Rubber bullets were once called ‘non-lethal'. Not any more
Australian journalist Lauren Tomasi came away from a day reporting on the Los Angeles protests with a 'bloody big old bruise' after a police officer shot her in the leg with a rubber bullet on Monday morning AEST.
The Nine News US correspondent continued working, sore and bruised, but otherwise uninjured.
Previous victims of rubber bullets have suffered serious injury, disability and death, and the use of so-called 'less lethal' weapons has attracted fierce criticism for years.
Rubber bullets are designed to travel slower than normal bullets and spread their impact over a wider range when they hit someone's body.
Researchers have described the bullets in The British Journal of Surgery as 'a blunt missile intended to inflict a painful slap to incapacitate dangerous individuals, yet not cause major or lethal injuries'.
The Los Angeles Police Department has weapons in its arsenal called 'less-lethal launchers' that fire 40mm 'sponge rounds'. The rounds are made from plastic with a rounded foam or sponge nose.
They weigh 30 grams and are 9.3 centimetres tall, about the size of a mini soft drink can, and are fired at speeds exceeding 300km/h, The Los Angeles Times reported.
The rounds are designed to be fired from a range of five to 40 metres and are supposed to target the 'large muscle groups of the buttocks, thigh and even the knees of the subject', according to technical specifications posted by US munitions company Defense Technology.
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