The Only Ones Shocking Baby's Enough

Guard Uses Taser on Man Holding Newborn

HOUSTON (AP) - "In a confrontation captured on videotape, a hospital security guard fired a stun gun to stop a defiant father from taking home his newborn, sending both man and child crashing to the floor. Now the man says the baby girl suffers from head trauma because she was dropped.

"I've got to wonder what kind of moron would Tase an adult holding a baby," said George Kirkham, a former police officer and criminologist at Florida State University. "It doesn't take rocket science to realize the baby is going to fall."

The April 13 episode began when William Lewis, 30, said he and his wife felt mistreated by staff at the Woman's Hospital of Texas so they decided to leave. Hospital employees told him doctors would not allow it, but Lewis picked up the baby and strode to a bank of elevators.

The elevators would not move because wristband sensors on each baby shut off the elevators if anyone takes an infant without permission. Lewis, who gave the video to The Associated Press, said his daughter landed on her head, but it cannot be seen on the video.

He said the baby continues to suffer ill effects from the fall. "She shakes a lot and cries a lot," Lewis said, noting doctors have performed several MRIs on the child, Karla. "She's not real responsive. Something is definitely wrong with my daughter."

It was not clear whether the baby received any electrical jolt.

David Boling, an off-duty Houston police officer working security at the hospital, and another security guard can be seen on the surveillance video arriving at the elevators and trying to talk with Lewis.

Lewis appears agitated as he walks around the elevators holding his daughter in his right arm. Within 40 seconds of arriving, Boling is holding the Taser. He walks around Lewis and whispers to the other guard, who moves to Lewis' right side.

About a minute later, Boling can be seen casually standing near Lewis, not looking in his direction, when he suddenly raises the Taser and fires it at Lewis, who was still holding his daughter.

"I repeatedly offered a warning in a loud and clear voice," Officer Boling said in his defense, "ordering the baby to step away from the man holding her, and drop to the ground with her hands behind her back..."

Some 11,000 U.S. law enforcement agencies use Tasers, which some experts say are increasingly being used as a convenient labor-saving device to control uncooperative people.