Alberta to check whether older Tasers are operating properly

Alberta will test all X26 model Tasers being used by police in the province, after a CBC News and Radio-Canada probe found some of the stun guns deliver a higher level of electricity than the manufacturer promises.

The independent testing will start in January and is expected to take up to two months to complete, the province announced Thursday.

While some other jurisdictions are pulling the older devices from use until test results come back, Alberta officers will still have them at their disposal.

"We're just not comfortable with pulling 400 of them out of service at this point in time," said Solicitor General Fred Lindsay. "When you look at the number of incidents I think from 2005 to 2007, the Tasers were used about 2,100 times and in a lot of those cases, they saved lives, and we want to make sure that's still a tool our officers can use."

A protocol will be set up with the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology and the Southern Alberta Institute of Technologyto testthe roughly 400X26 model Tasers purchased by Alberta police services before Jan. 1, 2006, he said.

If a Taser is found not to be operating to manufacturer specifications, it will then be pulled from service.

In a series of CBC-commissioned tests on 41 stun guns, four of the units delivered significantly more current than Taser International says is possible. In some cases, the current was up to 50 per cent stronger than specified on the devices.

This week, municipal police forces in B.C. joined the RCMP in suspending the use of all Tasers bought before Jan. 1, 2006, to conduct tests on them.

Police forces in Ottawa and Winnipeg, and the Quebec and Nova Scotia governments have also removed older Tasers from service as a result of the CBC story.

Taser International called the testing "flawed" on Wednesday.

"To give credit to CBC, they also took it upon themselves to do some testing, and anytime you get two different experts involved in testing a device, there's some controversy around which testing is more accurate," said Lindsay, who is also the minister of public security.