An 87-year-old grandmother using a knife to cut dandelions in the woods near her rural Georgia home last week was taken down by a police Taser and arrested.
Martha Al-Bishara was arrested for criminal trespass and obstruction of a police officer, according to a CNN report.
Chatsworth police said AlBishara had not dropped a steak knife despite several commands and a demonstration by officers.
Police had gone to a wooded area near a boys’ and girls’ club last Friday after an employee called 911 to report that an elderly woman was walking around with a knife.
“There’s a lady walking on the bike trails, she has a knife and she won’t leave,” the caller told a dispatcher.
Two Chatsworth officers along with police chief Josh Etheridge arrived at the scene and repeatedly asked AlBishara to drop the knife.
When she did not they used the Taser and arrested her.
The woman’s daughter-inlaw said the older woman, who has dementia and speaks Arabic, typically wandered into the woods looking for dandelions and collected them using a knife.