Search Results for: violence

Image by mohamed Hassan from Pixabay

(5-14-21) Former Rep. Tim Murphy (R.-Pa.) wrote and pushed the most significant federal mental health legislation in decades through Congress during the final days of the Obama Administration. In this OP Ed first published in the Pittsburgh Post Gazette, he argues that serious mental illnesses are claiming more lives than COVID and calls for reforms, many of which, were stripped from his original bill.  As with all guest blogs, the views expressed are the author’s. I welcome comments on my Facebook page.

Addressing the link between violence, serious mental illness

By Tim Murphy, writing in the Pittsburgh Post Gazette

Mass murders have already exceeded several dozen in 2021. The act is so abhorrent to us that we continually seek explanations in hope of finding a cause and cure.

Some blame the weapon (primarily firearms) and some the characteristics of the perpetrator such as the presence of serious mental illness (SMI), including schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. Global studies of mass violence report that perpetrator SMI is present in less than 10% of the cases, leading some advocates to suggest preventive efforts be directed away from mental illness.

Such action defies logic, facts and science.

Although SMI compromises only 5.2% of the population, the impact of their illness is far greater. According to the Treatment Advocacy Center, most with SMI are not violent; however, those with untreated SMI have 15-fold-higher rates of violence.

Click to continue…

(5-11-21) The American Psychiatric Association awarded its 2021 Distinguished Service Award to the Treatment Advocacy Center, founded by Dr. E. Fuller Torrey.

What’s interesting about the APA award is that it shows that Dr. Torrey’s 1998 creation is no longer, as one advocate put it, “a scrappy underdog”  hoping for a seat at the table.

The award and TAC’s recent actions cement its role as a power player. This is especially true when it comes to calling for criminal justice reform. More than mainline organizations such as Mental Health America and the National Alliance on Mental Illness, TAC has arguably been the most aggressive critic of the inappropriate incarceration of Americans with mental illnesses.

Calling TAC a “David to the Goliath” of a mental health care system that fails to meet the needs of individuals with serious mental illnesses, Dr. Jeffrey Geller, president of the APA, said in announcing the award:

“Not afraid to go out front with issues that could fundamentally improve the lives of persons with SMI but were not initially seen favorably, Treatment Advocacy Center has led the way to the availability of Assisted Outpatient Treatment (AOT) in almost every state.

“It has and is doing so by nurturing the concept, educating all stakeholders, developing model legislation, lobbying for statutory changes, and assisting in implementation. Treatment Advocacy Center continues in these efforts, focused on expanding the utilization of AOT statutes nationwide.”

The APA Distinguish Service Award honors “exceptional meritorious service to the field of psychiatry.” APA describes itself as the “leading psychiatric organization in the world” with some 40,000 members in a hundred different countries, all engaged in psychiatry.

TAC’s agenda has not made it universally loved. Mental Health America, the Bazelon Center For Mental Health Law, and groups such as Mad In America, strongly oppose AOT. Critics also have accused TAC of releasing reports that bend facts to push its platform.

Click to continue…

(4-6-21) If you met Cheryl Nimtz today, you would never suspect what she has experienced as an individual with lived experience. Rather than hiding her past, she writes poignantly about it in today’s blog and I am deeply grateful. 

I Tell My Story To Foster Wisdom, Understanding And Insight

By Cheryl Nimtz

Growing up, I had success by societies standards. I earned good grades, lettered in sports and graduated with honor society status in high school. I climbed the Grand Tetons, graduated with an associate degree and right out of college became one of Fort Wayne Indiana’s first women combat firefighters. (1980-1982)

At the young age of 21, I wasn’t aware of the storm brewing in my head. At the end of the two years, I started tripping in my dance of success.

I made poor decisions, lost my moral fiber and struggled emotionally. Things went from bad to worse when I resigned from the challenging job I loved. Soon after, I joined an extreme fundamentalist church and floundered as I tried to follow every rule to the letter.

Click to continue…

(4-2-21) An influential Virginia Sheriff lashed out at the state’s behavioral health department and the General Assembly during a press conference this week stating that both needed to “stop passing the buck and step up to develop and implement solutions to address the constant bed shortages and other deficiencies in the state response to mental health crises.”

Flanked by other sheriffs and police chiefs, Montgomery County Sheriff Hank Partin warned: “Folks that are in crisis, that need help – they aren’t receiving help.”

It is not uncommon, the sheriff said, for his officers to spend hours driving across the state searching for an available state hospital bed only to arrive and be told that none is available.

The officers’ complaints about a lack of state hospital beds for Virginians, who are being held under Temporary Detention Orders (TDOs), is hardly new.

A decade ago, then Inspector General G. Douglas Bevelacqua warned that there were not enough crisis care beds available at state psychiatric hospitals or at local hospitals. During a 90-day period, he discovered emergency rooms had turned away 200 individuals who had met involuntary commitment criteria and were judged dangerous. He called it “streeting” – simply kicking ill individuals to the streets.

In November 2013, state Sen. Creigh Deeds took his son, Gus, to a mental health facility but was told no local hospital bed could be found within the necessary time period for a TDO. Deeds and his son were sent home where Gus attacked his father with a knife, slashing his face, before ending his own life.

In 2015, Jamycheal Mitchell, age 24, died from “wasting away” syndrome in a Hampton Roads Regional jail after waiting 101 days for a state hospital bed. He suffered a heart attack after literally starving to death.

Virginia is not the only state that doesn’t have enough crisis care beds. Back in a 2005 study, the Treatment Advocacy Center warned:

“The consequences of the severe shortage of public psychiatric beds include increased homelessness; the incarceration of mentally ill individuals in jails and prisons; emergency rooms being overrun with patients waiting for a psychiatric bed; and an increase in violent behavior, including homicides, in communities across the nation.”

Fifteen experts cited in that report recommended states have “50 (range 40 to 60) public psychiatric beds per 100,000 population for hospitalization for individuals with serious psychiatric disorders.” At that time, Virginia had less than half that recommended number – 22.5 beds.

Click to continue…

 

(1-29-21) Should the police be the first responders when someone with a mental illness is in distress? Recently, Crisis Intervention Team programs have come under fire because of incidents such as the killing of Patrick Kenny who had paranoid schizophrenia. The four Springfield, Oregon police officers involved in his death all had CIT training and one was a CIT instructor. Jeff Fladen, executive director of the Tennessee state chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness defends CIT programs, and sees them as necessary even if communities develop alternatives to having the police respond.  You can read here about the history and effectiveness of the estimated 400 CIT programs currently in the U.S.. 

CIT is Foundational (and We Need Co-Response Too)

Guest blog by Jeff  Fladen

As a leader of my state’s effort to expand CIT (Crisis Intervention Training) for law enforcement and other first responders, I have been hearing the same story nearly every day.

Instead of CIT, what about Co-Response and Alternative Response models, where mental health professionals assist the police during a mental health crisis either in person such as a social worker ride along or remotely from a control room or crisis center.

The Cahoots (Crisis Assistance Helping Out On The Street) program, launched by the White Bird Clinic in Eugene, Oregon some 30 years ago, is often brought up as an example of a successful co-response, although this program does not include social workers “riding along” with law enforcement. Cahoots features two-person teams consisting of a medic (a nurse, paramedic, or EMT) and a crisis worker who has substantial training and experience in the mental health field.

The program developed as an alternative to law enforcement acting as the mental health crisis first responder and offers an alternative approach to non-emergent issues. Other Co-response models include the Boulder Early Diversion Get Engaged (EDGE) program in Colorado, and the Boston Police Co-Responder Program, in existence since 2011. Additional programs around the country have developed  or have been announced in the past year.

I am deeply concerned that this is sometimes framed as an either/or discussion when it comes to CIT.  It shouldn’t be.

Click to continue…

(1-22-21) Kimberly Kenny wrote a powerful blog last July for me describing how Springfield, Oregon police officers chased and fatally shot her brother during a mental health crisis. Shockingly, the four officers involved had undergone  Crisis Intervention Team training. The Kenny family received a $4.55 million settlement from the city — the largest lawsuit settlement involving police in Oregon’s history. The local prosecutor refused to file criminal charges and the department said its officers did not violate any laws or department policies.

After her blog was posted, the Kenny family told their story to The Washington Post: Fatal police shootings of mentally ill people are 39 percent more likely to take place in small and midsized areas.

And just before the year ended, the paper produced a podcast about the killing: Policing mental health crises: What can go wrong when police are the ones responding to mental health crises…

The disturbing 32-minute podcast narrated by investigative reporter Kimberly Kindy is difficult to hear because it contains recordings of Patrick Kenny pleas with police before his death. His sister told me in an email that she wants her brother’s death to be a wake-up call. A report, published by the Ruderman Family Foundation, found that nearly half of all fatal police shootings involved someone with a mental illness or disability.

We need alternatives to having the police be the first-responders when someone is in crisis.

Here is Kimberly Kenny’s original blog.

Crisis Intervention Training Didn’t Prevent Four Police Officers From Assaulting and Killing My Brother

 by Kimberly Kenny

The entire incident took less than five minutes.

It happened a little before 9 pm on a Sunday, near a hardware store Patrick liked to go to sometimes.

Click to continue…