Everyone, myself included, applauded. We were just relieved, I think, that he wasn’t dead.

“Of course,” Merker said, continuing his sales pitch, “during the period when he was down, law officers would have been able to cuff Leo, to subdue him. All you need is a few seconds to bring a suspect under control.” Merker walked over to Leo, put a hand on his shoulder while Lesley got an “after” shot. Merker gave her an annoyed look. “So, that’s twenty-eight times now. How are you feeling?”

“Absolutely,” Leo said.

A uniformed cop, a tall black man, stepped forward. “Mr. Merker, I’m the president of this police association, and we have a board that’s very hesitant about the use of these sorts of weapons. Has it been the experience of many other large city police departments that while stun guns are designed to be used in special circumstances to stop a suspect without actually killing him, once police have them, they start using them indiscriminately on suspects? Because their use is not fatal, officers aren’t just using them on dangerous psychiatric patients. Aren’t they using them on everyone from kids playing hooky to jaywalkers?”

It was an interesting comment, given who it was coming from. The police union head seemed pretty skeptical.

Merker was rubbing his nose again, one nostril in particular, like something inside there was really annoying him. He set his eyes on the questioner, almost accusingly. “Well, I guess if you’re saying that you think your own members aren’t responsible enough to handle these things,…well, then I guess you’ve got a problem.” There was some grumbling in the crowd, and I wasn’t sure whether it was directed at Merker or the union president. “Listen, I’m just here selling the hardware. I can give you guys good deals on these if you’re interested. If you don’t want them for yourselves, maybe you’d like to buy them for members of your family.”

Lesley was back beside me. “Got some awesome shots,” she said. “Did you see that guy go down?”

I nodded. “I thought he was dead there for a second.”

Three or four cops approached Merker after he finished his pitch, but I didn’t see anyone buying anything. As long as the stun guns were not being approved by the police commission, the cops would have to be buying them out of their own pocket.

“What if I could save you another fifty bucks?” I heard Merker tell one officer, but he still had no takers.

We found ourselves standing behind Gary Merker and his associate Leo Edgars at the elevator a couple of minutes later.

Merker turned and pointed to me. “You’re not a cop.”

“We’re with the Metropolitan,” I said, and offered a hand. Merker didn’t even look at it. “We came to cover your demonstration.”

“I didn’t know the press was going to be here,” he said. “I don’t think you should be doing a story about this.”

I shrugged. “That’s really not up to you,” I said. “The police let us in.”