I think in this case office could have taken the woman from the car by brute force, but he would have taken a high risk too. When the officer tries to grab woman, she's pulling herself away. She might have had a gun or knife in the car and police officer would have been an easy target.
I agree. Trying to grab the woman and pulling her out by force would NOT have been the smart thing to do. Like you said, she could have had a knife or gun and if the officer had tried to physically pull her out, it would have been easy for her to just grab a weapon and stab/shoot him. By using the taser he was attempting to subdue her from a distance far enough that she could not physically retaliate at him. Cops need to protect themselves too, after all. He did NOT know if she had a weapon with her, she may very well have had one. The cop did his duty and chose not to take any risky chances.
There is a problem in assuming she had a weapon if the officer doesn't see it, she doesn't threaten him with one, or if she doesn't even pull out something that looks remotely like a weapon. She was
on the phone with, I'm assuming a relative, when he used the taser. She was no immediate threat to his well being or his life. I also didn't get the impression that she was physically stronger than her, so he COULD have pulled her out of the car and handcuffed her.
He didn't, he used an extreme form of force, and that's what is wrong with this picture. It was unnecessary, and in my opinion, sad to look at. The reasons I'm seeing that support the cops decision to use a taser on an unarmed woman is no different from the reasons I saw that support the
NYPD's decision to shoot at an unarmed man 41 times and murdering him.
Granted, not ALL police officers are "bad"...it's just that they have quite a few shit-stains, that doesn't make their reputation any better. :/