5.5 Summary
- Multiple events have occurred in the United States that have caused the public to raise concern around policing practices – especially with regard to people of color and people with mental disorders, and most especially people at the intersection of these two vulnerabilities: people of color who also experience mental disorders.
- Local and national efforts have been implemented to make policing more just for marginalized communities as well as address the inequity in current practices.
- Training has been updated for police academies, specialized units within the police force have been created, and crisis response teams have been developed to create a joint effort by mental health professionals and law enforcement.
- Current police and training models and efforts are far from perfect and the most effective approach is still being developed.
- Continued collaboration between law enforcement and mental health providers is the most hopeful opportunity to address concerns with people with mental disorders being disproportionately impacted by lethal force.
5.5.1 Key Terms
- Assertive Community Treatment (ACT): A community-based model of care where mental health services are provided in a person’s home or in a community location. ACT has the goal of keeping people with serious mental disorders in the community and trying to decrease hospital admittance.
- Community mental health: Mental health services provided or funded by state or local governments to provide accessible mental health services to community members. Community mental health services are generally low-barrier to access and provide a wide range of offerings including clinic-based and community-based care.
- Crisis Intervention Training (CIT): a program aimed at training criminal justice professionals in safe and effective response to individuals experiencing mental health crises. CIT emphasizes deescalation techniques and referrals to mental health and social services [Source – I kinda fudged this definition].
- Crisis response: policies, plans and actions aimed at safely and effectively responding to people in emergent or problematic situations due to mental disorders, ideally without resort to criminal justice tools of force and arrest [Source].
- De-escalation: Strategies in crisis response that bring a person in crisis back to their baseline, and away from an intense state where they may be unreasonable and unpredictable.
- Forensic: relating to criminal investigation or court proceedings.
- Mobile Crisis Team: A team of mental health workers, health workers, and law enforcement that respond to mental health crises in the community. These teams are multi-disciplinary, involving different types of professionals, so may be uniquely able to meet complex needs.
- Multi-disciplinary teams: Teams of workers across professions. For example, law enforcement working closely with mental health or substance use treatment providers in a team can assist the community in an otherwise unmet way. Mobile crisis teams, for example, are multi-disciplinary.
- Use of force: An escalating series of actions ranging from “no force” to “lethal force” that an officer may take to resolve a situation when de-escalation encounters have been unsuccessful.
- Recidivism: the likelihood of criminal re-offending.
5.5.2 Discussion Questions:
- Law enforcement often feel like they are practicing outside of their ‘scope’ when they are asked to respond to problematic behavior in the community, however not necessarily illegal behavior. What additional training, partnering, or police staffing do you think would be helpful to consider for a multidisciplinary team to manage mental health symptoms in the community?
- We discussed in this chapter guidelines for encounters. What guidelines will you incorporate into your practice while working in the criminal justice field?
- If you or a family member was experiencing a mental health crisis, what type of community response would you like to see?
5.5.3 Summary Licenses and Attributions
Chapter summary written by Kendra Harding.