no connection between his training and his death...
...The Wisconsin Department of Corrections suggested the belt as a "humane" alternative to chaining prisoners together...
...The device crackles, and a miniature bolt of lightning leaps between the two metal prongs at its tip...
...Kronke describes officers at the Apple-ton facility who bet each other Mountain Dews, claiming that they will be able to remain standing the entire eight seconds of the shock—a very rare feat...
...Stun Tech's advertising material asserts that "merely wearing the belt is not a violation of civil rights...
...Kaufman says that this should put an end to unintentional activations...
...We will make it work if it comes into effect...
...They conducted their tests on animals—anesthetized animals...
...He did have a history of heart problems...
...We don't even have an idea if it is safe or not for the general population...
...And it's usuallv the pilot's fault...
...Yes, he says...
...stun belt in addition to leg shackles...
...A three- to four-second shock would have an incapacitating effect on the entire body for up to fifteen minutes...
...the company began installing a switch guard on all its belts...
...Since then, the U.S...
...Amnesty has had records of torture with low-voltage cattle prods since the 1970s, but these new varieties of electronic devices—the taser, the stun gun, the electroshock baton, the electric riot shield, and the stun belt—function at a significantly higher voltage than the older variety...
...The manufacturer of the device is Stun Tech, a company based in Cleveland, Ohio...
...He tells me the welts on his back took two months to heal...
...I feel a powerful smack and am immediately fatigued...
...The brunt of it falls on unpopular groups like prisoners, so people don't react...
...On the morning when I visit the Racine prison, Morgan informs me that the day's population is 1,297—377 over capacity...
...I call Kaufman several days later to check some facts...
...Watch his head," yells an off-camera voice...
...For those who do undergo the belt, Kronke offers pocket calculators and T-shirts...
...As a result of this overcrowding, he says, it's impossible to keep everyone busy, though most of the inmates work at food or janitorial service or groundskeeping within the fence...
...I enter the bright hallway...
...Until Wisconsin came up with the idea of stun-belting the chain gangs, most wearers of the belt were people charged with violent offenses, people whom police and correctional officers, or court officials, considered security risks...
...And that has Amnesty International worried...
...Kaufman maintains that the chances of a false activation (the result of an interfering radio signal) are "one in twentv-nine million...
...We do indeed have a technology gap," says Alan Bersin, the conference chairman...
...They just shrug...
...The officers in the Stun Tech video fall onto gym mats, or outside onto grass...
...Stratbucker conducted his tests on anesthetized swine...
...They haven't done studies on people at all...
...Let me put it to you this wav," he savs...
...The stun belt, Keith adds, is "just a modified dog collar...
...Eisenberg believes that the court's insistence that Oswald wear the belt "was part of a multiphase effort to torture this guy...
...About 400 inmates are currently unoccupied...
...Because of the body's reflex reaction to electrical shock, the stun generally lasts less than half a second—that is, less than the average shock needed to "take someone down," and much less than the stun belt's eight-second discharge...
...Stun Tech's promotional materials recAnne-Marie Cusac is the Associate Editor of The Progressive...
...belt, and supposedly proves its safety, discusses only a single application of the stun...
...Several months ago...
...I call it an electric restraining device...
...belt is available in two styles: a one-size-fits-all minimal-security belt (a slim version designed for low visibility in courts), and the high-security transport belt, complete with wrist restraints...
...Although the stun belt has not yet been sold abroad, Amnesty has expressed concern about the use of such electroshock weapons for torture...
...If it ever kills anyone," says Kronke, "I think it's going to be from fright...
...As the stun belt catches on nationally, it may become an attractive export...
...But, he adds, "the technology we are using is not capable of causing a heart attack...
...belt has been on the market, unintentional activations have matched intentional activations—nine times each, according to Stun Tech president Kaufman...
...I ask if Stun Tech conducts research on the prison systems of the countries it ships to...
...The Texas Department of Criminal Justice, which had used the shields to subdue prisoners since September 1995, immediately suspended their use...
...The stun belt would make an ideal torture weapon, Amnesty fears...
...We have numbers, as you can see, sleeping on the floor...
...He tells me the other officers have nicknamed him "Fifty," for 50,000 volts...
...belt goes off, there is no stopping it...
...Many of our prisoners want work...
...There are about thirty people jumping around like Mexican jumping beans," he says...
...Show me a refereed study on this thing...
...The Waukesha, Wisconsin, court system required Oswald to wear the stun belt...
...They're like fluff...
...It was devastating...
...Shortly after the second shock, Landis collapsed and died...
...The electric shock threw his heart into a different rhyfta* beat, causing him to pass away," he says...
...prisons "will inevitably encourage prison authorities—including those in torturing states—to do likewise," says Wood, who believes the chances are very high that the belt will eventually be used for torture...
...Although Stun Tech advises guards not to use the belt on inmates with a known heart condition, this precaution hardly eliminates all potential dangers...
...Although the physical evidence of electrical torture may eventually disappear, the real trauma is psychological—the experience of being shocked into incapacitation and severe pain again and again...
...The sponsor of the Los Angeles conference is the American Defense Preparedness Association...
...Some correctional officers wonder about the belt's real purpose, particularly when it is combined with chain gangs...
...Stratbucker conducted a series of safety tests using the Stun Tech Ultron II—a stun gun—a version of which forms the shock component to the R.E.A.C.T...
...All have been warned and given time to prepare themselves psychologically before the shock...
...States like Wisconsin that are putting prisoners back on the chain gang plan to use the belt to keep them in line...
...Shenson claims that 11 percent of the patients he sees at the Human Rights Clinic report electrical torture...
...When I ask Kronke if he will allow me to try the stun belt, he turns grave...
Vol. 60 • July 1996 • No. 7
