Seven-months-pregnant Malaika Brooks suffered repeated 50,000 volt shocks for refusing to sign a speeding ticket, and a federal court of appeals ruled it justified.

You are a police officer on traffic patrol and you pull over an irate driver who refuses to admit she was doing 32 mph in a 20-mph zone. She won't sign the speeding ticket, not even when you call for backup. Also, she is pregnant. What do you do?

a) Finish writing the ticket, making note of the fact that the driver refused to sign, and send her on her way, perhaps admonishing her in the process.

b) Grab the keys from the ignition, tase her three times, force her out of her car, and arrest her.

In the minds of three Seattle police officers in 2004, the latter was the reasonable course of action when they stopped seven-months-pregnant Malaika Brooks -- and last week, a federal appeals court agreed.

In a 2-1 ruling, Judges Cynthia Holcomb Hall and Diarmuid F. O'Scannlain of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled the officers were justified in their use of force, because of the threat that Brooks might somehow "retrieve the keys and drive off erratically," and because the third tasing allowed the officers to "finally extract her from her car and gain control over her."