Gardaí to use banned weapon

A CONTROVERSIAL non-fatal weapon due to be given to gardaí has been withdrawn from use by other police forces around the world because it proved too dangerous.

Bean-bag shot, an alternative to plastic bullets, is a square or circular fabric bag containing lead shot which is intended to flatten on impact spreading its energy over a large area.

The rounds, fired from a 12-guage shotgun are intended to be non-fatal.

Justice Minister Michael McDowell last month formerly authorised the acquisition and introduction of the bean bag round in Ireland.

Responding to a parliamentary question on the matter, Mr McDowell said three new non-lethal devices would be given to the Garda’s Emergency Response Unit (ERU).

Apart from the bean-bag round, ERU officers are to receive pepper spray and a shotgun cartridge which releases gas.

Police in Los Angeles are currently taking the manufacturers of the bean-bag round to court after a series of injuries and at least one fatality. In its claim against the manufacturers the LAPD claims it was never informed of the dangers of the bean bag round.

The round has also been banned from several British forces and was criticised by a recent research project carried out by the Patten Commission on policing in the North which ruled out use of the controversial weapon on safety grounds.

Amnesty International’s Jim Loughran last night criticised the introduction of the bean-bag round.

“Throughout the troubles the use of plastic bullets has been an unacceptable cause of loss of life and serious injury in the North and now here we have an Garda Siochana supposedly introducing a less deadly alternative to plastic bullets and yet we find the PSNI has eliminated it completely because of the risk of death and injury,” he said.

But a Garda spokeswoman said a review group had approved the weapon and an implementation team was already assessing different suppliers.

She said: “A high level review group from within An Garda Siochana sat and examined best practices with regard to these issues and arrived at their conclusions. The acquisition of these items has been fully approved.”