A Fort Worth medical examiner has ruled that the death of a mentally ill man is a homicide, after the victim had been tasered twice by Fort Worth Police Officers.

The family of Michael Patrick Jacobs, Jr. called the Fort Worth Police Department for help after he started causing problems while being off his medication for bi-polar disorder. When police arrived they felt 24-year old Jacobs was combative and they stunned him with a taser gun twice, once for 49 seconds and then another 5 seconds after a one second pause. Taser guns apply a 50,000 volt shock that causes muscles to lock up by over-stimulating the nervous system.

Jacobs began having difficulties breathing while he was being handcuffed, though reportedly the police waved off a paramedic crew. When Jacobs collapsed, they called paramedics back to the scene, but did not initiate CPR. Paramedics could not revive Jacobs either at the scene or at the emergency room, and he was pronounced dead about an hour after the taser had been used on him.

Videotape shows Texas Department of Public Safety Trooper Arturo Perez slamming a 22 year old woman into concrete barrier while handcuffed.

The trooper who is the subject of an investigation by the Texas Rangers for using excessive force during a DWI arrest on the Dallas North Tollway, has retired from the Texas Department of Public Safety. Arturo Perez responded to a single vehicle accident on the Dallas North Tollway on October 11, 2009 at around 3 in the morning. The 22-year old woman driving the vehicle was suspected of driving while intoxicated in Dallas, and Tropper Perez initiated a field investigation. The suspect reportedly failed several field sobriety tests and smelled of alcohol. As Perez was walking the woman to his squad car, she jerked and tried to walk away from him. Perez warned her not to resist or she would get hurt.

The video camera in his cruiser then captured images of him jerking the woman in an effort to take her to the ground. Instead, the officer ended up pushing the handcuffed woman chin first into a concrete ledge with such force that her feet left the ground. She then collapsed "like a sack of potatoes." Perez denied using excessive force, saying it was not his intent to hurt her.