In most jurisdictions at least, swearing at a police officer is not illegal. Highly ill-advised, but it’s not illegal. You wouldn’t know it if you were the Mohave Valley man who found himself getting tased and on fire after allegedly calling a cop a bum entrance, though.
According to Fox 10 Phoenix, it all started on July 16 when Clarence Coyl and a friend drove through an open gate at the Havasu National Wildlife Refuge, got spotted by Fish and Wildlife officer P. Nielsen, and were ordered to leave. Coyl left for a gas station on Fort Mojave Indian Reservation land 20 minutes away, but Nielsen seemingly followed them there. After Coyl went into the gas station and returned to his vehicle with a few sodas, the officer demanded his identification.
From Coyl’s phone footage, the interaction escalated as the officer pointed his taser at Coyl, threatened arrest, and Coyl questioned the charges. He can be heard saying, “A misdemeanor? A misdemeanor, a–hole.” Coyl is then tased before he can finish his next sentence, then catches fire and starts screaming. Per Fox, it is against Department of Interior policy to use “electronic control devices” such as tasers near flammable materials. Such as, y’know, a gas pump.
Here’s the footage from Coyl’s phone. And fair warning, it’s pretty disturbing.
They’re looking into it, mmkay?
“I thought I was gonna die,” said Coyl. “Believe it or not, I went into instinct to stop, drop, and roll.” Reportedly, Coyl was treated at the hospital but was never actually arrested. In fact, no one with a badge checked in on him for any reason at all. “I spent five and a half hours there. Not a single officer or anything followed up to write a report, question me, or nothing… nobody showed up at the hospital at all for any of this,” said Coyl.
He reportedly suffered first- and second-degree burns on his hands and says the ordeal has resulted in nightmares and trauma around gas stations that cause shaking and flashbacks.
A rep for the Department of Interior, which oversees the Fish and Wildlife Service, gave the following statement: “A taser was deployed during this incident. Consistent with DOI policy, all such deployments undergo review, and we are unable to comment further while that process is ongoing.”
I’m not going to claim to be an expert on Fish and Wildlife law enforcement or how this sort of thing shakes down, legally speaking. But if everything really happened in the way Coyl and his video represent that it did, I hope he’s already in talks with a lawyer who knows what they’re doing.
