Fired/Discharged Tasers - 549/2021

Request:

1. For each calendar year 2018, 2019 and 2020 and the period 1st January 2021 to 29th June 2021, could you please tell me:

   1. How many times your police officers fired/discharged Tasers at people (i.e. in drive stun mode, angled drive stun mode or fired so that the barbs are discharged at the subject)?

   2. The age range (i.e. youngest to oldest) of the people who police officers fired/discharged Tasers at?

   3. For your answer to question 2, could you provide brief details of the incidents involving the youngest and oldest person tasered?

   4. How many times your police officers fired/discharged Tasers at an animal (i.e. in drive stun mode, angled drive stun mode or fired so that the barbs are discharged)?
   5. The type of animals (including breed if the animal is a dog) that police officers fired/discharged Tasers at?

 

 

Response:

Questions 1-3:

I can confirm that Dyfed-Powys Police does hold the information requested, the details of which are as follows:

Please note: Dyfed Powys police force is part of a Joint Firearms unit, however the information provided in the below table relates only to instances in which a Dyfed Powys Police officer has discharged a taser in the Dyfed Powys police force area.  The table does not include instances in which a Joint Firearms unit Police officer from another force has discharged a taser in the Dyfed Powys police force area.

	Question 1	Question 2	Question 3
Year	No. of times a police officer has discharged a taser	Age range (youngest to oldest) *	Incident details/threat
2018	17	18 - 24 to 55 - 64	1 x bladed article threat; 1 x threat of violence
2019	14	18 - 24 to 55 - 64	2 x bladed article threat
2020	31	under 18 to 55 - 64	1 x bladed article threat; 1 x threat of violence
2021 (up to June 29th)	13	under 18 to 45 - 54	1 x threat not stated/no information held; 1 x threat of violence

*Please note age ranges have been provided as opposed to specific ages to avoid the potential use of exemptions

 

Questions 4 & 5:

I can confirm that there is no information held by Dyfed-Powys Police as there have been no animals tasered in the time frame requested.

 

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It should be noted that as a result of the systems adopted by Dyfed-Powys Police in relation to the recording of such information that the information released may or may not be accurate.

Furthermore, it should also be noted that Police forces in the United Kingdom are routinely required to provide crime statistics to government bodies and the recording criteria is set nationally. However, the systems used for recording these figures are not generic, nor are the procedures used locally in capturing the crime data. It should be noted that for these reasons this force's response to your questions should not be used for comparison purposes with any other response you may receive.