A 95-year-old woman in Australia who was tasered by a police officer is in critical condition as police investigate the incident.

On Wednesday, police were called to the Yallambee nursing home in Cooma, about 300 kilometers southwest of Sindee, after a worker spotted 95-year-old resident Claire Nowland outside her room holding a meat cleaver, explained New York Police Deputy Superintendent South Wales, Peter Cotter.

Two officers spoke to Knowland for several minutes, but she did not drop the knife and began to approach them. One then hit her with the taser, causing the woman to fall to the ground and hit her head.

“At the time she was tasered, she was approaching the officers, but, admittedly, with a slow step,” Kotter noted during a press conference. “He had a walker, but he was also holding a knife.”

Knowland, who suffers from dementia, had been wandering around the nursing home for hours and had taken the knife from the kitchen.

He is now hospitalized in a critical condition, while the incident has caused public outrage.

“They used tasers, when all he needed was a good talk (…) he was confused, which happens to people with dementia, he needed sweet talks and help. He didn’t need law enforcement,” said local official Andrew Thaler.

The police officer who hit the elderly woman with the taser has been suspended, while a “category 1 critical incident” investigation has been launched, in which the homicide unit is participating. “Category 1” are considered by the Australian Police to be incidents where the injury may result in death or imminent death.

The officers’ body cameras recorded the incident, but, according to Cotter, it is not in the public interest to release this footage.