Man Runs Stop Sign, Gets Tased, Dies

A California man who ran a stop sign is dead after being stopped and Tased by police. San Bernardino sheriff’s deputies caught up with 43-year-old disc jockey Allen Kephart at a gas station and say he “became combative and uncooperative,” according to the LA Times. “The deputies attempted to place him under arrest, at which time he was Tased,” a department spokeswoman said. Kephart became unconscious, was rushed to the hospital and there pronounced dead.

Kephart’s father, a longtime member of the Sheriff Department’s volunteer mounted rangers unit, is furious. “To me, it’s not just a traffic stop. It’s murder,” he says. “You don’t kill a person for running a stop sign.” Kephart says witnesses have told him the police Tased his son, who weighed 350 pounds and had high blood pressure, around eight times. He says he’s considering legal action. “Those Tasers are deadly,” he says. (More Allen Kephart stories.)