Batons Out, Nunchucks In: California Police Department To Arm Officers With Nunchucks To Ward Off ‘Aggressive Image’

California Police Department has taken the rather unusual step of introducing an oriental weapon into its armory – the nunchucks – made famous in the West by Bruce Lee’s movies during the 1970s.

The move comes at a time when concerns about police brutality and incidents of unlawful killings by police officials seem to be sweeping the country, with the latest mass protest having been called in New York only last weekend. The Northern Californian police department believes the decision to arm its officers with nunchucks instead of the traditional batons could go a long way in warding off the “aggressive” image police officials seem to conjure up everywhere they go.

Nunchucks chosen as nonlethal alternative for California police dept https://t.co/9psZxJloyw pic.twitter.com/WA3ARDajrN

— RT (@RT_com) October 27, 2015

Anderson Police Department, a relatively smaller police department which operates 200 miles north of San Francisco, will be the first to implement the idea at the ground level. With a department consisting of only 20 police officers, its top brass hopes it could provide a perfect testing ground for the use of nunchucks to subdue unruly suspects. According to the Los Angeles Times, Sgt. Casey Day emphasized the wide array of options a pair of nunchucks gives to a law enforcement officer.

“It’s a two-for-one weapon. It gives us the ability to control a suspect instead of striking them.”

Interestingly enough, the Anderson Police Department is not the first to implement the use of nunchucks. At the peak of its popularity during the 1980s, law enforcement agencies all over America began flirting with the idea, with several departments even using the nunchucks till it was usurped by the taser in the early 1990s. Basically two solid sticks of plastic attached by a foot-long nylon cord, nunchucks can be used to make an arrest or subdue a suspect in a relatively peaceful manner, according to officers.

But not everyone agrees. If the history of the use of nunchucks in American territories was to be charted, one would see that the the decline in its usage had to do with the tool causing serious injuries to subjects, including broken arms and legs, strained necks, and damaged nerves. PBS reports that the Los Angeles Department had to abandon the use of nunchucks only after a few years after more than 30 protesters sued the department over a wide range of injuries inflicted from the officers’ wielding tool during anti-abortion protests in 1991. “The department is concerned about the public perception of their using a tool some people feel is a tool of excessive force,” the former Deputy City Attorney had said at the time.

And once the taser appeared on the horizon in the late 1990s, the use of nunchucks across American law enforcement agencies plummeted dramatically. “The taser slowed everything down,” said Kevin Orcutt, a nunchucks maker for U.S. law enforcement agencies.

Now, however, nunchucks are set for a revival. Though tasers and batons have traditionally been preferred by law enforcement officials, perhaps no weapon can come close to providing the kind of versatility a pair of nunchucks can. They can not only be used to strike a suspect, but also arrest one without the use of force. Described as a “less than lethal” weapon by the Californian police department, officers will have to undergo a 16-hour training regime to be certified in the use of the oriental weapon. Officers once certified can then be considered eligible to instruct other officers in the proper use of nunchucks.

So what do you think of the move by California Police to implement the use of nunchucks in battling crime?

[Photo via Wikipedia]