Omaha police recently agreed to stop carrying gloves that can deliver electric shocks to students in the halls of Nebraska’s largest public school district.
The decision affecting most Omaha middle and high schools came after the Associated Press first revealed Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)’s plan to give officers the “Gloves” – or “generated low output voltage emitters”. The devices have also been used in recent years by some jails.
The superintendent of Omaha public schools, Matthew Ray, on ۱۸ August requested that police working in the schools, known as school resource officers, stop using the gloves. Omaha police agreed two days later.
However, the suburban Bellevue police department that patrols two Omaha schools and the large Bellevue district said its officers will continue carrying the gloves. Three other large school districts in the metro area that have Omaha school resource officers assigned to their buildings have not taken action to stop police from using the devices.
The AP left messages seeking comment from the Millard, Elkhorn and Westside districts that are also patrolled by Omaha officers.
Bellevue schools spokesperson Amanda Oliver said the district has a great relationship with Bellevue police and doesn’t see a need to alter anything.
“We’ve got a great communication and dialogue that we have with them consistently. And so for us right now, no changes are being made,” Oliver said.
Ray said in a school board meeting on ۱۷ August and in a letter to the public schools community that he’d only learned about the gloves the previous week. But local television station KETV found emails from ۲۰۲۳, when Omaha police notified the districts that the department planned to equip officers with the gloves, and an official with the Omaha district said they were already familiar with them because Bellevue police had them at two Omaha schools.
Students in all the Omaha area districts have gone back to class over the past two weeks.
Before halting the use of the gloves, the Omaha police department held a news conference in which an officer demonstrated how they can help an officer quickly get control of someone who is refusing commands.
Omaha police used the gloves twice during the ۲۰۲۵-۲۶ school year. And Bellevue police have also used them twice in previous years.
At the school board meeting, about ۳۰ people spoke out against police using the gloves. Residents and board members alike said they were appalled at the practice. No one spoke in favor of it.
“I can’t even imagine walking down the hallway and seeing a peer of mine being electrocuted in a place that is supposed to be a safe space for students,” said Nora Wessel, a senior at Omaha Central high school. “Yet, this is now a very real possibility. These are adults we are supposed to be able to trust, but these weapons create a barrier for our students to turn to resource officers when needed.”
Ken Trump, president of the consulting firm National School Safety and Security Services, said before schools allow police to bring in technology like shock gloves, there should be a careful discussion of questions like how school resource officers will respond to students with disabilities or special medical needs, how parents will be informed and under what circumstances the gloves can be used.
“Less than lethal doesn’t mean low risk,” Trump said.
Ray said the district recognized longstanding relationships with law enforcement partners and the important role school resource officers have in promoting school safety. Continued use of the gloves “would be counterproductive to our work together”, Ray said.
Omaha’s mayor, John Ewing Jr, who helped oversee creating the school resource officer program when he was on the police force, said the department has honored the school district’s decision to “opt out”. The Omaha police department said officers will continue to carry stun guns, batons, pepper spray and firearms.
Most of the Omaha police department’s ۳۴ school resource officers had been trained and were allowed to use the gloves, the mayor and the police chief, Todd Schmaderer, said in a statement.
“We believe it is the safest use-of-force option in the rare times when it is used,” the statement said.
In ۲۰۲۵, Omaha police agreed to pay Compliant Technologies LLC, which manufactures the gloves, about $۶۶,۰۰۰ for ۴۰ gloves, according to the contract.
Officers were expected to give warning before using the gloves and then touch the person for up to ۱۵ seconds while the electric shock was delivered, the statement said.
Bellevue’s police chief, Ken Clary, said his officers will continue carrying the gloves, which they have had for more than three years.
“I am not comfortable having our officers give up a tool that has repeatedly proven to be safe, effective and less harmful than the alternatives,” Clary said in a statement.
The devices activate when an officer presses a button. The gloves must touch someone’s skin directly to produce voltage that causes pain, which is intended to make people stop resisting officers. Unlike stun guns, they do not leave burn or contact marks.
In the ۲۰۲۵-۲۶ school year, an Omaha officer used the glove in one case to stop a high school student from another school from trying to escape after fighting with a security guard, according to the statement. In a second case, the glove was used on a student at the Omaha district’s integrated learning center for special education students. Police said that student made verbal threats and threw a chair at a school security guard, striking the guard in the head. The student also punched the guard in the head, according to the statement.
Bellevue police didn’t immediately have details about when its officers have used the gloves. Clary said the devices have been an extremely effective tool that sometimes make students cooperate on sight even without shocking a student.
Omaha public schools is Nebraska’s largest school district and serves more than ۵۰,۰۰۰ students, its website says. The metro area’s other districts are also among the biggest in the state.
