A Colorado Springs police officer is facing a $100 million lawsuit from a man who was reportedly tased and paralyzed two years ago.

Attorneys representing Jacob Root claim that police officer Robert Comstock violated the department’s use-of-force policy when he tased Root during a foot chase, and that Comstock’s actions resulted in Root being paralyzed from the waist down.

On May 16, 2022, officers working in a multi-agency auto theft task force saw Root driving a stolen car to a Kum & Go gas station on Airport Road, according to the lawsuit. When the officers approached Root, he fled. After a brief chase, Comstock shot Root in the back with a taser, causing him to fall face first into the street and break his neck, the lawsuit claims.

“This is about choice,” said Harry Daniels, Root’s attorney. “Officer Comstock chose to ignore the rules. He chose to disregard the safety procedures. He chose to act recklessly and dangerously and, because of that, Jacob Root is a quadriplegic.”

In body camera footage released by the attorney, an officer can be seen tasing Root as the suspect runs out of the Kum & Go parking lot. Root, who was running down a rocky slope, then pitches forward, face first, into the street.

As he is being handcuffed, Root can be heard saying, “I can’t move. Is that normal?”

“After being tased? Kinda,” a female officer tells him.

Daniels said Comstock violated one tenet of CSPD’s use-of-force policy by deploying the Taser while Root was in an elevated position, and violated another by not warning Root before tasing him.

“You cannot shoot a person in an elevated state. You cannot shoot a person without warning using a Taser,” Daniels told Gazette news partner KOAA. “He didn’t warn him and shot him in the back and caused him to fall.”

CSPD General Order 500 requires officers to give a clear verbal warning before deploying a Taser or any use of force. The department’s standard operating procedure on the use of Conducted Electrical Weapons states that an officer cannot tase someone “in an elevated position or a location where a fall may cause substantial injury or death.”

Root is seeking damages from Comstock “in his individual capacity” and not from the department, according to the lawsuit.

“The city has an amazing use-of-force policy,” Daniels told KOAA. “The problem is that the police officer’s not following it. That’s the issue.”

Comstock is still a member of the Colorado Springs Police Department in good standing, department officials said.

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