ICE’s Electric Shock Gloves Could Actually Make Arrests Safer
ICE's plan for electric shock gloves sounds brutal—but are the alternatives far worse?
The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) plans to allocate up to $20 million for electric shock gloves, dubbed G.L.O.V.E., that deliver pain through direct contact. Critics argue that these gloves could potentially make arrests safer by offering a less harmful alternative to Tasers and other force options, but the technology's safety remains unproven.
The gloves generate roughly 324 to 362 volts, compared to up to 50,000 volts for conventional conducted-energy weapons and around 1,000 volts for newer Tasers. Electrical injury depends on factors such as current, waveform, pulse duration, and the person's physical condition, making voltage alone a misleading measure of danger. The G.L.O.V.E. is designed to cause localized pain through skin contact, unlike Tasers, which can incapacitate a person from several feet away.
If ICE officers use the gloves to gain control without resorting to physical struggles or firing Taser probes, the lower-intensity electrical effect could serve as a step down the use-of-force ladder. However, civil rights advocates caution that the gloves' invisibility and lack of visible marks on the person could make it difficult to determine when they are activated, potentially leading to misuse.
ICE's decision to spend significant funds on body cameras for oversight may help establish whether officers use the gloves responsibly.
Written by urgent.news from Newsweek's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
