On October 14, 2007, Robert Dziekański (Polish pronunciation: [ˈrɔbɛrd d͡ʑɛˈkaj̃skʲi]), a 40-year-old Polish man immigrating to Canada, was killed during an arrest at the Vancouver International Airport in Richmond, British Columbia (BC).

During customs processing, Dziekański began showing frustration and agitation towards airport staff. When members of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) encountered him in the international reception lounge at the airport, they pinned, handcuffed and used a Taser electroshock weapon on Dziekański multiple times—with accounts suggesting the weapon was used four or five times. Dziekański died at the scene from a heart attack induced by the electrical shocks.

Video of the incident was recorded by an eyewitness, Paul Pritchard. The police initially took possession of the memory card containing the video as evidence, stating it would compromise the investigation if it were released to the public at that time. However, the following month, Pritchard was able to re-obtain the video, and sold it to the press—which brought additional prominence to the case. The final inquiry report, released on June 18, 2010, concluded that the RCMP were not justified in using a taser against Dziekański, and that the officers later deliberately misrepresented their actions to investigators. The four officers involved were charged with perjury and in 2015, two of the defendants were cleared of all charges while the remaining two were sentenced to twenty-four to thirty months in prison.

Robert Dziekański was a construction worker by trade, but had also worked as a miner. He was in the process of emigrating from Gliwice, Poland, to live with his mother, Zofia Cisowski, in Kamloops, British Columbia.

Dziekański's flight was two hours late, and arrived at about 3:15 p.m on October 13, 2007. According to official sources, Dziekański required language support to complete initial customs formalities. After a primary immigration inspection, Dziekański was directed to go to the airport's secondary immigration area for further processing. However, it is unclear whether Dziekański followed this instruction. Instead, he was seen around the baggage carousels at various points between 4:00 p.m. and about 10:45 p.m. Dziekański's mother, Zofia Cisowski, had told him to wait for her at the baggage claim area, but this was a secured area where she was not allowed to enter. At 10:45 p.m., when he attempted to leave the customs hall, he was directed again to secondary immigration to begin processing his immigration papers. Dziekański's immigration procedures were completed at about 12:15 a.m. on October 14. After 30 minutes in an immigration waiting area, he was taken to the international arrivals reception area. Cisowski had been making enquiries of airport staff since the early afternoon. Airport staff told her Dziekański was not at the airport and she had returned to Kamloops at about 10 p.m., believing her son had missed his flight.

When Dziekański left the customs hall, he became visibly agitated. Bystanders and airport security guards were unable to communicate with him because he did not speak English. He used chairs to prop open the one-way doors between a customs clearing area and a public lounge and at one point threw a computer and a small table to the floor before the police arrived. Four RCMP officers, constables Gerry Rundel, Bill Bentley, Kwesi Millington, and a supervisor, Corporal Benjamin Robinson, arrived and entered the customs room where Dziekański was pacing about. They apparently directed him to stand near a counter, to which Dziekański complied but then he picked up a stapler sometime after being told to place his hands on a counter.

Shortly thereafter, about 25 seconds after arriving at the scene, Corporal Robinson ordered the Taser to be used. Constable Millington tasered Dziekański. He began to convulse and was tasered several more times after falling to the ground, where the four officers pinned, handcuffed, and continued to taser him. One eyewitness, who recorded the incident on her cellphone, told CBC News that Dziekański had been tasered four times. "The third and fourth ones were at the same time" delivered by the officers at Dziekański's right and left, just before Dziekański fell. According to BC Crown counsel spokesman Stan Lowe, Dziekański was tasered a total of five times. Constable Millington testified that he deployed the Taser four times, but he believed that in some of those instances the probes may not have contacted Dziekański's body. Dziekański writhed and screamed before he stopped moving. Corporal Robinson stated he then checked for a pulse, but his heart had stopped. Testimony from the other RCMP officers stated they never saw anyone, including Robinson, check for a pulse. Dziekański did not receive CPR until paramedics arrived on the scene approximately 15 minutes later. Paramedics attempted resuscitation for 20 minutes; they were unable to revive him, and he was pronounced dead at the scene.

In 2013, the BC Coroners Service ruled the death to be a homicide, citing a heart attack caused by the repeated jolts.