TORONTO - Ontario's advocate for children called for a moratorium on using stun guns on minors except in extreme circumstances as the family of a teenage girl from a remote First Nation apparently zapped with a Taser in a jail cell went public Tuesday.

The teen, who was 14 at the time, was shocked after being told to stop picking at the paint in the holding facility in Sioux Lookout, Ont., where she was detained last July, a lawsuit brought by the family states.

A statement of claim filed with the court alleges that two Ontario Provincial Police officers entered the cell without warning, "violently" pulled the girl to the floor and applied the Taser to her right upper thigh for three to five seconds.

None of the allegations have been proven in court.

The girl, who has fetal alcohol syndrome, was arrested for underage drinking, the family's lawyer said.

The family says the incident was caught on tape.

Irwin Elman, the head of Ontario's Office of the Provincial Advocate for Children and Youth, said he's viewed the tape and calls the incident an example of "usage creep" with the devices.

"Tasers were brought in to be an alternative to lethal force in Canada," Elman said in an interview from Thunder Bay, Ont.

"We know in this case in Ontario there was no question that it was anywhere near anyone being harmed or harming themselves."

Elman's child advocacy office has sent a letter to the province's community safety minister asking for a ban on stun gun use on children until the effects of using the devices on young people can be studied.

"We want research done into how Tasers effect children and youth," he said.

The girl's family is suing the provincial police force for $500,000. They are also seeking an order that would prohibit the use of stun guns on minors except in cases where a life is clearly at risk.

"I was concerned that this would happen to someone else's daughter," the girl's father said in a telephone interview from Kenora, Ont., a small city near the Manitoba border where the family's lawsuit was filed Jan. 23.

The 55-year-old man, who cannot be named to protect his daughter's identity, said he "couldn't believe it" when he saw the video of the incident.

The girl was sitting on the cot in the holding cell, scratching the wall with one of her fingernails, he said. It's hard to tell how much, if any, damage she caused to the surface, he added, "but there was already marks there."

One of the hardest things to understand, the father said, is how his daughter could have been viewed as a threat.

"She was already in the cell. There was no danger to anyone around her. She wasn't hurting herself," he said.

The family's lawyer said police described the girl as "surprisingly strong" for her age and incorrectly recorded her as 5'5" and 140 pounds -- but the girl's father says she's 20 pounds lighter and an inch shorter.

Citing the pending civil suit, both the ministry and the police force declined to comment directly on the case.

The Ontario government says it's studying the use of the devices in consultation with police agencies.

"We expect this to be complete early this year and will take all recent reports into consideration. Our study is looking at all options including the use of Tasers on vulnerable groups," a spokeswoman wrote in an email.

A provincial police spokesman confirmed there was an incident last July at the Sioux Lookout detachment that involved using a "conductive energy device" on a minor, but would not discuss any further details.

The force has previously defended the use of stun guns as a "less lethal" option in serious situations.

"Use of force is always a last option for a police officer," OPP Insp. Dave Ross said Tuesday.

The use of stun guns by police forces has repeatedly come under fire in Canada.

The death of Polish immigrant Robert Dziekanski is the subject of an ongoing inquiry. He died October 2007 after being stunned with a Taser at Vancouver's airport. The death was captured on a bystander's camera.

In Manitoba, aboriginal leaders criticized the police last year following the death of a teen who had been shocked with a Taser.

The RCMP's watchdog recently announced a probe into 10 cases in which people died after being zapped by an officer's Taser.

The review, being led by the Commission for Public Complaints Against the RCMP, will look at cases dating back to 2001 -- the same year the national police force began using the 50,000-volt stun guns.