The NYPD is going to expand its use of Tasers, even though it would not have been the most effective weapon in the synagogue showdown between a maniac armed with a knife and a city cop.  Calvin Peters, 49, who suffered from bipolar disorder, stabbed Levi Rosenblatt, a 22-year-old student inside the Chabad Lubavitch World Headquarters in Brooklyn just before 2 a.m. Tuesday. Despite several warnings to drop the knife, Peters charged at cops and was fatally shot by police from close range.  “Given the speed and rapidity in which it occurred, a Taser might not have been effective in that particular situation,” Police Commissioner Bill Bratton said Wednesday.  Bratton said the Police Department plans to purchase 450 of the electroshock weapons in the coming months — adding to “several hundred” already in the city’s arsenal. “We’re starting to look at (Taser) use in many incidents but not in all incidents,” Bratton said.  The new Tasers would be doled out to training officers who shepherd rookies coming out of the academy.  Currently, only patrol sergeants are allowed to use Tasers, which are stored in the supervisors’ police cruisers. Emergency Service Unit teams are also equipped with the weapons, which are designed to temporarily immobilize the target’s muscles.  “We are very interested in expanding (the use of Tasers) very significantly,” Bratton said, adding that they represent “a nonlethal method officers could use.”  The weapons are not without controversy.  Between 2001 and 2012, more than 500 people died after being shot by Taser guns, according to an Amnesty International study.  The 50,000-volt devices caused at least one death in New York. In 2008, a Taser was used to incapacitate Iman Morales, a mentally ill man found pacing naked on the second-story ledge of a Brooklyn building. He was swinging a florescent bulb.  When he was hit with the electronic darts, he fell forward, hitting his head on the pavement below, officials said.  The NYPD lieutenant who authorized the use of the Taser later took his own life. Morales’ mother, Olga Negron, filed a federal lawsuit against the city, ultimately agreeing to a $700,000 settlement.  Eugene O’Donnell, a former police officer who now teaches at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, said Tasers “are not an ideal nonlethal weapon.”  “There have been too many bad endings to make it a weapon of choice, but we don’t have a weapon to disable someone without running the risk of injuring them,” O’Donnell said. “Any weapon that can give a cop an alternative to deadly force is most welcome.”  Bratton didn’t pin a price tag on the massive purchase. Tasers cost $500 to $1,000 each, according to the company’s website.
The NYPD will buy 450 Tasers, adding to ‘several hundred’ already in the department, said Commissioner Bill Bratton.