A 95-year-old woman is fighting for her life after a police officer shot her with a Taser gun at a nursing home in Australia.
The incident occurred Thursday after police received a report of a disturbance at the Yallambee Lodge, a care home for elderly people in New South Wales.
When officers arrived, they found Clare Nowland armed with a steak knife, the BBC reported.
Staff and police tried to disarm Nowland -- who suffers from dementia and uses a walker -- but she began approaching officers "at a slow pace," according to the report. At that point, one of the officers used a Taser to disable the elderly woman.
Andrew Thaler, a family friend, told the BBC that Nowland was struck twice by the Taser, in the chest and back, before she fell and hit her head.
Nowland, who's a great-grandmother, was rushed to Cooma Base Hospital in critical condition with a fractured skull and serious brain bleed, the BBC reported.
"The family are shocked, they're confused... and the community is outraged," Thaler told the outlet. "How can this happen? How do you explain this level of force? It's absurd."
A representative for the nursing home told local media that its staff was following procedure when they contacted police for assistance.
The New South Wales Police Department has launched an investigation.
"A critical incident team will now investigate the circumstances surrounding the incident," police said in a statement. "That investigation will be subject to independent review."
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