Porn Star Dies After Being Tasered by Police
An adult film entertainer died over the weekend after being reportedly tasered by police more than a week ago.
Marland Anderson, who went by his onscreen name Sledge Hammer, was tasered by police April 8 after they were dispatched for a disturbance.
Anderson's girlfriend, Alexa Cruz, explained that he was suffering from a severe anxiety attack and had a knife during the situation. She tried to get away from him because she did not want him to hurt himself.
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When police arrived, Cruz told police about Anderson's current mental state. They managed to calm him down enough to restrain him and put him on a gurney to which he was handcuffed. Then paramedics loaded him into the ambulance and proceeded to take him to the hospital.
En route to the hospital Anderson became unsettled and was able to break free from the gurney restraints as well as the handcuffs.
That is when, according to Lt. Andrew Neiman, officers tased him several times in order to prevent him from causing further harm to himself, as well as to officers and paramedics.
"He came out peacefully when the police arrived and told them repeatedly that he was very tired and scared. I told them about his state and made it clear that he needed a hospital, not jail. What happened next, I did not see but according to the doctors [and] nurses I spoke to, he got scared and started to panic, and the LAPD responded by tasing him 6 times," Cruz told the website LukeisBack.com.
Cruz furthered her defense of Anderson by explaining that he was suffering from anxiety and a mild form of schizophrenia, which may have been made worse by his marijuana use.
Doctors said that Anderson suffered from extreme swelling of his brain and that even if he did manage to come out of the coma that he had been in for close to a week, it was unlikely that he would ever regain consciousness.
