Australian Police ‘Taser’ 95-Year-Old Dementia Patient at Nursing Home

Australian police allegedly used a taser to subdue a 95-year-old woman with dementia after being called to a nursing home on Thursday.

The woman, identified as Clare Nowland, a great-grandmother, was reportedly carrying a knife when officers were called to a nursing home in Cooma, in the foothills of the Snowy Mountains in New South Wales.

She “sustained injuries during an interaction with police at a care facility for the elderly,” New South Wales police said in a statement, which did not mention firing a Taser.

She is believed to have suffered a fractured skull and brain haemorrhage when she fell during the incident, and local media reported that police struggled to disarm her before using the Taser.

Ms Nowland had been a resident of Yallambee Lodge in Cooma for the past five years.

Andrew Thaler, a spokesman for the Nowland family, said the entire community was in shock.

He claimed that Ms Nowland was shot in the chest with the Taser in the early hours of Wednesday morning.

“She had dementia that waxes and wanes, sometimes it’s good and sometimes it’s bad,” he added.

“The question will be how it was appropriate to use this level of force on a 95-year-old woman,” she told the Sydney Morning Herald.

A critical incident team will investigate the circumstances surrounding the incident, police said.

Snowy Monaro regional council said it “can confirm that an incident occurred” at the nursing home, which it runs, adding that staff, residents and family were being supported “during this difficult time”.

Ms Nowland is in critical condition at Cooma District Hospital.