Police in Bryant are hitting these streets these days armed with a new tool. They've added tasers to their belts and already deployed them in two separate cases.
Tasers can often be controversial when introduced into any community. But Bryant police say, when used properly, these weapons protect officers and put dangerous suspects off the streets without permanent damage.
Dash cam video shows a March 9 Bryant Police chase. The suspect's pick-up splashes through water at one point, turning around and ramming a squad car.
"It became an assault and the suspect just wasn't going to stop," Captain Phillip Newcomb said.
Moments later, the officer pulls a taser on the victim who slips out of the truck for a brief foot chase.
"Deadly force would have been authorized but the officer had another option and he took that option," Newcomb said.
Newcomb says the officer eventually hit the man with a taser, now part of the Bryant Police patrol.
"I think it's a great tool. The officers can go home safe and that's what we want them to do, and bad guys go to jail," Newcomb said.
Newcomb says, along with that traffic stop-turned police chase, officers deployed their latest tool on an armed robbery suspect running from a McDonalds.
"I'd much rather fire a taser than a fire arm because once you let go of that bullet, you don't have no way of pulling that back," Newcomb said.
Officers seem on board as well.
"Rather than to use physical force or pepper spray which can cloud the air and not only affect the person you just sprayed but yourself," Officer Collin Kane said.
Kane hasn't used his taser yet but when he does, he'll let let caution and common sense drive the way instead.
"We aren't eager to jump on the trigger just to jump on the trigger," Kane said.
Everyone in the police department went through a two-day taser training last month, all the way up to the police chief. And they were all "tasered" in the process to see what it's like.
Newcomb adds they've had problems with officers getting injured on the job before the tasers, coming back with twisted knees, ankles and fingers.
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