By: Michael Pope
August 25, 2015
Leaders
in Fairfax County may be on the verge of taking a different approach to mental
illness, especially how law enforcement confronts those with mental illness.
That's an issue that has raised alarms after two recent deaths, one at the
hands of a police officer and another at the hands of sheriff's deputies.
"Police officers have increasingly become
the first responders when a citizen is in the midst of a psychiatric
crisis," says a report crafted by the Mental Health Subcommittee of the Ad
Hoc Police Police Practices Commission (pdf). "Despite the minor nature of
these crimes, encounters between persons with mental illness and the police can
escalate, sometimes with tragic consequences."
Such was the case in two recent high profile
cases. One was in 2010, when David Masters was shot and killed on Richmond
Highway. Police kept the name of the officer secret for months, and they
concealed the dashboard video footage secret for years. As it turns out,
Masters suffered from mental illness and the confrontation was prompted to a
suspicion that he stole flowers from a nearby business.
More recently, five deputy sheriffs at the
Fairfax County jail hit Natasha McKenna, a woman suffering from schizophrenia,
multiple times with a Taser stun gun, leading to her death. She was handcuffed
at the time, prompting to harsh criticism of the sheriff's office.
Number and diagnoses of inmates with mental
illness in Virginia. (Virginia Department of Behavioral Health and
Developmental Services)
"There are a number of jurisdictions
nationally and even here in Virginia that already do this very well, in fact do
it better than Fairfax County does," says Del. Marcus Simon (D-53),
chairman of the subcommittee. "We want to encourage the county to not view
this as simply a police problem and a police training problem but to try and
figure out if there's a better way to deal with them than simply warehousing
them in the county jail."
Ever since the institutions that once housed
people with mental illness shut down decades ago, jails across the country have
become de facto psychiatric facilities. According to the National Alliance on
Mental Illness, about 40 percent of adults who experience serious mental
illness will come into contact with the police and the criminal justice system
at some point in their lives. And nearly half of all fatal shootings by law
enforcement locally and nationally involve persons with mental illnesses.
According to Fairfax County Sheriff Stacey
Kincaid, about half of all Fairfax County inmates have mental health and/or
co-occurring substance abuse disorders.
"There are people who are charged with
minor crimes like trespass and being a nuisance who are wandering the streets
or get into trouble because of mental illness," says Pete Earley, an
author who has written about the subject of mental illness. "These are not
hardcore criminals, and they deserve and need to get into treatment, not
punished."
One is the creation of crisis assessment sites,
which would receive those who would otherwise end up in the jail. Another
recommendation calls for additional mobile units that can provide on-site
evaluation, treatment and crisis intervention. Yet another key recommendations
is the creation of a new docket at the county court, which would allow judges
who have received specialized training to consider cases involving mental
health concerns outside of the normal crush of business.
These are all best practices that the
subcommittee learned are commonplace in many parts of the country but not
happening in Fairfax County, where the Sheriff's Office has the lowest level
training for mental illness in Northern Virginia.
"Fairfax County was behind for a variety
of reasons, one was a lack of leadership," says Earley. "You had
people in the judiciary who were strongly opposed to mental-health dockets or
getting involved. You had people in the police department who saw this as kind
of a hug-a-thug program."
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