By DAMIEN FISHER, InDepthNH.org
When Department of Corrections Commissioner Helen Hanks went before the Executive Council this spring seeking approval on a $2 million TASER lease deal, she failed to mention the fact the weapons had already been delivered the year before.
“They hid it from us that’s for sure,” said Executive Councilor David Wheeler, R-Milford. “That’s blatant disregard for the Council’s authority.”
According to a source inside DOC, the TASERs were shipped to New Hampshire in April of 2024, and then were kept in storage for more than a year. These shipment dates were confirmed by DOC’s Public Information Officer Jane Graham.
Hanks and other DOC administrators tried to get the Council to sign off first on a $2 million purchase in July of 2024, and then a $2 million, 10-year lease in May of this year for the equipment already sitting in a DOC warehouse.
“We didn’t find out until after the second vote they already had the TASERs,” Wheeler said.
Both Wheeler and Executive Councilor Joe Kenney, R-Wakefield, told InDepthNH.org they did not know about TASERs being in New Hampshire for a year until after they voted against the second proposal in May.
“We thought they had no TASERs, but after a series of meetings, and after some research, we found out they had them,” Kenney said.
All government departments in New Hampshire must get approval from the elected members of the Executive Council for any purchase or contract valued at $10,000 or more. Both Kenney and Wheeler said it is practically unheard of for the Council to be presented with a retroactive, multimillion dollar equipment purchase request.
“That’s something we don’t want to practice in state government,” Kenney said.
Hanks did not speak directly to InDepthNH.org, but her attorney, John-Mark Turner, responded to emails from InDepthNH.org on her behalf. Throughout Turner’s exchange with InDepthNH.org, the lawyer gave multiple warnings about a possible legal action in response to InDepthNH.org’s reporting and questions. In particular, Turner warned against linking the TASER shipment issue to Hanks’ sudden resignation in May.
“You should consult with counsel before you publish anything that implies Ms. Hanks was terminated or left employment at DOC because of the Axon issue,” Turner wrote.
Wheeler told InDepthNH.org the TASER saga did play a part in the recent resignations of Hanks and Assistant Department of Corrections Commissioner Paul Raymond.
“It’s one of the reasons the top two resigned,” Wheeler said.
Kenney told InDepthNH.org he’s not sure if the TASER issue was part of Hanks and Raymond ultimately leaving, but he did say the Council was not pleased with the way the purchase and lease proposals were handled.
“From our viewpoint, as a council, we weren’t happy the TASERs had been received,” Kenney said.
Gov. Kelly Ayotte’s office did not respond to InDepthNH.org when contacted for this story. InDepthNH.org also sought comment from current DOC Commissioner William Hart, but he did not respond.
According to Turner’s version of events, Hanks stepped into the TASER purchase process after the equipment was shipped without a contract in place.
“Ms. Hanks did not oversee the process for acquiring conducted energy weapons, which had a department project lead. Ms. Hanks intervened when Tasers were sent that did not follow procurement procedures. Ms. Hanks reassigned a new lead. In the end there was no purchase because it was not approved by [Governor and Council.] Ms. Hanks believed the product was collected by the vendor and no money was exchanged because it was not purchased,” Turner wrote. “There was no effort to hide the presence of the tasers from [the Governor and Council] and, in fact, Ms. Hanks expected they would be retrieved by Axon as she requested.”
Turner’s sometimes repetitive answers stressed the assertion that the TASER shipment was the fault of an Axon employee, and not anyone inside DOC.
TASER-brand devices are exclusively made by Axon Enterprise Inc., Scottsdale, Arizona-based security manufacturer that sells TASERs and other products to law enforcement across the globe. Graham and Turner both told InDepthNH.org that Axon sent the TASERs without a purchase agreement in place, and without anyone from the DOC requesting the shipment.
“It was a mistake made by the Axon representative to ship the Tasers before there was a contract with the State that complied with procurement rules. Again, Ms. Hanks had no knowledge of that until she was notified about the erroneous shipment,” Turner wrote.
InDepthNH.org made efforts to speak with Axon and Axon General Counsel Robert Driscoll, but the company did not respond to the requests for comment.
After Axon sent approximately 190 TASER devices — the latest model TASER 10 — and accessories to the DOC, Hanks and her team brought a proposed purchase agreement to the Council in July of 2024. In his emails, Turner stated that Hanks both stepped in to replace DOC officials working on the TASER proposal, and at the same time she did not take control of the process.
“Ms. Hanks did not ‘take over’ the process after she instructed staff to segregate and then have Axon retrieve the tasers. Instead, she assigned a new staff lead to manage the procurement process, which was what she always did for procurement projects,” Turner wrote.
Hanks claims, through Turner, that she told Axon the DOC was not going to pay for the equipment and she requested that the company retrieve the shipment sent seemingly in error. Graham told InDepthNH.org that no money changed hands and that Axon was never paid for the equipment. The TASERs were sent back to Axon sometime in May of this year.
According to public records, Hanks signed off on the proposed purchase that Raymond presented to the Council on July 24, 2024. Turner stated Hanks was following the rules by sending the purchase proposal to the Council after Axon’s mistaken shipment.
“Ms. Hanks’ understanding is that Axon’s account representative later acknowledged that Axon had mistakenly shipped the tasers without any contract being in place. Thereafter, to comply with procurement rules, the Department submitted the proposed single source contract to Governor and Council for approval. Ms. Hanks signed the proposed contract as she did for all proposed DOC contracts submitted to Governor and Council,” Turner wrote.
There is no mention in the July, 2024 proposal of the TASERs already being in New Hampshire, nor did Raymond disclose that to the Council during the meeting, according to the Council’s audio recording. Raymond can be heard explaining that the TASER 10s would replace the TASER 7 models that DOC staff currently used.
“We do not have these TASERs (the model 10s) today,” Raymond said during the meeting.
InDepthNH.org reached out to Raymond through his attorney, William Christie, and he declined to comment.
When Councilors questioned the cost, Raymond explained the purchase included a five-year equipment renewal for all of the TASER units. Under this proposal, Axon would send new TASERs five years after DOC used the Model 10s it bought. This would make sure officers had the latest equipment.
Sole-source contracts are government purchases that have not been subjected to the usual RFP competitive bidding process. These types of purchases are allowed if an agency gets a waiver from the state’s Department of Administrative Services. In June of 2024, as the TASERs were sitting in storage, DOC’s Director of Administration Lisa Stone got the necessary RFP waiver. In her waiver application, Stone explained the TASER 10 weapons are designed to work with DOC’s Axon body worn cameras, and that DOC staff are already TASER certified.
“Switching brands would require extensive and costly changes for the Department. Going out to bid and/or switching brands would be an inefficient use of departmental time and resources and would create a financial burden to the DOC,” Stone wrote.
The Department of Administrative Services waiver approval, submitted to the Executive Council, does not mention that the TASERs were already in storage.
Axon is the only company making TASERs, but TASERs are not the only conductive energy weapons on the market, Wheeler said. Nebraska-based PhaZZer’s top model conductive energy weapon costs about $2,500 per unit, compared to the TASER 10’s $10,000 per unit price tag, for instance.
The Council balked at the cost during the July 2024 meeting, and the fact it was a sole-source purchase that was not sent out to bid. The DOC withdrew the proposal in the following weeks, informing the council it planned to go out to seek competitive bids. Meanwhile, the 190 TASER 10s remained in storage.
“After Governor and Council rejected the proposed contract and requested that it be put out for bid, Department staff attempted to solicit multiple bids from various vendors for the proposed project through the RFP process,” Turner wrote.
So the DOC sent out a request to several companies to submit conductive energy weapon proposals. These requests went to Axon, PhaZZer, and several others. But Wheeler pointed out the bid specs DOC used required that the weapons be able to sync up with the Axon body cameras. That requirement effectively eliminated every company except Axon, Wheeler said.
“The bid specs could only be fulfilled by Axon,” Wheeler said.
Then a DOC evaluation team made up of Hanks, Stone, and Michael Edmark, the Department’s Training Administrator, reviewed and recommended the only bid received, a $2 million lease proposed by Axon for the TASER 10s already sitting in a warehouse in New Hampshire, according to the lease proposal documents submitted to the council.
The new lease proposal also included a five-year equipment refresh, much like the $2 million purchase the Council shot down in July of 2024.
The lease proposal was presented to the Council in April of this year. Weeks before that meeting, Axon’s General Counsel Robert Driscoll was in New Hampshire. Among the records part of the lease proposal are waivers Driscoll signed on March 27 in order to enter a correctional facility. The lease contract between the DOC and Axon was signed by Driscoll on March 27, and by Hanks on March 28. Hanks does not remember any meeting with Driscoll, according to Turner.
“Ms. Hanks does not recall any contact with Axon or its counsel that you refer to and there was no coordination or attempt to subvert procurement rules,” Turner wrote.
During the April meeting the Council again did not like the cost of the lease proposal, and was wary of the fact there was only one bid, Axon’s. Hanks said DOC wanted to have the weapons synched with the body cameras, as TASER 10s have the ability to automatically turn on Axon body cameras when drawn. But Wheeler said that is not enough justification for a $10,000 weapon.
“The body camera should have been on long before you have to draw,” Wheeler said.
The Council tabled the lease proposal, and finally killed it during the May 7 meeting.
Hanks resigned her position unexpectedly on May 19. Turner maintains the resignation was Hanks’ decision and not a result of political pressure. Her resignation was announced by a press release from Ayotte. In the same statement, Ayotte informed the public that Raymond was placed on administrative leave. Raymond ended up resigning his post in July.