Law enforcement officers should be forbidden from deploying stun grenades, except against a definite threat.
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TOPIC: "Law enforcement officers should be forbidden from deploying stun grenades, except against a definite threat."
Please read these DEFINITIONS carefully:
"Law enforcement officer:" Any law enforcement officer in the United States of America acting within the scope of their official duty. This includes, but is not limited to: municipal police departments; county sheriff's offices; and federal law enforcement agencies, such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation (F.B.I.). This debate is in the context of American law enforcement only, and, by virtue of its topic, is focused on paramilitary-style Special Weapons and Tactics (S.W.A.T.) teams.
"Stun grenade:" A grenade designed to induce temporary incapacitation by generating a burst of extremely bright light and/or extremely loud noise. Synonyms include "flashbang" and "distraction device." Any device designed or deployed with intent to produce similar incapacitation by similarly overwhelming the visual and/or auditory system(s) of persons in the vicinity of its activation would also be considered a "stun grenade" for the purposes of this debate. See the article in source [1] for a further definition of stun grenades, and the article in [2] for a specification of a typical model of stun grenade.
"Definite threat:" A situation where a reasonable law enforcement officer would be certain, or have strong probable cause to believe, that: (1) an immediate threat of death or severe injury exists to at least one person, including themselves; (2) deploying a stun grenade is a sensible option to resolve the situation with minimum total harm to persons threatened as defined in (1). Equivalently, this excludes situations where there is a mere suspicion or unverified possibility of a threat, or threats which a reasonable law enforcement officer would not determine poses a high risk of immediate threat of death or severe injury towards at least one person.
It is furthermore remarkable that stun grenades are frequently deployed by S.W.A.T. teams, especially while serving high-risk search warrants, when no definite threat exists. Pro considers such deployment pre-emptive and indiscriminate.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stun_grenade
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M84_stun_grenade
Not really. I've basically retired from debating, and I feel this debate would most likely boil down to semantics of definite threats.
Would you like to debate this topic against me?
While you're unlikely win at this point, I hope you're able to post something for the next round. There's no shame in losing as long as you make an honest effort.
Good first round, a shame about your opponent forfeiting.