Research & Reports

Larry Fedja

INQUEST launch groundbreaking mental health report

police & mental healthall credits: INQUEST
published: 11 February 2015

On Wednesday 11 February 2015, in parliament, INQUEST launched a ground breaking evidence based report Deaths in Mental Health Detention: An investigation framework fit for purpose? 

The report is based on INQUEST’s work with families of those who have died in mental health settings and related policy work. It identifies three key themes:

  1. The number of deaths and issues relating to their reporting and monitoring
  2. The lack of an independent system of pre-inquest investigation as compared to other deaths in detention.
  3. The lack of a robust mechanism for ensuring post-death accountability and learning

It documents concerns about the lack of a properly independent investigation system unlike deaths in prison and police custody which are independently investigated pre-inquest and the consistent failure by most Trusts to ensure the meaningful involvement of families in investigations.

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4WardEverUK

‘Shocking Britain’: controversial roll-out of Tasers

Drawing Taser Gunby: The Justice Gap
published: March 2014

In an interview with The Justice Gap, the national lead for the police force on armed policing, raised the prospect of every officer being kitted out with a Taser weapon.

‘If you talk to the average police officer on the ground they will say: “We want all to be issued with Taser for our own protection, and to protect the public”,’ said Simon Chesterman, deputy chief constable of West Mercia Police.

‘Shocking Britain’ is a documentary made by Matt Spencer for www.thejusticegap.com.

As of last year, there were 14,700 officers trained to use Taser in the UK – see Alastair Logan OBE (Tasers: the ‘non-lethal’ weapon reckoned to have caused more than 500 deaths).

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Larry Fedja

Naphtali speaks out: Fury as ‘lethal’ Taser use on children rises

Tippa Naphtali - 2011-2by: The Sunday Post 
published: 27 October 2013

4WardEver’s Tippa Naphtali speaks out to Sunday Post.

A furious row has broken out over the use of police stun guns on children. Official guidelines warn of potentially fatal consequences if youths are hit by the 50,000-volt Taser devices. But despite this, their use in confrontations with under-18s has rocketed by 1,000% over five years.

Figures show police used the weapons on just 29 occasions in 2007 but that shot up to 323 in 2011, an average of six times a week.

This included firing them outright and doing “drive stuns” in which the device is placed against a youth’s body and fired without causing incapacitation.

Justice campaigners said the soaring use of Tasers on children was a major concern. However police defended their actions.

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