Deputies training to do 'Mental Health First Aid'

July 13--Palm Beach County Sheriff's deputies, who encounter mentally ill people more than most residents, are taking classes to learn more about those individuals, with the hopes of defusing incidents before they turn violent.

More than 900 of the PBSO's 2,400 law enforcement and corrections deputies have taken a 40-hour Crisis Intervention Training course. But freeing personnel for a full week is difficult, PBSO leaders say, so groups of deputies are now being enrolled in an eight-hour crash course called Mental Health First Aid.

The course covers a range of afflictions they might encounter -- bipolar disorder, panic attacks, depression, autism, substance abuse -- and gives deputies guidelines for responding in the best way.

The accelerated training started last month. PBSO had been criticized by some activists of the Palm Beach County mental health community following the fatal shootings earlier this year of three mentally ill men who were in violent confrontations with deputies.

Chief Deputy Michael Gauger invited a Palm Beach Post reporter to participate in a recent class. At that session, Gauger said PBSO had almost 4,000 interactions with mentally ill people in the past year. He also acknowledged that law enforcement agencies nationwide have been targeted with lawsuits because they didn't take into account a mental illness when detaining a person. Gauger introduced the course this way to the deputies:

"Here is some information about words we can use when we approach people," Gauger said. "What to look for. What are the signs? Where do we take them what do we do with them? Do they go to jail or do they go to a mental health facility?"

Gauger said that going through the training did not mean that a deputy would never again be forced to kill a mentally ill attacker in order to defend his or her life. But he asked the each deputy take the course "with an open mind."

"This is another tool in your tool box so that you can respond in a different way," Gauger said.

The Mental Health First Aid course was developed in Australia and first brought to the U.S. in 2008. The instructor at the PBSO session was Pamela Cohen of the Alpert Jewish Family and Children's Service in West Palm Beach, which will provide the course to about 150 PBSO deputies this summer.

Early on, Cohen explained the scope of the problem. She said 25 percent of Americans will suffer mental health crises at some point in their lifetimes and that such episodes can be touched off by the loss of a loved one, divorce, loss of a job and other common causes.

She also told them that the overwhelming majority of their contacts with mentally ill people will come because they have been the victim of a crime, not a suspect. But she also acknowledged that some mentally ill people can turn violent.

"I'm not here to ask you to compromise officer safety," she said. "You always come first."

The first step is to determine whether a person might kill or harm himself or harm others. In the case of a person suspected of planning suicide, the issue should not be avoided, she said.

"Ask the person directly whether he or she is suicidal," she said

One of the messages delivered by Cohen repeatedly was tolerance.

"Listen non-judgmentally," she said. "Treat the person with respect and dignity. Do not blame the person for his or her symptoms."

Deputies should express concern, a willingness to help and assist the person in getting professional help. In less urgent cases, or cases where an individual refuses professional help, the deputies should be prepared to suggest self-help strategies and other support services, including those offered by religious institutions.

Among the disorders discussed was autism. Cohen told deputies about possible behaviors of autistic people, especially those who have become agitated.

"They may pace back and forth, " she said. "They might flap their arms. They don't understand danger and they may not follow commands. They may flee." She also gave the deputies certain do's and don'ts.

"They are very sensitive to touch, so be careful about touching them," she said. "Use short sentences and be aware that they need time to process information. Don't put them in with the general jail population."

Cohen fed them the best opening line to use with an autistic person in crisis, a line that was repeated many times during the day for various different forms of mental health crisis.

"I am concerned about you,'" Cohen said. "That's the best way to start a conversation."

The course also covered the topics of anxiety disorders, panic attacks and psychosis.

A person experiencing a psychotic episode -- a loss of contact with reality -- can be extremely irritated and hyper, saying the same phrases over and over. Cohen advised deputies to keep their distance from such a person and that only one deputy should speak to calm the person down. It's also a good idea to remove from the scene any person causing the irritation and to try to find a family member of caregiver who can help defuse the situation.

At end of the daylong session, PBSO veteran Capt. Marty Bechtel of Special Operations said the course was useful.

"A deputy pulls up and determines, 'This is mental illness and not a criminal matter,'" he said. "You are going to address the situation differently. This opens up our minds that there is more out there than the criminal element."

Lt. David Moss, who serves in Lake Worth, said he also found value in the course.

"As long we know the person doesn't have criminal intent, it gives us a different approach," Moss said. "We realize things aren't only black and white out there."

___

(c)2014 The Palm Beach Post (West Palm Beach, Fla.)

Visit The Palm Beach Post (West Palm Beach, Fla.) at www.palmbeachpost.com

Distributed by MCT Information Services