Man who died after being Tased identified

A man who died in Daly City early Wednesday morning after being shocked with a Taser stun gun by police late Tuesday night has been identified by the San Mateo County coroner’s office as 34-year-old Warren Ragudo.

Police responded at 11:22 p.m. Tuesday to an altercation between family members at an address in the 900 block of Brunswick Street after Ragudo’s father called for help.

Officers restrained Ragudo, deploying a Taser to help get him into handcuffs, and shortly afterward they noticed he was unresponsive. Medics were already en route at that time, as is standard procedure any time an officer deploys a Taser, but Ragudo was pronounced dead some time after midnight.

Daly City police referred questions about the in-custody death to San Mateo County District Attorney Steve Wagstaffe, whose staff has taken the lead role in the investigation.

They’re looking into Ragudo’s mental health history and the possibility that he’d ingested some kind of drugs. Wagstaffe said Ragudo’s father called the police because his son was acting out of control, yelling, screaming and shaking.

Wagstaffe said:

“Growling was the term used at one point. … We don’t know what would make him act the way he was, such that his father would call the police.”

After officers arrived, Ragudo became aggressive and angry. He didn’t attack them, but was physically uncooperative when the officers needed to bring him under control to assess whether he needed psychiatric evaluation or some sort of medical attention, according to Wagstaffe.

After Ragudo had been handcuffed, officers noticed that he had stopped breathing and began to administer CPR, but their efforts were unsuccessful, Wagstaffe said.

The case remains under investigation, and an autopsy has been scheduled to determine Ragudo’s cause of death.