NYAPRS Note: NYAPRS congratulates CCIT on their press conference yesterday in NYC, where dozens of advocates representing the broad coalition of support for the measure joined Senator Parker in support of the legislative bill that would require crisis teams in NYC. NYAPRS has had positive meetings with legislators in support of this issue and will work continuously to see through its passage in 2014. The hard work of NYAPRS co-president Steve Coe and incoming president Carla Rabinowitz, both from Community Access, was essential to the success of yesterday’s event.
State Senator Kevin Parker Joins Fellow Officials to Promote NYS Senate Bill Calling for CCITPRNewswire, 2/19/2014On Wednesday, February 19 at 11 a.m., State Senator Kevin Parker joined Brooklyn Borough President, Eric Adams, and the Communities for Crisis Intervention Teams (www.ccitnyc.org) – a coalition of 50 behavioral health providers and concerned citizens – to call for the creation of specially trained Crisis Intervention Teams (CITs) that can partner with police officers to help better respond to the 100,000 “emotionally disturbed person” (EDP) calls the New York Police Department (NYPD) receives each year. During a City Hall press conference, Senator Parker announced a new bill (S6365) he has introduced, and outlined why its successful passage will greatly improve police/community relations throughout New York City – through the establishment of new CITs, better police training, and more substantial police/community partnerships. Assembly Member Jeffrion Aubry, is introducing the same legislation in the Assembly. Senator Parker shared: “When the NYPD receives a call related to an ’emotionally disturbed person’ (EDP), that person is usually experiencing mental health issues or substance abuse problems, or both, but too often those calls can result in an unnecessary arrest, emotional abuse or worse. My bill, S6365, would require training for the NYPD to enable it to respond to EDP calls in a manner that increases the safety of the ’emotionally disturbed’ citizen and the police officer, and bystanders, and create better outcomes for all.” The CIT model has a proven track record and has already been adopted by 2,700 police departments across the United States, including in two of our four biggest cities: Chicago and Houston. By establishing closer ties between the police and mental health recipients, and by making trained mental health professionals part of the response to EDP calls, CITs equip frontline officers with the tools they need to successfully de-escalate crisis situations, and divert distressed individuals away from a criminal justice system that is over-stretched and ill-equipped to help. Elected officials backing plans to introduce CITs in New York City include Council Member Rosie Mendez: “The creation of Crisis Intervention Teams would bring a welcome solution to an existing problem affecting mental health consumers and their interactions with police officers. All too often, we have seen NYC police officers escalate a situation where community residents and family members have called for police assistance. Ensuring referrals to mental health service providers or providing alternatives to incarceration through Crisis Intervention Teams will bring needed services to mental health consumers and result in better community/police relations.” And Council Member Jumaane Williams: “I have long advocated for improved policing. These well-trained Crisis Intervention Teams are critical to ensuring that those who may be experiencing an emotional impairment are not presumed to be a threat to an officer, and therefore risk arrest or injury. In these situations, trained officials must be at the ready to see that people get the help that they need. I am proud to support legislation that would accomplish this goal.” Steve Coe, CEO of Community Access, Inc. (www.communityaccess.org) – NYC’s leading housing, advocacy and social justice nonprofit for mental health consumers – shared why Community Access has taken a lead role in organizing the CCIT coalition and the importance of partnership and collaboration between CITs and the NYPD: “For 40 years, Community Access has built homes for thousands of New York City’s most vulnerable citizens. We want the police and community members experiencing emotional crises to have a system in place that promotes safety, security, and emotional and physical well-being. CIT models have worked well in hundreds of cities around the nation, and now is the time to bring them to New York City.” About CCIT NYC (www.ccitnyc.org)
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Contacts: cell: (917) 826-6747 John Williams cell: (646) 715-8419 SOURCE Community Access
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NY Bill Seeks Improved 911 Response to the Emotionally DisturbedEpoch Times; Jane Gray, 2/20/2014
New state legislation aims to cut down on the number of avoidable injuries and deaths of emotionally disturbed individuals after tangles with the police. Last year the NYPD reported 56 incidents involving the emotionally disturbed where people were accidentally injured or killed by police gunfire. Recent reports show that the NYPD deals with 150,000 calls regarding the emotionally disturbed each year. The Crisis Intervention Act, introduced by state Sen. Kevin Parker, supports a model of Crisis Intervention Teams (CITs) partnered with police officers to better respond to 911 calls involving the emotionally disturbed. The CIT model was first started in Memphis in 1988. Assemblyman Jeffrion Aubry is introducing the same legislation in the Assembly. “Too often those calls can result in an unnecessary arrest, emotional abuse, or worse,” Parker said. Recent incidents include the fatal shooting of Rexford Dasrath, the accidental shooting of bystander Sahar Khoshakhlagh in Times Square, the injury of Karl Anders Peltomaa who was mistaken as emotionally disturbed a day after open heart surgery, and the wrongful arrest of Peltomaa’s wife, Suzanne LeFont. The cost of the CIT training is minimal compared to the millions in damages the NYPD may potentially need to pay families of the emotionally disturbed who have sued, according to Steve Coe, CEO of Community Access, a nonprofit for mental health consumers. The CIT model has previously been rejected in New York, but he is hopeful that new Police Commissioner Bill Bratton will adopt it. “With the new administration we have a window of opportunity,” said Coe. Eugene O’Donnell, a former NYPD police officer, and now a lecturer at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, said the bill is overdue. He believes the NYPD needs more training to better deal with the emotionally disturbed. He said that the NYPD has a few specially trained units, but frequently they are unable to respond in time because there are not enough of them. He believes the police would see things differently if they had an opportunity to role-play, and to understand better what the emotionally disturbed are going through. “It allows the cops to buy time,” he said. “The more they feel knowledgeable and secure the better. The worst thing is when there is a lack of information—it can create rash and bad decisions.” “We are always one day away from a tragedy when you have armed people dealing with the mentally ill,” he said. |
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Hit by Stray NYPD Bullet, a Victim Turns to Advocacy
Epoch Times; Jane Gray, 2/14/2014
On a balmy September evening last year, two young women were headed to Times Square for a girl’s night out. They planned to see what was on at the movies.
A few seconds later, Sahar Khoshakhlagh was shot by a police bullet intended for someone else.
But for the 38-year-old Iranian-born mental health worker, what was more traumatic was that the police were shooting at an emotionally disturbed, unarmed man, who had been lurching around in the middle of the street.
“This man could possibly go to jail. That really weighed heavily on my conscience. I have to say something,” Khoshakhlagh said. “He didn’t do anything to me, and he needs help, this is a person who obviously needs help.”
Khoshakhlagh suffered a minor injury from the police bullet, a grazing of the buttocks, while another bystander was shot in the knee. The police entirely missed the man, Glenn Broadnax, 35, though he was eventually subdued with a Taser gun.
Broadnax has been charged with assault on the basis that he is responsible for Khoshakhlagh’s and another bystander’s injuries. If convicted, he could face a maximum of 25 years in prison.
He was unharmed, but police encounters have all too often ended tragically for the emotionally disturbed.
A recent case is of Rexford Dasrath, 22, who was shot and killed by police in Brooklyn last November.
The NYPD reported 56 emotionally disturbed people who were accidentally injured or killed by police gunfire in 2013. Although a record low compared to previous years—83 similar incidents were recorded in 2012—some experts feel these deaths could have easily been avoided by a few simple techniques.
A New Approach
Before lurching around in traffic near Times Square, Broadnax was talking to dead relatives in his head. At the time of the police shootings he was trying to throw himself in front of cars to kill himself, according to court documents.
When the police confronted him, he put his hands in his pockets, pulled them out, and simulated shooting at the officers, then-Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said shortly after the incident.
Professor Gary Cordoner, author of several books on policing, said for the emotionally disturbed, the typical “command and control” approach where officers surround and shout at the person, often has the opposite effect.
Across the country, a popular way to try and resolve the problem is through Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) programs, which are designed to improve how the police and the community respond to emotionally disturbed people.
CITs consist of officers who have had specialized training, and workers from hospitals and community groups. The idea was first started in Memphis in 1988 by Maj. Sam Cochran and has since been adopted in San Francisco, Chicago, and Philadelphia, to name a few.
Los Angeles adopted a CIT model in 1995. New York Police Commissioner Bill Bratton was former chief of the Los Angeles Police Department while the program was in place, but it is yet to be implemented in New York.
CIT training for police officers includes officers putting on headphones that simulate the voices in the minds of people who are emotionally disturbed.
The NYPD responds to around 90,000 calls regarding the emotionally disturbed each year, according to a 2008 report by the New York Mental Health-Criminal Justice Panel. Recent reports put that number as high as 150,000.
Mariann Wang, Khoshakhlagh’s lawyer, thinks that rather than using money to prosecute Broadnax, it would be better to use it for training.
“It just seems not the proper use of resources,” Wang said. “Why aren’t they using exactly that amount of money to figure out how to make a program for the police to deal with [the emotionally disturbed] in a better way.”
“They pulled out their guns, it’s not the way to do it,” she said.
Police said the officers who opened fire had been on the force for one and a half years and three years respectively.
Legislation
A bill, called the Crisis Intervention Act, introduced by State Sen. Kevin Parker, would mandate specially trained CITs to respond to calls involving the emotionally disturbed.
The Communities of CITs, a coalition of 50 behavioral health providers, is holding a news conference Wednesday, Feb. 19 at 11 a.m. in front of City Hall to call for the passage of the new bill.
Speakers include Parker, Suzanne LaFont, whose husband was injured by police when they thought he was emotionally disturbed, and Khoshakhlagh.
Voice for the Voiceless
Khoshakhlagh hasn’t spoken at news conferences or at advocacy groups before. But fueled by her firsthand experience of being shot, and her profession managing Brooklyn-based housing for 48 adults who are emotionally disturbed, she feels compelled to stand up for the voiceless.
“That’s part of the difference of knowing something intellectually, and then when you are experiencing it firsthand, it opens up to this other life,” she said.
As a childhood refugee from war-torn Iran, and a mental health professional, Khoshakhlagh feels it is her duty to help the police understand how to better deal with the emotionally disturbed.
When she was in school and she saw someone bullied, she used to react by stepping in.
“[Emotionally disturbed people] don’t have the kind of support system that we have. I’m drawn to that, I think that it’s not fair that some people are disadvantaged, they can be bullied in society, they can become a scapegoat in society,” she said.
“People who obviously need help, almost get sucked into the system,” she added.
Hopeful
In an open letter to Mayor de Blasio and Bratton dated Jan. 8, 2014, Khoshakhlagh asked the administration to learn from the past.
“I am writing this not only because the police shot me, but because this incident highlights a serious problem that the NYPD should make it a priority to address,” Khoshakhlagh wrote.
She also wrote: “Everything we do during a crisis matters. You cannot put out fire with more fire.”
Wang remains hopeful in the new administration after its open approach to stop and frisk.
The two women are waiting for a response to their letter before considering the possibility of a lawsuit against the NYPD.
“We haven’t made a decision, we are hoping that de Blasio would respond, I thought he would,” Khoshakhlagh said.
http://www.theepochtimes.com/n3/507677-hit-by-stray-nypd-bullet-a-victim-turns-to-advocacy/