By Joelyn Hansen
Idaho Falls Post-Register
IDAHO FALLS, Idaho — Police officers carry 15 pounds of equipment around their waists while on the job, ready to respond to a variety of situations.
But in the event officers need to deal with a mentally unstable person, what’s on their belt isn’t necessarily going to help.
That’s where the Idaho Region VII Crisis Intervention Team comes into play, task force member Kim Jardine-Dickerson said during training of eastern Idaho officers last week.
The intervention team equips law enforcement officers with methods to respond to people with serious mental illness in crisis. This reduces officer injuries, citizen deaths and community tragedy, Jardine-Dickerson said.
Eastern Idaho’s crisis team is patterned after a team that was started in Memphis, Tenn., in 1988, following a police shooting of a man with a serious mental illness.
Last week, 25 officers from the Idaho Falls Police Department and Bonneville and Madison county sheriff’s offices met for training in Idaho Falls.
Officers and first responders underwent 40 hours of training that included basic information about mental illnesses, the local mental health system, local laws and community resources.
The training included staged exercises that helped officers utilize the skills they were being taught, among them how to safely de-escalate a dangerous situation.
In one scenario, an officer was presented with a person suffering from severe depression and suicidal thoughts. The officer used his newly learned techniques to talk to the individual and figure out a way for her to get help without harming herself or others.
In another situation, the person was agitated and hearing voices.
Bonneville Sheriff’s Capt. Sam Hulse said the concept of a crisis team is appealing because situations arise where officers encounter someone who’s mentally unstable and placing the individual in jail is not the best option.
""Officers deal (almost) every day in the field with these types of situations,"" he said. ""We have to put the tools in place. If we intervene quicker, we can avoid criminal incarceration.""
Hulse said Bonneville County has anywhere from two to five calls per week that lead to officers interacting with a mentally unstable individual.
On Sunday, for example, Hulse was involved in a welfare check of a young woman who was having delusions.
""We were able to talk with her and help her see she needed to seek professional help,"" he said.
Jardine-Dickerson, a psychiatric nurse and drug and alcohol counselor in Idaho Falls, said it’s an asset to the community to have police officers who can communicate and relate to someone suffering from a mental disorder.
When an officer comes into contact with a mentally unstable person, they can assist with calming them down or getting help, which in turn limits injuries to themselves or others, she said.
Crisis team founders Randolph Dupont and K.B. Turner helped trained eastern Idaho officers last week. They said the crisis team concept works because it creates partnerships involving numerous community resources, including law enforcement, the National Alliance on Mental Illness, health care professionals and other agencies.
""It must be an overall effort between law enforcement, mental health and (mental health) advocacy groups,"" Turner said.
Copyright 2010 Idaho Falls Post-Register