With the stun belt, law enforcement officers can inflict severe pain and incapacitate a prisoner at the push of a button. Officers can use it to psychologically threaten a prisoner, and it appears to be designed to humiliate and degrade the prisoner. No strictly independent medical study of such belts has been reported by suppliers or users. Data from other electro-shock weapons indicate that the high pulse 50,000 volt shocks lasting 8 seconds at a time could result in longer term physical and mental injuries. Amnesty International believes that the use of such belts could constitute a violation of international human rights standards prohibiting cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment. Amnesty International is calling on the U.S. government to immediately suspend the use and export of stun belts and other electro-shock weapons unless and until independent medical evidence can clearly demonstrate that the likely practical use of any such weapons for law enforcement will not contribute to deaths in custody, torture or other cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment. Notes