Hesterberg

The adoption of tasers as a law enforcement tool has undoubtedly saved countless lives. Tasers provide law enforcement officers with the opportunity to use intermediate force where they might otherwise have no choice but to utilize deadly force. The advent of tasers, however, has also given law enforcement the opportunity to use a high level of intermediate force where the use qf such a level of force would not have otherwise been possible; in other words, tasers also permit the use of more serious force.

This case asks whether it was objectively reasonable for National Park Service Ranger Sarah Cavallaro to tase Plaintiff Gary Hesterberg, who indisputably posed no danger to Ranger Cavallaro, the public, or himself, but had refused Cavallaro’s command not to leave the scene after she had already warned him about walking his dog off leash and he had complied. Defendant the United States of America insists that if a person disobeys a law enforcement officer’s order to “stay put,” the law enforcement officer has the discretion to tase the person in dart mode if the person might otherwise escape regardless of why the law enforcement officer issued the “stay put” order in the…