(9-4-20) I deeply appreciate law enforcement officers who want to help individuals in crisis by undergoing Crisis Intervention Team training. Sadly, too many Americans with mental or drug problems end up being arrested, injured or dead after the police are called. This is why I favor community alternatives that put responsibility back on social services and the medical community, such as mobile crisis response teams and peer support, to de-escalate a situation, while acknowledging that sometimes police must get involved.

The Rochester N.Y. police department’s response to Daniel Prude is calling attention to the deaths of not only people of color, but those having a mental health/drug crisis, as noted today in The New York Times. Eugene, Or., is cited as an example of alternatives to having police always be the first responders. Compare that community’s approach to the horrific police killing of Patrick Kenny in Springfield, Or..  What makes Kenny’s death even more appalling is that all of the officers involved had undergone CIT yet none used any of the de-escalation tools taught to them.

Mental health as crime New York Times by David Leonhardt

Daniel Prude, right, and his brother, Joe.Roth and Roth LLP, via Associated Press

On March 23, just a day after having gone to the hospital for mental health problems, a 41-year-old man named Daniel Prude bolted out of his brother Joe’s home in Rochester, N.Y, wearing few clothes. Joe was scared about what might happen to his brother.

So he did what many Americans do when facing an emergency involving mental illness. He called 911.

In the hours that followed, police officers found Daniel Prude walking down a street and handcuffed him. One officer held a knee on his back for two minutes. Unable to breathe, Prude lost consciousness and died a week later.

On Thursday, after the Prude family released a video of the confrontation, the mayor of Rochester suspended seven officers. (For a more detailed account, you can read this reconstruction by Times reporters.)

The case has raised many of the same questions — about racism and police behavior — as some other recent deaths of Black men. It has also highlighted a specific issue that many experts believe is crucial to reducing police-related violence: mental illness.

“Americans with mental illnesses make up nearly a quarter of those killed by police officers,” Pete Earley, whose mentally ill son has twice been shot with stun guns by police officers, has written for The Washington Post. As Earley also points out, “115 police officers have been killed since the 1970s by individuals with untreated serious mental illnesses.”

Are there any promising solutions? There appear to be.

Some cities have had success moving more mental health treatment — including emergency response — out of the criminal justice system. And many advocates for better policing have called for an expansion of these efforts, as part of shifting some police funding to other areas. “This is the only medical illness that we use criminal justice to respond to,” John Snook, the executive director of the Treatment Advocacy Center, told Vice.

One alternative: Eugene, Ore., routes some 911 calls — like many involving mental illness or homelessness — to an emergency health service, the White Bird Clinic. Last year, the clinic received 24,000 such calls Ebony Morgan, a White Bird crisis worker, told National Public Radio. In fewer than 1 percent of those cases did White Bird need to call for police backup as part of its response.

It’s hard not to wonder whether Daniel Prude would still be alive if his brother had been able to call medical professionals instead of the police.

(9-2-20) Several readers told me they are upset and disappointed that I published a blog this week whose writer was critical of D. J. Jaffe, a friend and fellow advocate of mine. I was told the timing was insensitive coming so close to his death. Others felt betrayed.

None of this was my intention.

D.J. was my friend. We enjoyed each other’s company. I admired his tenacity and advocacy for the seriously mentally ill who he passionately argued are too often ignored and abandoned by our mental health care system, government and mental health organizations. He was well-loved by many parents, especially those who often feel voiceless.

Periodically, I post views different from my own. I do this to present and better understand different points of view and hopefully build bridges. Based on comments on my Facebook page, that didn’t happen this week. Instead, the chasm between those who considered Jaffe a champion and those who felt hurt by him grew deeper. Positions more intransigent. I deeply regret this divide and wish it were otherwise. Deep down I believe all of us want the best for one another. The problem is that these issues are complex and, often by their nature, divisive. While we quarrel among ourselves, the rest of the world remains unaware and unconcerned about our struggles and hopes.

Those of us who appreciated D. J. will continue to do so. Those who didn’t will continue to do so.

None of the turmoil swirling around his death would have surprised him. He relished the role of being a bomb thrower and was not someone who was concerned about going through life quietly.

Rest in Peace D. J.

Other voices:

Manhattan Institute: Jaffe a passionate and tireless advocate for the seriously mentally ill.

Treatment Advocacy Center: a longtime, relentless pioneer in efforts to prioritize the care of those with severe mental illness,

(9-1-20) Ten new members have been named to serve on the Interdepartmental Serious Mental Illness Coordinating Committee that advises federal officials and Congress about mental health and addictions.

I am one of four original members asked to continue serving on the advisory committee. I am delighted that Miami-Dade Judge Steven Leifman is one of the new appointments.

HHS Secretary Alex M. Azar II and Assistant Secretary of Health and Human Services for Mental Health and Substance Use Dr. Elinore McCance-Katz are responsible for naming advisory members. Those asked will serve a three year term. The law that created ISMICC requires both federal and non-federal ISMICC members to issue a final report to Congress on December 2022. Congress can reauthorize ISMICC or let it expire after that report is issued.

The nonfederal members are: (returning members bold faced.)

• Trinidad de Jesus Arguello, Ph.D., LCSW, PMHRN-BC, Director, Compostela Community and Family Cultural Institute
• Yasmine Brown, M.S., Chief Executive Officer, Hope Restored Suicide Prevention Project, LLC
• Ron Bruno, Founding Board Member and Second Vice President, CIT International
• David Covington, LPC, MBA, CEO/President, RI International
• Pete Earley, Author
• Dainery Fuentes, Ph.D., School Psychologist, Polk County School Board
• Brian Hepburn, M.D., Executive Director, National Association of State Mental Health Program Directors
• Jennifer Higgins, Ph.D., CCRP, Owner, CommonWealth GrantWorks
• Johanna Kandel, B.A., Founder and Chief Executive Officer, The Alliance for Eating Disorders Awareness
• Steven Leifman, J.D., Associate Administrative Judge, Miami-Dade County Court, Eleventh Judicial Circuit of Florida
• Adrienne Lightfoot, Peer Program Coordinator, DC Department of Behavioral Health
• Amanda Lipp, B.S., Director and Filmmaker, Lipp Studios
• Winola Sprague, DNP, CNS-BC, Medical Director, Children’s Advantage
• Rhathelia Stroud, J.D., Presiding Judge, DeKalb County Magistrate Court
• Katherine Warburton Williams, D.O., Medical Director and Deputy Director of Clinical Operations, California Department of State Hospitals

Click to continue…

Michael Skinner

(8-31-20)

D. J. Jaffe and A Culture of Fear by Michael Skinner

Dear Pete,

I read your blog post, “Influential Critic D. J. Jaffe Has Died: Remembered As “Bomb Thrower” Who Demanded Mental Illness Reforms” and thought of how he has done so much to hurt those of us labeled “mentally ill”. You considered him a friend, he was anything but for those of us struggling with the challenges of trauma, abuse and mental health concerns.

These are some of my thoughts on D.J. Jaffe. He did not have the best interests of people struggling despite all of his rhetoric, it was based in fear, hate and disdain for those of us labeled “mentally ill.” There was no compassion in that man or his cohort, E. Fuller Torrey, despite their bombastic appeals to the contrary.

They built a house of cards, a hurtful, dangerous house of cards.

Click to continue…

Got Mafia hitman a job as delivery truck driver – penile implant for depressed gangster – in return for breaking Omerta code of silence bringing down the mob.

(8-29-20) My good friend and co-author, Gerald Shur, the founder of the federal Witness Protection Program, has died.  He passed away August 25, at age 86, of lung cancer, his son, Ron, told me in an email.

Gerald and I wrote WITSEC: Inside the Federal Witness Protection Program, a 2002 nonfiction history of the program and a biography of his life up to his retirement from the Justice Department.

Although relatively unknown to the public, Shur played a pivotal role in the government’s war against organized crime. He was involved in every major Mafia witness case starting in 1961 until he retired in 1995.

Beginning with Joseph Valachi, considered the first member of the La Cosa Nostra to expose the mob’s secrets, Shur interacted with a Who’s Who of organized crime, including Joseph ‘the Animal’ Barboza, Vincent “Fat Vinnie” Teresa, Aladena “Jimmy the Weasel” Frantianno, Joseph “Joe Dogs” Iannuzzi, and Henry Hill of the best-selling book Wiseguy and popular movie, Goodfellas. One of the last mafia informats Shur handled was Sammy “the Bull” Gravano, who was initially given a new identity and relocated after he’d admitted 19 mob killings in return for his successful testimony against John Gotti, a flamboyant New York Godfather who had been known as the “Teflon Don.”

In a strange twist, Shur and his wife, Miriam, were forced to enter WITSEC themselves for several months in 1991 after the DEA intercepted a Medellin drug cartel hit man entering the U.S. who had their names on his hit list.

Click to continue…

Photo courtesy of Pixabay Stock photo

Matthew Needed Compassion and Help. Instead He Was Tasered and Jailed. Why? 

(8-26-20) Guest blog by Lori J. Butler

I was leaving my office at Mountain Help, an outreach ministry operated by the First Baptist Church, when I saw a young man with mental illness running through our village of Crestline in the San Bernardino Mountains of San Bernardino County, California.

He wasn’t a jogger. It was as if he was running for his life. I had no idea, in that moment, that he actually was.

I joined a crowd that had gathered around him and began calling out to two San Bernardino Sheriff’s officers who were chasing him.

“He’s mentally ill!” I’d recognized Matthew because I had been trying to help him find housing and get into treatment.

The deputies didn’t respond.

When Matthew stopped running, he picked up a piece of wood. He didn’t swing at the officers. He simply paced back and forth – common behavior for someone experiencing paranoia and symptoms of  PTSD.

Several in the crowd began videotaping what was unfolding. Others joined me in telling the deputies that Matthew was mentally ill and known to hear voices. We are a small community. People care about each other.  I felt I had to do something so I gathered the courage and walked over to speak directly to the deputies. My adult son has had similar episodes so I thought I could help.

I told them about the three most important steps in PERT deescalation training.

Click to continue…