No, The Other Guy Police Set on Fire with a Taser Gun

Yesterday I was catching up on reading I missed while I was on vacation. Over at Drug WarRant Pete pointed to a TalkLeft post about a Wisconsin man who was set on fire after being Tasered by Kenosha police.

So -- maybe it was jet lag -- but I figured I was reading a bit more about the same case when I came across this guy-set-on-fire-by-police-Taser story. After a bit of coffee I realized that no, this was a completely different story about cops using a Taser gun to set a guy (this time in Florida) on fire.

So just how usual is this especially barbaric form of cruel and unusual punishment? The Florida case -- you know, the one that happened after the Wisconsin case -- is just about unprecedented, according to a Taser spokesman quoted in the Florida case.

Officials with Taser International -- which manufactures the nonlethal weapon that uses a shock to incapacitate dangerous people -- said they've never heard of anything quite like this before.

"I would call this beyond a rare fluke," spokesman Steve Tuttle said.

[A police officer] said the department is investigating the Monday incident, but so far nothing seems to be amiss with the Taser.

So is this spokesman telling the truth, or do Taser guns set more than a couple of people on fire? I'm prepared to err on the side of calling Tuttle a liar -- considering that the company bills its deadly product "nonlethal" and since it seems fires like these are nowhere near as rare as Taser would have us believe.