By RACHEL CRADER, STEPHANIE LEVY, RYAN OWENS AND EMILY YOUNKER
news@ColumbiaMissourian.com

Owning a Taser is illegal in seven states.

Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey, Wisconsin, Michigan and Hawaii all prohibit sale and ownership of the electronic weapon, a ban that applies primarily to civilians.

Wisconsin banned possession and sales of Tasers in 1982, making it a Class E felony.

In Massachusetts, Tasers were banned in 1986, then reinstated for police use in 2004. Several communities, including Framingham and Mansfield, have purchased them for their police departments, but notably, the Boston Police Department has not yet adopted them.

In New Jersey, a bill passed in 1985 made it a crime for anyone, including law enforcement officers, to possess a Taser. The law was later amended to exclude the officers from the ban.

Connecticut and Illinois restrict the use of Tasers for citizens but allow police officers to use them.

In the 43 states where Tasers are legal, the manufacturer, Taser International, reports selling more than 181,000 devices to citizens. The company has even expanded the appeal of its civilian product, Taser C2, by offering it to customers in fashion pink, leopard print and camouflage designs.

Dana Leigh Shafman of Scottsdale, Ariz., has taken it a step further and started a campaign to spread Taser use among women as a means of self-protection.

Her “Taser parties” began in 2007 by introducing women to the Taser C2, a smaller version of the device that retails from $299.99 to $379.99 in the pink, camouflage and leopard prints.

“I think a lot of people — because I took a controversial weapon and coupled it with a Tupperware-style party — everybody thought I was nuts,” Shafman said.

Today, she trains salespeople around the country to sell Tasers and hosts the parties through weekly online seminars.

Making sure people take the product seriously is a concern for Shafman, who focuses on educating women about self-defense and ways to prevent attacks.

“They’re coming here for personal safety. They’re really not coming here to have a party,” she said. “They’re coming to learn and be educated in a very safe and really loving environment.”

Steve Tuttle, a spokesman for Taser International, said background checks and safety precautions are created to encourage safe, responsible use.

Once a person purchases a Taser either online, at a retail store or through a salesperson like Shafman, Tuttle said it is only a “fancy paperweight” until he or she contacts the company and completes an identification verification test, which requires a Social Security number. The test includes a series of questions that only the owner of the Social Security number would know.

After passing that test, a background check is completed and, if there are no felonies in a person’s history, the purchaser is sent a unique code that activates the Taser.

Firing the device also disperses small pieces of confetti with numbers to identify the owner, Tuttle said.

“Now, I don’t know about you, but if I’m going to commit a crime, I don’t think I want to drop 20 to 30 small little business cards at the scene of the crime that I won’t be able to pick up,” he said.

On occasion, there are reports of law enforcement officers using Tasers for entertainment at civilian events.

In Leesburg, Fla., earlier this fall, Dan NeSmith held a party at his home to celebrate a friend’s birthday.

NeSmith, then a rookie police officer with the Eustis Police Department, was approached during the party by a 15-year-old about getting stunned.

“At some point during the party, the topic of the Taser came up and the 15-year-old expressed his desire to be (stunned),” Eustis Police Chief Fred Cobb told ABCnews.com. “Officer NeSmith opted to show him what it was like.”

A video taken of the incident by a partygoer shows NeSmith, 22, explaining to the 15-year-old what will happen once the Taser is fired. Amid cheering and a countdown from spectators, NeSmith places the Taser to the teenager’s back and fires. The teenager falls forward while NeSmith continues to hold the Taser to his back.

Although it is legal in Florida for both law enforcement and civilians to own Tasers, their use is restricted to purposes of self-defense. According to the Orlando Sentinel, NeSmith was suspended Sept. 22 and officially fired in October.

Eustis police Sgt. Harold Hughes said the department’s written policy stipulates there is a time and a place to use a Taser. A Friday night birthday party at the request of a teenager is not one of them, he said.

“That’s the reason (NeSmith) doesn’t have a job — because he improperly used a Taser,” Hughes said.

In summer 2007, several deputies with the Knox County Sheriff’s Department in Maine stunned a groom-to-be, also a sheriff’s deputy at the time, at a bachelor party. They then tied him up, covered him in oil and feathers and paraded him through the small town of Camden on the back of a pickup truck. As was the case in Florida, this incident was videotaped.

Maine allows both law enforcement and civilians to own Tasers; again, use is restricted to defense. Knox County Sheriff Donna Dennison ordered an investigation in April.

Four of the deputies later received written reprimands while a fifth received an oral reprimand. All were found to have violated department policy, part of which states, “I will keep my private life unsullied as an example to all and will behave in a manner that does not bring discredit to me or my agency,” according to a report from the Bangor Daily News.

One also violated a policy that equipment is to “be used by employees only for its intended purpose in accordance with established agency procedures,” the newspaper reported.

No criminal charges were filed against the deputies.