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Omaha police shocked special-education student with electric-shock compliance glove during school crisis

On May 8, 2026, an Omaha Police Department school resource officer twice shocked a middle-school special-education student's forearm with an electric-shock "G.L.O.V.E." compliance glove at Omaha Public Schools' Integrated Learning Program, after the student threw a chair and struck a security guard and the officer during a behavioral crisis. Compliant Technologies, the glove's manufacturer, warns against using the device on children or people with disabilities, but OPD's internal use-of-force review cleared the incident as within policy. The incident became public at an August 17, 2026 school board meeting, prompting objections from parents and the Arc of Nebraska.

Jurisdiction
Nebraska
Location
Omaha, Nebraska

Abuses documented

Actors

  • Omaha Police Department (school resource officer)

On May 8, 2026, an Omaha Police Department school resource officer used an electric-shock "G.L.O.V.E." compliance glove on a middle-school student at Omaha Public Schools' Integrated Learning Program, a school for students with social, emotional, behavioral, and learning disabilities. According to OPD's own incident report, a security guard confiscated a lighter from the student on the playground; when escorted inside, the student made threats toward a paraprofessional, then threw a chair that struck the security guard and punched the guard in the head. The resource officer gave verbal commands to stop and then applied the glove to the student's forearm for about one second, and again for two to three seconds when the student did not comply. A school nurse found no injury, and OPD said the student declined medical support.

The G.L.O.V.E. (Generated Low Output Voltage Emitter) is made by Compliant Technologies LLC of Lexington, Kentucky, and delivers an electrical shock of 324 to 362 volts directly to a person's skin for up to 15 seconds. The manufacturer's own materials warn against using the device on children, pregnant women, elderly or disabled people, or anyone showing only "verbal defiance." Twenty-nine of OPD's 34 school resource officers are trained to use the glove, deployed under a 2025 purchase the Omaha City Council approved without public comment. Despite the manufacturer's warning, OPD's internal use-of-force review process cleared the May 8 use of the glove on the special-education student as within policy.

The incident, along with a second glove use on a student at Omaha South High School, became public in mid-August 2026 after U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's separate plan to buy the same device drew national scrutiny to the manufacturer. At the Omaha Public Schools board meeting on August 17, 2026, parents, students, and the Arc of Nebraska objected to the device's use on students, with the Arc of Nebraska specifically citing the risk to students with intellectual or developmental disabilities.

Updates

2026-08-18 — OPS asked OPD to stop carrying the gloves in schools; OPD agreed [5]

On August 18, 2026, Omaha Public Schools Superintendent Matthew Ray sent a letter to Omaha's mayor and police chief, Bellevue's mayor and police chief, and the Douglas County Sheriff requesting that school resource officers no longer be authorized to carry the G.L.O.V.E. device on OPS property. Omaha Police Chief Todd Schmaderer and Mayor John Ewing Jr. agreed to the request the same day, saying OPD school resource officers in OPS buildings would stop carrying the glove while continuing to carry standard equipment including tasers, OC spray, batons, and firearms.

Why we recorded this

Schools carry a heightened duty of care toward the children in them, and that duty is highest for students whose disabilities limit their ability to comply or consent. An Omaha police school resource officer twice shocked a special-education student with an electric-shock "G.L.O.V.E." compliance glove during a behavioral crisis at a school serving students with social, emotional, and learning disabilities — a device the manufacturer's own materials warn against using on children or people with disabilities. This archive records the incident because deploying a tool explicitly contraindicated for the population it was used on shows the safeguards meant to limit force against vulnerable students failing in practice, not just on paper.

Sources

  1. 2 OPS students were shocked with gloves. Now the community is demanding answers. — 3 News Now / KMTV primary accessed August 19, 2026
  2. Parents raise questions about shock gloves after Omaha Police detail incident at special education school — WOWT primary accessed August 19, 2026
  3. Omaha police, mayor detail two uses of electric shock gloves by school resource officers — Nebraska Public Media primary accessed August 19, 2026
  4. Cops Love ICE's New Shock Gloves. Parents Want Them Out of Schools. — Mother Jones investigative accessed August 19, 2026
  5. Omaha Public Schools requests police officers not carry shock gloves — 1011 NOW / WOWT primary accessed August 19, 2026

See also