I read with interest two opinion pieces in your July 14 issue. One, a letter to the editor by five Baltimore City ex-cops (”Ex-city cops: Baltimore needs a new protocol for handling mental health crises,” July 13), and two, the op-ed from the attorney in the Public Defender’s Office in Baltimore (”What did Baltimore cops learn from the Gun Trace Task Force? Seems like nothing,” July 13).
The veteran ex-officers make a good point of recommending having trained medical professionals handle calls-for-service that involve individuals in mental distress instead of cops. What they failed to include was that very few initial calls-for-service indicate that the person involved is a mental case (“mental case” was a common BPD term in general usage).
Many of these calls will come out as “investigate the trouble,” “disorderly man,” “disturbance,” etc. It’s only after the responding cops arrive at the scene that they can actually determine that the person involved is a mental case. Question: what do they do now? Are they supposed to back-off and request a trained medical or psych social worker? What if the person is hostile, belligerent, threatening — what now? Are the cops supposed to babysit the situation until the arrival of the intervention team? Tell that one to any BPD shift commander!
Are the trained mental health social workers available at all hours, city-wide? If and when they arrive, what if the situation is beyond a medical intervention-worst possible scenario-what if a weapon is involved? What if a family member is being physically threatened? I guess they would have to er, um, call the cops?
Say what? Are we now back to square one? These pie-in-the-sky theories sound awfully good in their virtual formulations, but I hardly think they are viable and street-level practical in the real world of police patrol response.
Next, we have the “expert” input from the Public Defender’s Office bemoaning the lack of transparency ostensibly caused by the Law Enforcement Officers’ Bill of Rights. Understand this, one of the first things a new, rookie cop learns is that no one is going to look out for him (or her), take up for them, support them when they are in trouble and yes, lie for them if necessary, than other cops. It won’t be the pols at city hall, nor the suits at BPD HQ and certainly not the street activists. The Law Enforcement Officers’ Bill of Rights was created precisely so that cops could protect themselves, because no one else was going to and when stuff hit the fan on the 6 p.m.local news, we only had this legislation to keep us from personal and career disaster.
An old friend and colleague of mine from the BPD once, in a moment of utter frustration, said: “The trouble with police work is that there are too many non-police trying to tell real police how to police non-policeable situations.”
John Fuller, Perry Hall
The writer retired from the Baltimore Police Department in 1992 after 32 years of service.
Add your voice: Respond to this piece or other Sun content by submitting your own letter.