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Mississimia t1_jdbebny wrote

>Herman Whitfield III was having a mental health crisis. While he had never received a mental health diagnosis – to his parents’ knowledge –he had experienced recent episodes where he’d become disoriented. His mother said they’d been able to calm him down.

We need to start taking mental health crises more seriously. He should've gotten help before the police needed to be called.

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BubbaTee t1_jdboysr wrote

Often, the state's response is that they can't do anything until the person poses an imminent threat to the physical safety of themselves or others.

And the gap between "poses an imminent threat" and "has committed a crime" is extremely narrow. By the time the former is recognized, the latter has often occurred. And that's what brings the police response.

There's been attempts to expand the scope of "pre-threat" intervention (eg, CA's new CARE law, Ricky's Law in WA), but they face stiff opposition by civil libertarian groups like the ACLU.

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Mississimia t1_jdbp7e8 wrote

I was thinking more that his family could've encouraged him to seek out a diagnosis, even if they'd been able to calm him down.

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FiveUpsideDown t1_jdd3uut wrote

We need to develop an approach to mentally ill people in distress that does not involved the police. All of these incidents establish that the police throughout the US are not equipped to deal with people suffering from mental illnesses.

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