Police tape could be seen wrapped around a portion of the J & J Sunoco Gas Station lot (20 Center Street) along SR309 in Tamaqua for most of the morning today (Friday, August 8, 2014) as officers with Pennsylvania’s State Police investigated the death of a Tamaqua man.
Updated online reports from various news agencies state that police responded around 4 AM this morning to the Fegley’s Mini Mart parking lot (30-32 Center Street) after borough resident Jose Paulino Jr., 38, was observed shouting obscenities and running around the lot. Paulino then ran over to an adjacent gas station (J & J Sunoco). The reports add that Paulino was non-compliant and aggressive with the responding officers. That is when Paulino was tasered by police.
Paulino died while being transported to St. Luke’s Hospital in Coaldale.
A State Police ‘Major Case Team’ is investigating the incident.
INFORMATION FROM A WITNESS:
A local resident called TamaquaArea.com after hearing and seeing all the false rumors online. TamaquaArea.com is choosing to keep the name of the witness anonymous.
Below is information provided via the witness and verified by a second witness:
The witness said that Paulino was fine at first. He then started crossing SR309 towards the Tamaqua Diner when, all of a sudden, he turned around and ran back to the Fegley’s parking lot. That is when he started to roll around on the ground. Shortly after, the man got up and approached the witness and others standing outside the Fegley’s Gas Station, yelling, “I am going to kill you!” That is when the witness and others called police. Paulino then walked over to the J & J Sunoco Gas Station and started to punch the gas pumps, utility pole and signs. Tamaqua Police arrived on scene. Paulino turned towards the police officers and charged at them. The police yelled to Paulino to get back or they would taze him, but Paulino continued to charge at them. That is when police tasered him once. Two officers from Coaldale and Rush Township also responded. The witness said the taser had no affect on Paulino, stating, “Paulino kept fighting.” He was tasered one more time. It still had no affect and he remained combative. The witness mentioned that Paulino was not in handcuffs when he was tazed. It took multiple bystanders and four police officers to eventually subdue the man.
Click HERE to view the WBRE/WYOU TV story. (credited TamaquaArea.com photos)
Click HERE to view the WNEP TV story. (credited TamaquaArea.com photos)
Click HERE to view the MORNING CALL story. (credited TamaquaArea.com photos)
A Republican Herald story (dated 8-10-2014) states the autopsy came back as “inconclusive.” It added that other tests might take weeks.
Click HERE to read the story.
Keep checking this story for updates.
TamaquaArea.com 
This was my husband..he was messed up on fake weed but that’s it no other drugs..he is human being ppl make mistakes..he was more than a husband he was also a father..Jose was a loveing,careing person who loved life and his family..he should not of been tased to death..the police killed him and ended his life..yeah he was out of control and needed. To be restrained not killed..he had ppl who loved him..I just want him back
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He should have not been doing drugs and it would not have happened. Sorry for your loss but he should have thought about his family before he took the drugs that caused this to happened
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Perhaps what killed him was the crap he was strung out on. Don’t blame the cops for your husbands illegal activities.
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Sorry for your loss but at 4 am he should have been more worried about being at home or work than out doing drugs. Sounds like a perfect affect of bath salts to me. Not pot. I dont blame officers for what they have to do. Its either they go home safe or not. They choose to go home. Your husband was yelling he was going to kill people. That’s not normal. 50000 volts more than once and no affect is not normal for a straight sober person. If you knew he had this problem and ignored it. Its on you not the officers
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Fake weed is bath salts. Just throwing it out there.
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I’m sorry for your loss, but it sound more like bath salts then fake week. You’re husband was acting oddly and being zapped more than once and not going down leads me to believe other drugs were involved. Don’t blame the cops because your husband chose to get high, instead of being home being a good father and husband, as the yarn you’re trying to spin!!
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I am so sorry for your loss. If you and your child were in that lot, and you never met the man acting wildly, you would have a dif. opinion. My husband acts like a nut,a lot of the time, and I worry, when he is out. Many-Many people have been tased more than 2-3 times and lived. Maybe it was the fake weed -not the cops who killed him. It is going to be very rough, so I wish you and your family strength to stand up and survive.
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Reading the witness statement and then the comment about weed tells me that this man was NOT mistreated by police. Multiple tazer and he still was out of control? That was more than just weed. I feel bad for his family but he chose to use drugs. . Maybe he got some that was laced with other stuff, or took something “harder” this time. But in the end even with multiple tazers, he still needed several people to subdue him. My guess is that an autopsy will show he has an underlying heart condition that ended his life. That is NOT the fault of the police or others who helped them. Police are trained to protect. He was posing a danger to more than himself.
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I agree with you 100% couldn’t have said it better myself.
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I also agree with you 100%
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Accused in 2012 of trying to lure children into a car & previous brushes with the law. Sounds like an upstanding citizen of our community….not!
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A human being does not deserve to DIE because he is irrational! This was an extreme act of undue force used on another human being. This was excessive force. Obviously this man was in a state of excited delirium. Police are trained to subdue suspects, killing him was not necessary. When did this society turn into such a fear mongering society of murderers? All living things want to live.Life is precious. Death is final. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=7626840
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Fake weed is NOT bath salts just saying and spice will not kill you…idk what to say about this incident.there is two sides and im hearing a bunch of different stories but its sad that the man died and left children behind..I don’t think the cops should have tassed him to death they should have got him hand cuffed.that’s just my opinion
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Side effects of synthetic cannabis include
“hypertension, tachycardia, myocardial infarction, agitation, vomiting, hallucinations, psychoses, seizures, convulsions and panic attacks. Among individuals who need emergency treatment after using synthetic cannabis, the most common symptoms are accelerated heartbeat, high blood pressure, nausea, blurred vision, hallucination and agitation.Other symptoms included epileptic seizures, acute psychosis, and heart attacks.”
My guess is the synthetic cannabis combined with the voltage of the taser stopped his heart.
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Like i said the most extensive autopsy was done and came back inconcluseive
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This is a perfect example of how small town cops can’t handle big time jobs. At no time did they attempt to use anything other than a taser. What happened to night sticks? What happened to plain physical force? The man was average build and had out of his mind power, but the cops just kept relying on those tasers. If this incident had happened in the same way in another part of the world (Allentown, Philly, etc.) he would not have died because cops receive the proper training to handle such situations. Tamaqua is not such a small town anymore. The cops need to be trained to better handle situations that will inevitably arise due to the influx of hard drugs in this area. I hope that at the very least this man’s death will serve a purpose to make the local law enforcement open their eyes and realize they need to get their shit together.
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