Epileptic Man Tasered and Beaten By Police During Seizure

I saw this story via Reddit (quickly becoming my favorite news site, by the way).

To quote from the article:

"...a Michigan man with epilepsy, who, when experiencing a seizure, apparently was unjustifiably tasered, clubbed, arrested, jailed and committed to a psychiatric facility for violent offenders -- all based on non-threatening behaviors caused by a seizure."

Wow. It's apparent to me that in the particular case of Daniel Beloungea, the epileptic in question, because he was unable to comply with the orders of the police they viewed his non-compliance as an act of rebellion, and acted to stamp it out immediately.

The actions of the police officers in question are a perfect example of police abuse and further evidence of a nascent police state.

The police in question state that their actions were completely justified and that he was playing with himself in the park and lunged at the deputies with a weapon:

"He reportedly advanced on a deputy after being Tasered, ripping the barbed dart from his stomach and pointing it towards the deputy. He had to be dropped to the ground with a baton blow to the leg.

Beloungea was jailed and charged with disorderly conduct and resisting and obstructing an officer. On his lawyer's advice he pled not guilty by reason of insanity and spent 20 days under evaluation at a state forensic center.
...
Undersheriff Mike McCabe said deputies are trained for medical emergencies and stressed their actions were justifiable."

Apparently his men need more training.

As an epileptic I can tell you that when I've had seizures I'm completely disoriented during and after and my wife reports that I thrash about violently during the seizure. I don't have the partial seizures that Mr. Beloungea has, but rather, full clonic-tonic (grand mal) seizures, so it's more clear what I'm undergoing. Every time I've had a seizure, the ambulance gets called and the police come along as well, more to help the EMTs if I'm completely uncontrollable.

I can't imagine the horror for my wife if in the middle of a seizure the cop bursts in and starts beating me with a baton. My heart goes out to Mr. Beloungea and his family, and I hope that the deputies in question are punished for their reckless endangerment of a man who was clearly not a threat to them, but in terrible need of medical help.