By Patrick Crowley
Enquirer staff writer

BURLINGTON - Steven Yanke stood on the front porch of his Florence home Wednesday evening and taunted Boone County sheriff's deputies investigating a domestic violence report, officers said.

Police had been told that Yanke, 43, hit his wife with a broom handle and chased her from their home with a knife. They said that after confronting and taunting deputies, Yanke turned and ran back into the house.

Officers pursued Yanke into the house and Deputy Mike Gross subdued him with one of the department's new Tasers.

Sheriff Mike Helmig has purchased 20 of the $800 Tasers and hopes to buy more.

"There are so many times when deputies get into scuffles with people and somebody gets injured," said department spokesman Tom Scheben. "While this hurts and debilitates a suspect, it is temporary."

Yanke was arrested and charged with fourth-degree assault and wanton endangerment. He was not injured.

A growing number of local police departments - including Cincinnati and Dayton, Ky., - are turning to Tasers as a crime-fighting tool.

Tasers fire two probes that attach to a person's skin or clothing. A 50,000-volt charge of electricity incapacitates the suspect by electro-muscular disruption, which Scheben described as "an uncontrollable contraction of muscular tissue that's been described as a full-body charley horse."

Tasers can be used when suspects are combative, using drugs, emotionally disturbed or holding hostages, Scheben said.

"In those situations it is safer for the deputy to maintain a distance for his own safety or for that of others," he said.

E-mail pcrowley@enquirer.com