These families would love to have access to proper intervention much earlier. But that won’t help if a person with schizophrenia suffers from “anosognosia” – the inability to understand that they are ill and need treatment. Hopefully we can all work together to develop a workable solution to address this heartbraking issue. Working with organizations like NAMI, the National Alliance on Mental Illness can help. More info can be obtained at http://www.nami.org

In a perfect world families who have exhausted all other alternatives to help their child in psychiatric crisis would be able to make a call to an entity that would provide an immediate, helpful and compassionate response. But we do not live in a perfect world.

But in most states, when it comes to involuntary evaluations, the police may need to get involved. The police may be the only option people may have when a crisis erupts to write a request for emergency evaluation that will allow a person to be kept in a hospital up to 72 hours to determine if a committal is necessary. Even with a doctor – the doctor will often call the police.

I am not saying that the police can and should be called any time someone is in crisis. However, there are times when it is necessary for the safety of the person and those around him or her. Unfortunately – that plan can backfire. What we have found is that training families on how to communicate with the police and giving police options for appropriate and safe responses can be a win-win for everyone.

When a person is suicidal and does not want to go to the hospital and there are no other alternatives – who will you call? Too many people have died (people with mental illness, police officers, mothers and fathers) because no one wants to deal with this problem except blame each other. Its easier that trying to find a solution.

I have talked to too many families and police officers who have been traumatized and suffer greatly because of the failure of our society to address this.

The fact or the prospect of a parent or a child or a sibling or a cousin faced with a family member who is a danger to himself or to others (and I’ve been the latter three in just that situation, and I’m batting .333, which ain’t great) isn’t much improved if some well-meaning community organizer type (and I think both are really great things — I mean, who’s cheering for the ill-meaning community disorganizers, eh? Probably the same kind of folks who’ve read too many old comic books and think criminals would really call themselves The Injustice League or the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants…) has come up with a Clever Plan to Make Things Better But Hasn’t Yet Been Implemented Here.

Sorry. Gotta make the call as the situation presents itself. Mark points to one risky thing to do — dialing 911 — and I could point to the time I made another, less conventional call, that demonstrably had other risks (my cousin Joshua Smotkin didn’t get the help he needed, and he hanged himself in his St. Paul on December 7, 1997).

Police officers are NOT a bunch of bone-heads eager to use their guns and make arrests.

You keep telling yourself that. Yes, they are. Not all of them, sure, and I’d guess not many of them, except in the sense of “too many.” But some sure as shit are, and if you’ve got the magic words to say to the nice folks at 911 that will save you from getting one of those triggerhappy boneheads sent out in response to your call, would you tell the rest of the world what the hell those magic words are? And never mind the not-particularly-triggerhappy, entirely well-meaning folks who just might not have what it takes in your particular incident, although (and I can speak with a little authority on this) the ballistics of the projectiles coming from the muzzles of their service weapons are identical to those of the boneheads’.

But, hey, if you want to tell yourself that calling 911 is “the only choice,” you go ahead and do that. No skin off my nose.

[Mark: this is kind of raw; I stand by every word, but if you decide to delete it for whatever reason, we're cool, of course.]

Like police apologist David, clearly you have an agenda that makes you want to misread what I’ve written (“It isn’t about whether Aaron’s parents should have called the police”). I’ll let that pass, and try to bring you back on topic with this question:

Why should the rest of us (other than cops) who have to deal with the mentally ill not have crisis intervention training?

The major mental illnessess (major depression, bipolar disorder and schizophrenia) are neuro-biologically based brain disorders. These are not illnesses caused by dysfunctional family dynamics.

Like diabetes is a disorder of the pancreas, these major mental illnesses are diseases of the brain caused by chemical imbalances or structural changes in the brain. Unfortunately, there are not enough services to help people with mental illness in our communities. Current laws which rightfully protect the rights of people with mental illness also prohibit hospitals and doctors from providing treatment if the person has no insight into his/her disease and does not want treatment.

Families are unable to get involuntary treatment for their loved ones unless their son or daughter has gotten sick enough to be a danger to themselves or others. Contrary to popular belief, there is no sound mechanism in our laws to get a person into involuntary treatment prior to that. It can be a very long and drawn out process. (Talk to families who have tried to get help through the courts.) Because of this, families who have loved ones who, by nature of their illness do not believe they are sick and are over 18, feel terrified and helpless. They are left to wait until the person attempts suicide or threatens them. By that time, one has no choice but to call the police. At that point, it is not the “least bad choice” as Mr. Bennett puts it – it is their only choice.

Please don’t blame families for a situation over which they had no control. They are dealing with a medical emergency that often becomes a public safety issue because of our laws and lack of affordable and accessible community based services that can keep people fully engaged in their own treatment. There is very little funding earmarked to support mental health treatment in our communities.

Police officers are NOT a bunch of bone-heads eager to use their guns and make arrests. Nothing could be further from the truth. They want to help people. Police officers will use lethal force when they percieve that their lives of the lives of others are in danger – no one should fault them for that.

Thousands of police departments around the country are reaching out for intensive training in how to slow things down and communicate with people in psychiatric crisis so as not to escalate the situation. Police officers have found that crisis intervention training (CIT) actually keeps them safer. In 90 % of the cases this works and in other cases, they may still have to use lethal force – but at least they have more tools to try to prevent that when possible. Police who are CIT trained are also less likely to make an arrest, whenever appropriate- if the community mental health providers can respond quickly to get the person into treatment instead of jail.

Let’s stop blaming the families of loved ones with serious mental illness. And don’t polarize our citizens from the police when families make that desperate call for help. Instead, police, families and communities need to take a proactive stance to see how they can work together to address this issue. It works in the thousands of communities where the Crisis Intervention Team programs are in operation. It is more than just training the police – it is a community-wide approach to problem solving. It also takes strong lobbying for better services for people with chronic mental health issues so they can finally be affforded with the same options to treatment like a person with chronic diabetes or a heart condition.

It is time for all of us, the criminal justice system, public health system communities and families to work together. We all need to be part of the solution.

You must have missed the part where I said, “This is not about whether Aaron’s shooting was justified. It doesn’t matter.” And the part where I said, “It isn’t about whether Aaron’s parents should have called the police.” (Did you read my post at all?)

If the report ends up saying that even a trained mental health professional could not have handled Aaron, it’s a lie. The truth is that we’ll never know.

His doctor couldn’t do anything because he wasn’t there. So he gave advice that led to Aaron’s death. My opinion? He should consider himself responsible.

When you say “Boy”. Maybe if Officer Estrada was 17. Estrada is 23. You are right in saying non of you were there to make the call. Andrew who has military back ground says shooting an unarmed man is extreme. Should think back to his training about hand to hand combat. a person, even a combat veteran can be strangled or knocked unconscious. Speaking as a police officer you should not call 911 for mental problems.

I can guarantee you when the investigation is released to the public you will see that even a “Trained mental health professional could not have handled Aaron” What happened that day was tragic for both the Hobart family and the Estrada family.

That’s why his parents called the police because HIS doctor could not handle it.