There has been considerable and well-deserved publicity regarding cases where implicit or explicit police bias has led to unwarranted arrests and shooting of unarmed black individuals. The Starbucks case illustrates how a black man waiting at a place of business can be construed as loitering or engaging in disorderly conduct. A black man standing in his backyard with a telephone in his hand can be shot as a potentially dangerous suspect. About 22-25% of people shot and killed by police in 2017 were unarmed black men (Sullivan, Anthony, Tate, & Jenkins, 2018). How many of these shootings were necessary?
It is similarly true that about 25% of the people killed by police are experiencing a mental health crisis (Khan, 2017). Many of those shot may be both acting in ways that suggest mental illness and be black, a double stigma. For example, a Chicago police officer called to handle a domestic dispute in a black neighborhood, saw Quintonio Legrier wielding a bat and within three minutes of arrival on the scene shot and killed both him and Bettie Jones, his neighbor who was keeping an eye on him (Fusco & Dumke, 2016). The major cases of police use of lethal force investigated by the Department of Justice in Chicago involved disabled black men (Perry, 2017).
Like in the Starbucks incident, many members of the public generalize from their own experiences of being treated well to conclude that the men at Starbucks or others in similar situations would never have been arrested without a legitimate cause. But for offences of equal severity persons acting in an erratic manner are twice as likely to be arrested as those behaving in a more expected fashion (Reuland & Schwarzfeld, 2012: Crocker, 2014 ). Without videos, we rely heavily on our own experiences to make judgements. For example, while sitting in the waiting room of a mental health court, I met a middle-aged white woman. She told me that she had been standing in line to buy a hamburger, minding her own business, and the manager asked her to leave. She refused. She told him, “Hey I got a right to stand here in line, like anybody else. So, he called the cops on me. Can you believe it, no one said anything while the police dragged me away? Now I’m locked up in a mental ward.”
I looked at her. She was dressed like a bag lady, shaggy, unruly hair, mismatched clothes, and a face aged beyond its time on earth. My first thought was that she must have been at least shoving people and screaming. I had to consciously reach outside my first disbelieving reaction to be able to entertain the possibility that her report was accurate. I could do it not only because I have read data that shows that about 25% of people with mental disorders have been arrested at least once in their lives (Livingston, 2016), but also because I have gained some experiences I would have preferred not to have had in the mental health world.
Pre-existing bias and fear predisposes escalation of violence. It makes a person with a certain look and behavior appear dangerous a priori. It is difficult to dispel such beliefs with data. Our unconscious is emotionally conditioned and does not react well to countervailing facts. Even our conscious or higher level thinking processes are more programmed by experience and culture than by evidence (Klein, 2008).
The responses of police are of great concern because they wield considerable power. They are often the gatekeepers to decide if a person should be shot, arrested, taken to a hospital, or ignored. If police decide to take an individual to jail it disrupts their life, but also if taken to a hospital, the person might be involuntarily committed and remain locked on a psychiatric ward for some time, an experience of questionable benefit.
While all people may make judgments based on race, gender, age, dress, and apparent mental health status, the responses of the police are often more heightened by fear and aggression. Police are an odd combination of prey and predator. They are alert to opportunities to catch a thief or a terrorist or someone loitering about, but in addition to seeking small and large prey, they are sometimes prey themselves. Like other prey animals their amygdala reacts instantly to a sign of danger, often before the message has reached their neocortex (the judging part of their brains). A phone is more likely to look like a gun in a black man’s hand than in the hand of a white woman. The amygdala makes people prone to acting upon stereotypes and superficial unconscious cues or use Recognition Prime Decision-Making (Dalyley, 2016).
The end result is that many people feel forced to remain out of sight, fear to call the police in order to help a person in crisis, and will not reach out for health care to avoid violent encounters with the police. This is one way in which such structural violence based on stereotypes creates or perpetuates psycho-social disabilities as Chris Huff, disability rights activist discussed (apud Perry, 2017).
The number of cases of police shooting of people with loaded gun has led some police agencies to implement various programs around the country and abroad such as calling in a Crisis Intervention Team and training police in bias control and de-escalation techniques. However, the Intervention team is not always immediately available and police are often not well prepared. Unfortunately, police are trained in the use of force 8 hours for each hour they are trained in de-escalation. Not surprisingly, there is minimal evidence of the efficacy of the short-term tolerance training or mental health training programs given to police (Cantlebury et al., 2017). But better training models are beginning to show better results. Police are learning to slow things down, keep a distance, and learn more about the situation before engaging. In some cities, such as Camden and NYC police caused fatalities are declining dramatically (Jackson, 2016).
I suggest that anti-bias and de-escalation training would be more effective if police also have normalized neighborhood encounters. This is something that happens often when you have a community-based police force. Police who walk the streets get to know the residents, rather than only interacting with people who are in the midst of a crisis or criminal acts. Neighborhood police officers can also more effectively collect information from witnesses, judge situations, and help individuals avoid unnecessary jailing or hospitalization allowing people with mental health disabilities to be safer in public venues.
References
Andrew, D., Bronx Judge Acquits NYPD Sergeant in Shooting of Mentally Ill Woman, NY Law Journal, 2/15/18. https://ift.tt/2I7rYZD
Charette, Y, Crocker AG, Billette I. Police encounters involving citizens with mental illness: use of resources and outcomes. Psychiatr Serv. 2014;65(4):511–516.
Dayley, E, Reducing the Use of Force: De-escalation Training for Police Officers, 9/16, https://ift.tt/2rGTn9V
Fusco, C., and Dumke, M., Shifting stories for Chicago cop in LeGrier, Jones shooting, Chicago Sun Times, 3/18/16. https://chicago.suntimes.com/news/varying-stories-for-police-officer-in-legrier-jones-shooting/
Jackson, T., De-escalation training to reduce police shootings facing mixed reviews at launch, Washington Post, 10/15/16.
Kane, E. Evans, E., and Shokranah, F., Effectiveness of current policing-related mental health interventions in England and Wales and Crisis Intervention Teams as a future potential model: a systematic review, Syst. Rev. 6:85, 2017.
Aliya Khan, When Police Shoot a Man Who Was Stabbing Himself, ACLU of Minn., 12/22/17. https://www.aclu.org/blog/criminal-law-reform/reforming-police-practices/when-police-shoot-man-who-was-stabbing-himself
Gary A. Klein, “Naturalistic Decision Making,” Human Factors 3, June 2008, 456 – 460, doi: 10.1518/001872008X288385.
Livingston, James, Contact Between Police and People with Mental Disorders: A Review of Rates, Psychiatric Services, 67(8):250-57, 2016.
Perry, D. Police killings: The price of being disabled and black in America, The Guardian, 6/22/17. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jun/22/police-killings-disabled-black-people-mental-illness
Reuland M, Schwarzfeld M, Draper L. Law enforcement responses to people with mental illnesses: a guide to research-informed policy and practice. Council of State Governments Justice Center: New York; 2012.
Scantlebury, A., Fairhurst, C, Booth, A., McDaid, C., Moran, N,, Parker, A., et al., Effectiveness of a training program for police officers who come into contact with people with mental health problems: A pragmatic randomised controlled trial, PLOS< 9/8/ 17. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0184377
Sullivan, J., Anthony, Z,, Tate, and Jenkins, J, Nationwide, police shot and killed nearly 1,000 people in 2017. Washington Post, 1/5/18.
Taheri, S. “Do Crisis Intervention Teams Reduce Arrests and Improve Officer Safety? A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis,” Criminal Justice Policy Review (November 5, 2014): 79, doi: 10.1177/0887403414556289.
from Psych Central https://ift.tt/2KWTVkq
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